Several NOTAM possible
- Sandra Häberli
- POROSNICU Eduard
- Andreea Perca (Deactivated)
- Markus Haas
Introduction
Some events may require the issuance of several NOTAM from one Digital NOTAM encoding. Typical events are:
- airspace activities in the vicinity of airports
- outages of navigation aids affecting serving several airports and/or FIR;
- establishment of ATS airspace serving more than one airport;
- obstacles in the vicinity of several airports
- etc.
The reason is primarily related to how NOTAM are currently selected for inclusion in Pre-flight Information Bulletins (PIB), based on the item A ( which may contain one airport code or up to seven FIR codes). It has to be assured that the NOTAM appear correctly in the relevant en-route and airport PIB and that duplication in PIB (e.g. in the FIR) are avoided. Depending on the number of affected airports and FIR, NOTAM item A content limitations (maximum 7 FIR or 1 airport), NOTAM series allocation or other national requirements, different options exist to assure correct PIB inclusion. The NOTAM for the en-route and airport part of the PIB may also be combined, provided NOTAM rules are respected. This is often done to reduce the number of NOTAM issued.
The most frequent practical solution is to identify one airport and its associated FIR by one NOTAM (with scope AE) and issue any additional airport NOTAM separately. When more than one FIR is affected, the typical solution is to issue one NOTAM for all the affected FIRs and one NOTAM for each affected airport/heliport. This practice is explained in the OPADD version 4.1, item 2.3.9.3.
Airport PIB is served by Q-line qualifier scope A, the airport affected is indicated in Item A. En-route PIB is served by Q-line qualifier scope E or W (depending on the event), the FIR(s) affected is indicated in Item A. In the case of NOTAM combining scope AE or AW, the FIR can be derived from the Q-line FIR or more frequently by database association of the airport indicated in Item A.
Correlation of NOTAM scope and Item A:
Scope A → Item A: 1 airport
Scope W → Item A: 1 or several FIR (max 7)
Scope E → Item A: 1 or several FIR (max 7)
Scope AW → Item A: 1 airport
Scope AE → Item A: 1 airport
For further details refer to OPADD document.
Rules for additional airport NOTAM
The Event association with airports and/or FIR allows for explicitly identifying the aerodromes and/or FIR affected by the Event Also, an Event can have several NOTAM associated.
Each "decoding" scenario that may be affected by this situation includes a section with the title "Several NOTAM possible", which provides specific rules for that scenario. Each scenario contains the detailed NOTAM generation rules for the “first NOTAM”. This section contains rules that are applied when issuing the additional airport (scope A) NOTAM:
| Q-line | FIR | Insert the designator of the overlying FIR of the airport indicated in Item A |
|---|---|---|
| Q code | Insert the Q codes as indicated in the dedicated scenario. | |
| Traffic | Pre-filled according to ICAO doc 8126 NSC for the selected Q-code | |
| Purpose | Pre-filled according to ICAO doc 8126 NSC for the selected Q-code | |
| Scope | A | |
| Lower limit | 000 | |
| Upper limit | 999 | |
| Geo reference | Insert the coordinates of the ARP (aerodrome reference point) of the airport indicated in Item A | |
| Radius | 005 | |
| Item A | Apply the general rules for item A using the AirportHeliport concerned data | |
| Item E | Insert the text as indicated in the dedicated scenarios. A pure aerodrome NOTAM (scope A) does not allow the use of items F and G. Therefore, if the "first NOTAM" has values for items F/G, these are copied at the end of item E for all the additional NOTAM with purpose A. The formatting rules are specified in each scenario concerned. | |
| Item F/G | Do not exist for scope A NOTAM | |