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By Daniel Baxter |
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November 15, 2010 - Federal Aviation Administration
(FAA) accepted the second and final report on the
November 2009 telecommunications outage prepared by an
independent review panel assigned to investigate the
incident.
FAA Administrator Randy Babbitt had asked the panel to
examine the cause of the FAA Telecommunications
Infrastructure (FTI) outage and to recommend strategies
to reduce the potential for similar future outages. He
also asked the panel to examine the FTI's present and
future architecture as it relates to emerging technology
and future FAA systems. The FTI system operates 24 hours a day seven days a week and provides communication support for the National Airspace System. Harris Corporation operates and maintains the FTI for the FAA. |
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Last April
the FAA began carrying out the panel's initial recommendations
which included; developing new automated tools for making
configuration changes to network devices, increasing FTI
workforce staffing during network maintenance.
In addition developing an alternate means for the entry
of flight plan information to limit the impact of
telecommunications network failures on the flight plan entry
system, creating two network enterprise management centers which
give the FAA greater situational awareness of network activity
and maintenance and installing additional cybersecurity measures
throughout the National Airspace System.
The final
report on the FTI outage lays out 14 long-term strategic
recommendations the FAA should pursue as it transitions to
future network systems. The FAA has already begun evaluating and
working through the recommendations which revolve around five
areas. On the morning of Nov. 19, 2009 the FTI experienced an outage that resulted in system-wide delays. During the four-hour event, air traffic controllers managed flight plan data manually and safely according to FAA contingency plans. Air traffic control radar and communication were not affected during that time and critical safety systems remained up and running. |