ASCI 202

  Two air traffic control entities that I want to tell you about is the Anchorage oceanic air traffic control center (ARTCC) and the clearance delivery system. Both are very similar and yet very different in many ways.             An ARTCC is one of the FAA’s largest components of the United States national airspace system. Operating seven days a week twenty-four hours a day year-round, they are also one of the most utilized services. The ARTCC is a FAA service responsible for the safe and efficient operation of aircraft 10,000’ feet or higher (F.A.A., n.d.). Utilizing surveillance data from radar sites to issue clearances, provide weather information, and traffic information ATCC’s across America are responsible for more than 100,000 flights each day (F.A.A., n.d.). Specifically, the Anchorage oceanic ARTCC is also for three sections of airspace, Anchorage domestic FIR, Anchorage oceanic FIR, and Anchorage artic FIR for a to...

Air Pollution An environmental issue that affects everyone including airport managers is air pollution. Up to this point in human history society has been in a race for innovation and industry, now society is at a point in determining the safest way to sustain our achievements. This directly affects airport managers as society becomes more conscious of air pollution and how to manage the problem by asking lower emissions from aviation operations.             Air pollution is defined by the National Resource Defense Council (NRDC) as the release of pollutants into the air that are detrimental to human health and the planet as a whole. (NRDC, 2021). Air pollution is therefore an unfortunate byproduct of burning fossil fuels like jet fuel, as fuel is combusted gases like carbon dioxide are released into the air attributing to the total rise of the earths temperature (NRDC, 2021).         ...

  Legislation I believe that was critical in shaping the aviation industry is the Airport and Airway Development act of 1970. This legislation was put in place to provide grants for airport planning, supervised by the planning grant program (FAA, 2021). The overall goal of this legislation is promoting development of a system of airports and airways to meet the U.S. needs (FAA, 2021). The program was funded from several aviation user taxes on items such as fares air freight, and fuel (FAA, 2021). While the ability to issue grants under this program is now passed as of September 1981, this legislation allowed for 8809 grants approval totaling 4.5 billion in support (FAA, 2021).                                                                            ...

  Human factors of aviation in my opinion relates to the mental and physical aspects of human nature. Certain conditions of human factors from the Pilots handbook of aeronautical knowledge (PHAK) I believe are important to note are complacency and stress (2018). According to the PHAK stress can be a benefit to preventing complacency, but if not coped with appropriately stress can build to become an intolerable burden (FAA, 2018). A team challenge that often faces the problems of human factors is flight operations. Behind any successful flight involving the transportation of people or goods is a hard-working operations department. For example, with my company for an international flight to be a success normally four days of work are required before a flight even takes place. If operations aren’t able to complete their jobs, then the results can be costly resulting in delays, cancellations, or a loss of trust and access to certain airfields.         ...

As the world drives further into a technology-embraced future, it is safe to assume that the rise of cyber threats would also increase as well. This is evident in the figure below reported from aviation today (2021). According to aviation today, most of these cyber-attacks were financially motivated, with the loss of personal data accounting for 34% of the cases (2021). This presents a severe issue to security in the aviation community today. The compounding effect of this issue is that almost every actor in the aviation community depends on technology, from the passenger to the supply chain, to the airport itself. If awareness of the threat and a plan are not in place, the results can be devastating. In conjunction with other agencies, the transportation security agency (TSA) is working diligently to thwart these threats. In 2018 the TSA launched a cybersecurity roadmap assessing how to deal with cyber security threats (TSA, 2018). Using the layers of security model the TSA al...

 Cabin Pressurization System Planes may love to go high, but the human body does not. Our bodies need oxygen, and while in flight many planes are equipped with a cabin pressurization system to meet that need. As aircraft travel higher in altitude the air becomes less dense (FAA, 2016). This decrease in density results in less oxygen available, and can lead to hypoxic effects like confusion, inability to concentrate, and unconsciousness (Skybrary, 2019). To prevent this situation, aircraft that operate frequently above 10,000’ utilize a cabin pressurization system.             One of my favorite Instructor Pilots always said, when it comes to cabin pressurization “we mindlessly flood the cabin, and brilliantly meter the rest”. On a Beechcraft King Air 200, the cabin vessel is a sealed system with bleed air routed from the last stage of the compressor (CAE, 2017).   Bleed Air Valve  (Photo Credit CAE 2017)  ...