Full FAA Chronology at this link.
19350814: An amendment to the Air Mail Act of 1934 (see June 12, 1934) became law, permitting the Postmaster General to award air mail contracts for a three-year period. The amendment also authorized moderate increases in route mileage, which had been frozen at 25,000 miles in the 1934 act to prevent extension abuses.
19570814: August 14, 1957: President Eisenhower signed the Airways Modernization Act (Public Law 85-133). The act established the Airways Modernization Board charged with “the development and modernization of the national system of navigation and traffic control facilities to serve present and future needs of civil and military aviation.” The AMB was to select such systems, procedures, and devices as would promote maximum coordination of air traffic control and air defense systems. The act provided for a three-member board consisting of a chairman, appointed by the President with the advice and consent of the Senate, the Secretary of Defense, and the Secretary of Commerce. The act further provided for its own expiration on June 30, 1960. Since the AMB was an interim organization, the act also contained the following provision: “It is the sense of Congress that on or before January 15, 1959, a program of reorganization establishing an independent aviation authority, following the objectives and conclusions of the Curtis report, entitled ‘Aviation Facilities Planning,’ be submitted to the Congress.”
The Senate confirmed the appointment of Elwood R. Quesada as chairman on August 16. In the following month, Malcolm A. MacIntyre, Under Secretary of the Air Force, and Louis S. Rothschild, Under Secretary of Commerce for Transportation, were designated respectively by the Secretaries of Defense and Commerce to act in their stead as members of the Board. (See April 11, 1957, and November 1, 1958.)
19740814: The Operations Committee of the Air Transport Association (ATA) decided that, effective September 1, its member airlines would withdraw from the familiarization flight (SF 160) program under which an air traffic controller could make up to eight free flights per year as a cockpit observer. Members of the Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization reacted by conducting work slowdowns that continued until ATA reversed its decision on October 16. (See May 7, 1975.)
19970814: The Eighth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in St. Louis dismissed a standing protest by Wilcox Electric against FAA for having awarded the then-$500 million Wide Area Augmentation System (WAAS) contract to Hughes. FAA had terminated the Wilcox contract on April 26, 1996, claiming Wilcox, the original prime contractor, had failed to live up to provisions of the contract. FAA subsequently awarded Hughes Aircraft a sole-source award for WAAS development. (See March 29, 1996; September 23, 1997.)
20010814: Representative John Mica (R-FL), chairman of the House aviation subcommittee, criticized FAA for delaying deployment of the airport movement area safety system (AMASS). Mica said the program was six years behind schedule. (See May 29, 2001.)
20090814: FAA convened a New York Airspace Working Group to review current operating procedures over the Hudson and East Rivers and recommend safety improvements within two weeks. August 28, the working group made a number of recommendations to FAA. One of the most significant recommendations suggested dividing the airspace into altitude corridors that separated aircraft flying over the river from those operating to and from local heliports or seaplane bases. This new exclusionary zone would be comprised of three components
* It would establish a uniform “floor” for the Class B airspace over the Hudson River at 1,300 feet, which would also serve as the “ceiling” for the exclusionary zone.
* Between 1,300-2,000 feet, it would require aircraft to operate in the Class B airspace under visual flight rules under positive air traffic control, and to communicate on the appropriate air traffic frequency.
* Between 1,000-1,300 feet, it would require aircraft using VFR to use a common radio frequency for the Hudson River. Aircraft operating below 1,000 feet would use the same radio frequency.
In addition, new pilot operating practices would require pilots to use specific radio frequencies for the Hudson River and the East River, would set speeds at 140 knots or less, and would require pilots to turn on anti-collision devices, position or navigation equipment and landing lights. Existing common practices that took pilots along the west shore of the river when they were southbound and along the east shore when they were northbound would become mandatory. In addition, pilots would be required to have charts available and to be familiar with the airspace rules. September 2, 2009, FAA announced it would modify the airspace over the Hudson River by revising procedures to create safe, dedicated operating corridors for all the aircraft that fly at lower altitudes around Manhattan. It also would propose standardized procedures for fixed-wing aircraft leaving Teterboro to enter the Class B airspace over the Hudson River or the exclusionary zone. (See August 8, 2009; November 16, 2009.)
20130814: UPS Flight 1354, an A300 cargo plane en route from Louisville, KY, to Birmingham, AL, crashed approximately 1/2-mile north of runway 18 on approach to Birmingham Shuttlesworth International Airport at about 6 am EDT, killing both pilots onboard.
20130814: NASA Administrator Charles Bolden unveiled a new strategic vision for the agency’s Aeronautics Research Mission Directorate to align program activities and investments toward progress in six research and technology areas (see May 9, 2013; August 22, 2013)
* Safe, efficient growth in global operations, including NextGen and technologies to improve safety;
* Innovation in commercial supersonic aircraft, including work on lowering sonic boom impacts (See March 30 2020.);
* Ultra-efficient commercial transports, including pioneering technologies for big leaps in efficiency and lessening environmental impacts;
* Transition to low-carbon propulsion and alternative fuels (See June 10, 2013; September 13, 2013.);
* Real-time, system-wide safety assurance, with emphasis on new integrated monitoring technology; and
* Breakthroughs in autonomy with high-impact applications.
20190814: The Kansas Department of Transportation (KDOT) announced it had received permission to conduct the first ever BVLOS drone operation in the nation leveraging only onboard detect-and-avoid systems. This was the first FAA authorized operation to fly without a requirement for visual observers or ground-based radar and was the result of the 31-member Kansas Unmanned Aircraft Systems Integration Pilot Program (IPP) team effort to advance drone technologies. In a collaborative effort between Kansas State University Polytechnic Campus (K-State Polytechnic), Westar Energy, Iris Automation, and KDOT, the Kansas IPP team flew a nine-mile track to evaluate technologies to inspect power lines in rural Kansas. (See July 31, 2019; November 21, 2019.)
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This Day in FAA History: August 14th
