Pilots back global campaign to cut excessive NOTAM burden

Cockpit crew representatives are backing efforts to overhaul of the NOTAM system this year, claiming that the repository of aeronautical information has become cluttered, inefficient and burdensome. Some 1.7m NOTAMs were published in 2020. Even though this was a 5% reduction on the previous year, as a result of the air transport crisis, the number amounted to a seven-fold increase in NOTAMs over the past two decades, according to ICAO. It adds that about 35,000 remain active on any given day. ICAO is to launch a global campaign for NOTAM improvement on 8 April, intended to relieve some of the pressure on those having to handle and absorb the information. “It is not uncommon for a pre-flight briefing package supporting a long-haul international flight to contain more than 100 pages of NOTAM information,” says the organisation. “Findings have shown that 20% of these will be old NOTAMs, exceeding their three-month applicability period.”<br/>