How the National Airspace System Works

Looking at more of the presentations, we see that this not "How the National Airspace System Works". Rather it is the plan for a next generation system that the FAA hopes to implement.

If you have an interest in this you can see how things are intended to change. A lot of it looks like intended automation of work presently done by controllers. It appears there could be some challenges. For example, weather affects the flow, and what happens when you miss your pushback time?

A series of voice descriptions with animations.

There are many terms and acronyms. I am familiar with the user side of the system. Without this background I would have a hard time following the narrative. Even so I find the descriptions unclear. I don't know of a good overview of the airspace system that does not also explain the rules of operation. I think those become too detailed for casual knowledge.

If you want to have any chance at all of understanding this you probably need to listen to all 250+ episodes of the ‘opposing bases’ podcast. Those ATC guys love TLAs.

Fun fact: the US did not have any sensible short-range SAMs (surface-to-air missiles) prior to 9/11 for additional defense of high value targets. Airspace defense was based almost exclusively on interceptor aircraft, which proved quite insufficient as we all know.

Luckily the Norwegians had already developed the NASAMS system, which was running on repurposed AIM-120 AMRAAM air-to-air missiles. The AMRAAM is an extremely popular missile widely used in the US and allied countries, so the Pentagon was very keen on obtaining it. You could even use no longer airworthy rockets, what's not to like here!

These days the NASAMS systems are no longer needed and are being famously sent to Ukraine, to replace some of the heavily used S-300s, Buks, Tors.