Who gets to name fixes?

Jim K

Jim K

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Some instrument fix names are obvious, like NEWMY directly over the town of Newman, or LODGE over....Lodge.

Others certainly appear to be the product of Terps Elves having fun.

The one that made me wonder is our RNAV 14L here at CMI. RRRED, GRANJ, ORANJ, & BLLUE all make perfect sense to fans and alumni of the university of Illinois, but I wouldn't necessarily expect a random terpster to come up with them.

Is there local input on fix names, or did we just get lucky enough to have an alumnus name them? Perhaps they do some local research to come up with the names?
 
The LAAYK intersection above KAVP used to be the LHY (Lake Henry) VOR. (Just learned that today from the DPE)

V312 has fixes JIMEE and FALON.

LEBRN is the Final Fix on the CHARDON Arrival into Cleveland.

Orlando has a bunch of Disney and Universal Studios related fixes: you can find HKUNA, MTATA, and RFIKI (the Lion King References) on the PGLET Arrival, JAZMN and JAFAR (Alladin), TTIGR Arrival, MICKX (Mickey), MINEE, POPYE, TWETY, BURRD, GRNCH, DAFIE (Daffy Duck), BUGGZ, BUNIE, TINKR (Tinker Bell), EARRS (Mickey Ears), and TRAMP (Lady and the Tramp).

Here's an article addressing your question (and giving a LOT more illustrations like listed above)

If you want to have some fun, put in 5 letters that are close to your last name. I'd have to fly Y578 off shore from Nantucket to find mine.
 
I dunno but this arrival is HILARIOUS! It’s a fart! Flew it a hundred times before I just noticed one day!
 

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Mostly, it's just near-random selection. Some people may put more effort than others into finding ones that are sort of pronounceable, but if you're doing a few new approaches at an airport, and need 15 or 20 fix names, sometimes you just take what comes out of the list next.

When you see the "special" names, that's because those names were sitting there reserved by the ARTCC for potential future use. Somebody at the center combed through the list of available names and reserved them in the system.
 
Tools said:
I dunno but this arrival is HILARIOUS! It’s a fart! Flew it a hundred times before I just noticed one day!
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I haven't seen that one, that's pretty good.

My favorite in the NAS: RNAV 33 @ LOU
Screenshot_20211231-053753_Pilot.jpg

Louisville actually has a bunch of good ones, which I guess means someone at ZID has a sense of humor.
 
MMU in jersey

42808fc8569a1b5e4cc6685962840f8a.jpg
 
A lot of fix names are holdovers from the days when intersection names didn't have to be unique, and weren't limited to five letters or even one word. Here's where some of the names in the Los Angeles area came from:

HENER = HENDERSON (Henderson was an airstrip near Ojai, closed in the 1970s)
GINNA = VIRGINIA
TWINE = TWIN LAKES
CHATY = CHATSWORTH
MERMA = MERMAID
EXERT = EEL
DOYLE = DOLPHIN
TANDY = TUNA
INISH = KINGFISH
LIMBO = LING
ALBAS = ALBACORE
STABO = STADIUM
SADDE = SADDLE
BAYST = BAY
LAHAB = LA HABRA
AMTRA = ALHAMBRA

L.A.jpg
(not for use in navigation :p)
 
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Jim K said:
Some instrument fix names are obvious, like NEWMY directly over the town of Newman, or LODGE over....Lodge.

Others certainly appear to be the product of Terps Elves having fun.

The one that made me wonder is our RNAV 14L here at CMI. RRRED, GRANJ, ORANJ, & BLLUE all make perfect sense to fans and alumni of the university of Illinois, but I wouldn't necessarily expect a random terpster to come up with them.

Is there local input on fix names, or did we just get lucky enough to have an alumnus name them? Perhaps they do some local research to come up with the names?
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Here's one. PEGRS. That was named by the procedures guy at Los Angeles Center for his wife Peggy. Can't remember which ones they were but I knew a guy who named a few for his children Years ago a new fix was needed near Santa Monica. Charles Schultz lived very near it. Someone wanted to name it like SNUPY or LUUCY or some other Peanuts character. The powers to be said no. This naming of fixes after people, famous or not is getting out of hand. Someone responded, So we can't name a Fix for Charles Schultz but there's a VORTAC named for a Whorehouse. Mustang FMG.
Another Fix story. Years ago I worked at Santa Barbara KSBA. It was a Non Radar Approach Control then. We'd get airplanes from the Center and Mugu Approach with a Clearance Limit of KWANG. We'd clear them beyond on initial contact, usually HALIBUT by saying ' cleared to halibut via kwang, goleta and lobster. When the all fixes must be 5 letter names thang started we submitted a request for the new namings. Halibut became habut, kwang(already a 5 letter) we wanted to be HAUPP, Goleta to become SKIPP and Lobster to become JUMPP. We could say 'cleared to habut via hop, skip and jump. Yeah, those guys at the region had no sense of humor. Kwang stayed the same, Goleta became GOLET and Lobster became LOBER.
 
One day, the FAA was flight checking a GPS approach and reported a fix inbound. The usual screwy combination of vowels consonants. Someone (not saying who) keyed the mike and said "Now you guys are naming these after your kids."
 
luvflyin said:
Years ago I worked at Santa Barbara KSBA. It was a Non Radar Approach Control then. We'd get airplanes from the Center and Mugu Approach with a Clearance Limit of KWANG. We'd clear them beyond on initial contact, usually HALIBUT by saying ' cleared to halibut via kwang, goleta and lobster. When the all fixes must be 5 letter names thang started we submitted a request for the new namings. Halibut became habut, kwang(already a 5 letter) we wanted to be HAUPP, Goleta to become SKIPP and Lobster to become JUMPP. We could say 'cleared to habut via hop, skip and jump. Yeah, those guys at the region had no sense of humor. Kwang stayed the same, Goleta became GOLET and Lobster became LOBER.
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Wasn't KWANG the old CHANNEL intersection? I flew that GOLETA-LOBSTER transition many times in 1970 when I was based at OXR and commuting to SBA in my dad's C-150E for CFI training. CHANNEL was the IAF (see the chart in my post #11 above).
 
Local airport has the fixes named after a succession of airport owners. Beulah (BYULA) Jack (JAAK), Gil (GILBT). The creation of the approach involves other input from airport management so they are already in communication with the FAA and the approach designer. As long as the name is apolitical, not obscene and unique the FAA doesn't care much.
 
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On the Portland (Oregon) ILS 10L you pass BUXOM (not far from a nude beach), then for the NBA fans there's TRAYL and BLAZR. On the 28L approach is HPSTR -- a remnant of the more innocent days of "Keep Portland Weird" -- and HANAH, named for the Portland-based Dick Hannah car dealership chain. On the 28R approach is OMMSI, a nod to the popular Oregon Museum of Science & Industry.
 
For the marijuana fans there is GANJA on a few DFW area STARS from the west.
 
Dresr... and it has a hard altitude of 14,000....

So it’s “crossdresser at 14000”... always cracked me up.
 
The fix for holding on the missed approach into Monterey, CA was several miles offshore over the ocean and had the appropriate name: SHARK.

I was sad when they changed it to SHOEY. Ruined a good joke!
 
Pilawt said:
Wasn't KWANG the old CHANNEL intersection? I flew that GOLETA-LOBSTER transition many times in 1970 when I was based at OXR and commuting to SBA in my dad's C-150E for CFI training. CHANNEL was the IAF (see the chart in my post #11 above).
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Check the DME from FIM. 32 vs 39.

Another good one out in the Banning Pass. MORONGO (Indian Tribe) became MORON.
 
ILS RWY 01 @ DCA has an IF that is phonetically our last name, fun to hear Potomac clear people direct.

M'lady has reportedly read back, "cleared direct ME!, KATRN" at least once.
 
The FAFs to KLAX 24R and 25L have been renamed KOBEE and GIGII in memory of Kobe Bryant and his daughter, Gigi. KOBEE is almost over the old LA Forum where the Lakers used to play.

There's UPDOC which is over the Warner Bros. studios in Burbank.

SBONO, CLOWD and UBABE are near Palm Springs where Sonny Bono was Mayor.

And of course POA's aterpster has his own fix (WALLY) as the FAF on the RNAV(GPS)-B to KEMT.
 
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IK04 said:
The fix for holding on the missed approach into Monterey, CA was several miles offshore over the ocean and had the appropriate name: SHARK.

I was sad when they changed it to SHOEY. Ruined a good joke!
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Oh if only it had been BAITT and SHARK was a Fix along the way to it
 
Pilawt said:
On the Portland (Oregon) ILS 10L you pass BUXOM (not far from a nude beach), then for the NBA fans there's TRAYL and BLAZR. On the 28L approach is HPSTR -- a remnant of the more innocent days of "Keep Portland Weird" -- and HANAH, named for the Portland-based Dick Hannah car dealership chain. On the 28R approach is OMMSI, a nod to the popular Oregon Museum of Science & Industry.
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The three fixes leading up to BUXOM are MYCRO, BBREW and PUBBB. On the other side is HHOPZ and WIDMR for Widmer Bros Brewing. Portland is the Brew Pub Capitol of the World.
 
Htaylor said:
The FAFs to KLAX 24R and 25L have been renamed KOBEE and GIGII in memory of Kobe Bryant and his daughter, Gigi. KOBEE is almost over the old LA Forum where the Lakers used to play.

There's UPDOC which is over the Warner Bros. studios in Burbank.

SBONO, CLOWD and UBABE are near Palm Springs where Sonny Bono was Mayor.

And of course POA's aterpster has his own fix (WALLY) as the FAF on the RNAV(GPS)-B to KEMT.
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And, in the Bishop area:

WALLE is the RNP AR 30 FAF.

JAAKE is the RNAV 12 FAF. Jake was my maternal grandfather who built a cabin in the area before I was born. I spent some great times at that cabin.

RBRTS is on V230 and one of the IAFs for the RNAV 12.

I received these Bishop area fixes because of my work with an FAA/Industry committee that finalized RNP AR. We each got to pick a terrain-challenged airport for the launch of RNP AR. I picked Bishop. The FAA TERPs rep on the committee and I were (and are) good friends.

I got WALLY at KEMT in the 1970s because I made a deal with the TERPs guru in the Western Pacific Regional Office (IAPs were designed in the regions in those days). I made a bet with him that I could get a VOR/DME IAP to fit from the west, yet avoid the LAX Class B. I won the bet so he found WALLY reserved in the Eastern Region. He made a swap.
 
San Jose (KSJC) used to have the JAWWS THREE arrival, with waypoints GOALLI, JAWWS, SHRRK. Hockey fans got it.
 
If they ever let me design the RNAV 36 into my airport (which they won't) maybe we should go with these three: IMMAA, GONAA, LLAND. I don't see any of those charted currently.
 
A fairly recent arrival update to Las Vegas is the Choww1 arrival in honor of the movie The Hangover; most of the character names are referenced.

Another of my subtle favorites is on Q438 over Lake Erie; FARGN and ICHOL. Whoever named those was a fan of the 1984 movie Johnny Dangerously…
 
Actually, too bad CATER and PILAR are already taken. DOZER is too. Man, we could make a cool Peoria approach.
 
jbDC9 said:
A fairly recent arrival update to Las Vegas is the Choww1 arrival in honor of the movie The Hangover; most of the character names are referenced.

Another of my subtle favorites is on Q438 over Lake Erie; FARGN and ICHOL. Whoever named those was a fan of the 1984 movie Johnny Dangerously…
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Good one. I think that's my new favorite to.
 
I remember reading about one person in Kansas City who was responsible for naming all the fixes. I dug in my archives and can’t find her name. I’m sure it’s been long enough she has long retired, but that faa facility likely still has that function.

Another favorite is the greatful dead “Truckn Two” departure out of SFO.
https://www.airnav.com/depart?http://aeronav.faa.gov/d-tpp/2113/00375TRUKN.PDF
 
RussR said:
Mostly, it's just near-random selection. Some people may put more effort than others into finding ones that are sort of pronounceable, but if you're doing a few new approaches at an airport, and need 15 or 20 fix names, sometimes you just take what comes out of the list next.

When you see the "special" names, that's because those names were sitting there reserved by the ARTCC for potential future use. Somebody at the center combed through the list of available names and reserved them in the system.
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Dude. Yer like in the inner circle. Come up with something for us. Like PPOAA THRED LOKED
 
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