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AIN Blog: FAA, Thanks For Helping Us Navigate

AINONLINE

by  MATT THURBER

The free FltPlan Go app includes geo-referenced (own-ship) position display on charts and terminal procedures and is available on Apple and Android devices.

March 26, 2014 - 12:10pm

We owe the FAA a debt of gratitude for the most excellent job the agency has done to provide data to aid our flying. It is amazing that for a relatively small cost pilots have access to a wealth of navigation information. Much of it—VFR charting especially—is gorgeous, pretty enough to hang on a wall or use as wrapping paper after the expiration date.

What is even more amazing is that the FAA’sAeroNav Products Division—at least for now—sells all of this data in digital form to anyone for a paltry sum. You can download individual charts and approach plates for free, but it’s far easier to use one of the many aviation apps to view charts and terminal procedures than to manage updates and figure out how to store and view this stuff on your own.

The FAA’s munificence in making all this data available for $1,085.70 per year (for U.S.VFR, en route, terminal procedures and airport/facility directories) deserves recognition, even though the agency has said that it’s trying to figure out how to charge more. The result of low-cost data has been an explosion in development of incredibly useful smartphone and tablet apps, including creation of entirely new businesses built around those apps.