FAA Poised to Take on Role as Traffic Cop for Space | Hacker News Reader

FAA Poised to Take on Role as Traffic Cop for Space

wsj.com

50 pointsjackgavigan34 comments

Seems a little funny that the FCC isn't being discussed more seriously. Although it's not a totally intuitive fit on the surface, it makes a little more sense once you consider that U.S. satellite launches already require FCC licenses, and one of the things you have to include in the application is your plan to mitigate the threat of orbital debris.

Wouldn't NASA be the natural choice for this, especially given their history of working with the military?

The FAA is a well-established regulatory agency that already manages significant portions of spaceflight (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Office_of_Commercial_Space_Tra...) and also has a long history working with the military.

NASA should be in the exploration business, not the regulatory one.

To the first part, I didn't know that, thanks for the link. To the second, good point.

The line isn't that clearly drawn. NASA runs the Aviation Safety Reporting System, for example [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aviation_Safety_Reporting_Syst...].

Though it does make more sense for NASA to build the systems and then hand them off to regulators to operate and iterate

ASRS is NASA ran for a specific reason: To keep a clear line between safety and enforcement. For ASRS to function effectively, pilots have to be able to report incidents without fear of FAA enforcement. In fact, by regulation, a pilot can use the "immunity" rule once every 5 years to avoid a FAA violation.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aviation_Safety_Reporting_Syst...

The first A in NASA is "Aeronautics". They've run many experimental aviation programs and are doing a good job running the ASRS.

But that's part of a deliberate attempt to avoid the possibility of information in the ASRS database being used for punitive regulatory actions.

Huh, I always thought it was North American Space Agency. Well fancy that.

Why exactly is the FAA taking this over?

It's clearly stated that the US military is still going to be the primary source for the data.

Why not have an open RFP that anyone is able to provide a proposal and if the a existing agency doesn't win, make it independently run?

The article explains that the DoD doesn't want the job, and that having tracking run by the military makes multinational cooperation more difficult.

How would an RFP work? How are agencies like FAA or NASA or the US Forest Service supposed to bid on this if they don't know they'll have the budget for it?

Military would be required to provide a scope of work, privately state what their budget is, and it would be open to anyone that meets the stated requirement.

Congress would review the proposals and select the winner and provide the budget needed.

Honestly at this point, strongly feel there needs to be a agency explicitly responsible for commercializing space - and neither FAA or NASA have a track record of doing this.

Because providing collision avoidance and other warnings to civilian satellites is not a core activity of the military.

Logically, NORAD Air Defense Sector controllers have the radar data to provide traffic advisories to civilian airliners flying outside FAA radar coverage, but they rarely do so. If an unknown aircraft is detected above 18,000ft (i.e possible collision hazard to airline traffic) without a transponder and within the US Air Defense Identification Zone, ADS controllers may attempt contact on emergency guard frequency 121.5, which is commonly monitored by airliners. There are also USAF/USN controllers responsible for specific sectors that may attempt contact. ADS would likely scramble jet fighters too.

It may be that they envision a regulatory component to these responsibilities which, for both legal and practical reasons, might make it a good idea to move them to a regulatory agency instead of a branch of the military.

I was just as confused by the title of the article as some others on this comment thread, so here is a TLDR explaining the intent:

Commercial satellites (i.e. their operators) need warnings to move out of the way when space debris approach them. This service used to be provided by the Pentagon, who have now handed it over to the FAA for multiple reasons, including for this very relevant reason quoted from the article:

“It will be a lot easier for the United States to have conversations about safety with the rest of the world,” according to Mr. Nield, without having the Department of Defense in the middle of those discussions.

Anyone interested in this should check out the International Institute of Space Law's Moot Court http://www.iislweb.org/lachsmoot/index.html

The same FAA that has been unable to modernize the air traffic control system since, what, the 70s?

What needs to be modernized?

ATC.

https://www.oig.dot.gov/sites/default/files/WEB_ATC_Mod_4-14...

Basically, FAA's nextgen project has been some big dig level crap (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Dig for those not familiar)

They've been trying to figure this out for almost 3 decades (though publicly, the current incarnation only started to have a joint planning office in 2003, and so they try to pretend that's when they started).

They currently don't expect to finish until 2030. AFAIK it'll have been ~50 years for a technology modernization project.

(I actually don't know all the details, so if someone wants to come along and say "it's not that bad", great!)

DEFCON 20: Hacker + Airplanes = No Good Can Come Of This https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CXv1j3GbgLk

Good watch if you wanna see how naively designed the whole thing is.

That same FAA has dramatically reduced airline crash fatalities since the 1970s, despite massive increases in number of passenger-miles flown.

Does the FAA get credit for that? (and why not, say, the european version of these agencies, etc)

Mid-air collisions involving airliners are extremely rare. As I recall, its been decades since an airliner had a mid-air within the US.

This is largely due to the improvements in Secondary Radar [0], Transponders[1] and TCAS[2]

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secondary_surveillance_radar

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transponder_(aviation)

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traffic_collision_avoidance_sy...

Mid-air collisions involving airliners are rare because of the FAA and ATC. Also, mid-air collisions are not and have never been the greatest contributor to airline passenger deaths (or aviations deaths in general.) And on that count, the FAA has also been a major contributor to safety, since the regulations regarding pilot and aircraft certification, as well as operational regulations (and enforcement) are really what makes airline travel safe.

Incidentally, the biggest aviation accident in history (Tenerife) still can be felt today in how the FAA trains ATC personnel and how they choose the language that is authorized for use by ATC.

Air Traffic Controllers are highly skilled professionals, although at least 3 mid-air collisions [0][1][2] involving airliners have been a direct result of limitations in the radar technology. Newer technology like SSR gives the controllers better tools to use their skills.

Practically every pilot has heard of the Tenerife disaster, and is commonly discussed in flight schools. A lot of safety changes in aviation can be tied back to previous mishaps. In Naval Aviation, the flight standards program is known as NATOPS [3] (Naval Air Training and Operating Procedures Standardization), and the phrase "The NATOPS has been written in blood" is largely because it dramatically reduced the mishap rate, and changes are often as a direct result of previous mishaps.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hughes_Airwest_Flight_706

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1996_Charkhi_Dadri_mid-air_col...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1986_Cerritos_mid-air_collisio...

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NATOPS#History.2Fraison_d.27.C...

The FAA, and the ATC are examples of the government doing their job of managing the commons extremely, extremely well.

I've gotten (luckily) to fly on some not-tiny airplanes in my life, and gotten to sit with the pilot for the flights. Every single time, I leave impressed at the efficiency of the ATC moving all of these things around cities, in and out of airports, etc.

I'm a private pilot as of 1 year this month, having only 250 hours. Of those hours many of which are spent traveling "cross country" out of Tampa Airspace into New Orleans, Miami and Orlando areas... arguably some pretty busy airspace.

I'm constantly shocked by not only how well traffic controllers do their job, but how serious they seem to take and how courteous and helpful 99% of the controllers are, both in regional approach/departure TRACON and large center control such as Miami, Jacksonville, Atlanta or Houston.

The majority of the goals of what they are trying to do with "NexGen"[1] is primarily moving all aircraft to more effecient GPS routes, which are for the most part already in place and getting airplanes to talk to each-other 2 way with ADS-B in and out. Of course every pilot is going to have a different opinon, but as others have stated my experience has shown that the FAA has done a decent job of accomplishing that mission without completely disrupting the current air traffic control, and of course it's not ideal it's still as good as you can hope for givin the constraints. We have a tendancy of blaming the government of being too beurocratic, but the implimentation of current next-gen policy has been not only pragmatic but mostly sympathetic to the fleet of aging General Aviation. [2]

My experience are this: I can get in my plane, file a flight plan to an airport in the next state, ask for GPS direct and get traffic awareness of about 80% of the planes in the sky directly and the remaining 20% are sent to my plane via ADS-B. I'm not having to fly using only Victor Airways reliant on aging VOR stations I'm having NEXRAD radar streamed into my cockpit, including weather TAF and METAR updates at airports. Other planes in the sky know where I'm at as well. A lot of this can be done with a small GPS box and an iPad. (And yes, I know ADS-B out is only certified installed equipment) But foreflight and many other solutions are here, the ADS-B recievers are cheap and it works today. [3]

All of this has only been available over the last few years because of ground work and policy that has been being pushed over the last 2 decades, and is within reach of not only the largest air carriers but even the student pilot just getting his start.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Next_Generation_Air_Transporta... [2] https://www.faa.gov/news/fact_sheets/news_story.cfm?newsId=2... (* Rebate programs and other incentives to help get people into new equipment) [3] https://www.foreflight.com

Isn't it a bit presumptuous to assume the US can regulate the worlds space access? Did anyone ask the 200 other countries?

Edit sorry didn't read the article. It doesn't sound like they'll have the power to block access to space?

This is the service that says "hey sat operator, something is going to hit/come close to your sat, you might want to move it".

This is part of the government moving services provided traditionally by the US military to civilian run agencies. These services started off this way because they are things that the military only cared about or had enough budget to care about but now have extensive civilian uses/needs.

They're not regulating the world's space access... they're monitoring to prevent commercial satellites from colliding with debris and other items in orbit. This is a public service.

The US at large does have the power to block access to space, given that they posess the most technologically advanced military on the planet, but I doubt the FAA will be intervening militarily against your bottle rocket any time soon.

The article is not clear but this seems to be limited to US commercial space operaters and country to country colloboration happen on a different level.

The most technologically advanced is a matter of opinion. How would they block Russia or Chinese lauches? Even India has frequent launches. This is far fetched as either could then do likewise.

It would be odd if China or Russia decided to unilaterally announce they are going to take on role as traffic cop as a 'public service'. This is a matter for global agreement and discussion and will require an international agency.

It would require an international agency for enforcement, you don't need an international agency for notification.

> The most technologically advanced is a matter of opinion. How would they block Russia or Chinese lauches? Even India has frequent launches. This is far fetched as either could then do likewise.

Well, Russia, China and the US all have demonstrated ASAT capabilities, used to take down their own satellites. Using this capability against satellites owned by another state however would violate the Outer Space Treaty and likely be interpreted as an act of war.

To interrupt a launch? All 3 likely could as well. Cyber or physical sabotage would be a great way, even fighter aircraft could potentially be used against a spacecraft at the time of launch, as they have been demonstrated to be effective against ballistic missiles if they are nearby the launch site.

Space is an arena where most nations try not to make threats or militarise in the interests of international collaboration, but I'm willing to bet there are some secret contingency plans held by the 3 superpowers you mentioned. India, probably not.

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