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NOTAM Confusion

Asked by: 4604 views ,
FAA Regulations, General Aviation

I was reading up on NOTAM decoding and I came across this page,  https://www.faasafety.gov/files/gslac/courses/content/43/595/Decoding%20the%20D%20NOTAM.pdf It is a document from the FAA which describes how to decode a NOTAM (D). Specifically, it refers to the following NOTAM:

!MIV MIV RWY 10/28 CLSD WEF 0707011200- 0802011200-0802051600
There is nothing in the document, which I can see, that tells me the the first set of numbers is for,  0707011200.  I know the last two numbers are the WEF numbers, but what is the first number?  I assume that it may be the time the NOTAM was issues, but this is not explained in the document.  It seems to be an oversight.
   

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2 Answers



  1. Kris Kortokrax on May 01, 2015

    I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again.

    Information contained in NOTAMs relates to safety. As such, the information should be presented in a clear, easily understandable fashion. Pilots should not need a secret decoder ring to figure out what a NOTAM means. In the olden days when teletype machines were used, this may have been needed, but in this day and age of high speed internet, there is no place for coded information and the obvious confusion it creates.

    This information is important and there should be no question about the content.

    As to your question, the number 0707011200 is a date. It is connected to the other two dates by a hyphen. Its significance is unclear and this is the big problem with the NOTAM system.

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  2. Skyfox on Jan 21, 2016

    I’ve been looking through hundreds of NOTAMs and have been unable to find any with three time blocks like what you show from that NOTAM decoding sheet so I could run it through the Duats plain language decoder. The closest I’ve found is, “…OBSERVED AT 1601211307. 1601211307-1601221307,” which clearly shows the distinction between the observed time and the range of time the matter will be in effect. My best guess is that whoever was editing that informational sheet was trying to change the time it listed, mistakenly left the first half of the previous time block, and didn’t notice the typo before publication. If you should ever find a NOTAM that shows three time blocks like what you’re trying to figure out, definitely run it through the translator on Duats, or alternatively call up flight service and see if they can tell you what it means.

    On a side note, it seems the abbreviation “WEF” (when in effect) might be no longer used. When I searched NOTAMs on a fictional flight from JFK to LAX, which covers a lot of land, nowhere on the page did the word WEF appear.

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