Late TFR notifications from FAASTeam emails

P

poadeleted20

Deleted
Joined
Apr 8, 2005
Messages
31,250
From the FAA on this issue (edited):
As you may have noticed, we have been having significant problems with the FAASafety.gov email server. Some emails have not been sent, some have been sent after a seminar is over, and some have been sent too late to be of any value, while some have been sent okay; very confusing! This is true of Notices as well as SPANS event notifications. This has proved to be a problem with no easy solution. In fact, the contractor worked over the weekend without finding a solution.

The problem is that emails are being queued properly, but are not being
sent in a timely manner. A frustrating problem! For example, we still have
a backlog of 1.2 million emails in the email queue.

Here is what we have done today to address this issue:

1. Effective [Monday, 10/26] at 1400 EDT, we turned off the email server
2. We moved all emails in that large queue to a holding tank, so to speak
3. This emptied the email server queue so that only new, current and
correct emails would be sent.
4. Then we turned the email server back on.
5. The problem is still not solved! This is just a band aid fix!
6. I will review the current queue to ensure that it does indeed contain
valid and timely emails.
7. We will review the holding tank for emails that are still valid and can
be sent; we will attempt to move those into the email queue. Because of its size, this may not happen in a timely manner.

What this means is that some valid emails may not be sent on time or even at all! Please review upcoming seminars for the next two weeks for impact. Emails that were scheduled to be sent for events October 25th or later need to be reviewed. Nationwide, there are 75 events scheduled for October 25th through October 31st. And there are 55 events scheduled between November 1st and November 8th. This is a total of 130 events that may not have had emails sent!

We have every reason to believe that events scheduled after November 8th will be emailed properly.

[snip]

Please be assured we are treating this with the highest priority!

Thanks,
Bryan Neville
FAA Safety Team
National Outreach Manager
Click to expand...
In addition, I've been told by my FAASTeam Program Manager to remind pilots to remember that the email notification of TFRs is still a courtesy and not required by any policy. Pilots are still responsible to get the TFRs by briefing from a qualified source (like DUATS or FSS) prior to flight. Just like relying on other unofficial sources like AOPA's TFR pages, I've been told that if someone tries to use this problem as a defense in a violation, the email notifications will probably just go away and we will lose another resource.

Fly safe,
Ron
 
Last edited:
Ron Levy said:
From the FAA on this issue (edited):

In addition, I've been told by my FAASTeam Program Manager to remind pilots to remember that the email notification of TFRs is still a courtesy and not required by any policy. Pilots are still responsible to get the TFRs by briefing from a qualified source (like DUATS or FSS) prior to flight. Just like relying on other unofficial sources like AOPA's TFR pages, I've been told that if someone tries to use this problem as a defense in a violation, the email notifications will probably just go away and we will lose another resource.

Fly safe,
Ron
Click to expand...

Absolutely correct. Personally, I think they should stop sending the TFR E-mails altogether. It's up to the pilot to get the information. The E-mails (there are a lot of them) are a waste of someone's time.
 
steingar said:
Absolutely correct. Personally, I think they should stop sending the TFR E-mails altogether. It's up to the pilot to get the information. The E-mails (there are a lot of them) are a waste of someone's time.
Click to expand...

I wholeheartedly DISagree. If you said they should stop the VIP TFRs, then I would have agreed!
 
Email is not a reliable method of timely delivery of information that some believe is critical. Whether or not we receive an email about a TFR are we not still required to get the up-to-date information prior to our flying?
 
Bob Noel said:
Email is not a reliable method of timely delivery of information that some believe is critical. Whether or not we receive an email about a TFR are we not still required to get the up-to-date information prior to our flying?
Click to expand...

Yes, we are. However, having a push notification ahead of time can make planning a lot easier.
 
Grant's point is well-taken. Sometimes, the early email notification provides the lead time needed to move our plane out of where the TFR will be the day we want to fly, or to make alternate plans because we won't be able to go to our planned destination. In that regard, I consider it a welcome courtesy, and hope it continues in a timely manner.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top