On Apr 17, 6:27 pm, Doug Vetter wrote:
Has anyone seen the notice on the NGA website that the USFIF (raw
aviation waypoint data for the US) will be discontinued in October of 2007?

They tried to kill DAFIF as a whole last year but eventually succumbed
to pressure from the industry to allow US territorial data to remain
available. If I'm reading this correctly, however, they're about to
screw us anyway (read the second notice down from the top):

http://164.214.2.62/products/usfif/v0008/USREADME.TXT

I just sent email to their feedback address and am looking forward to
their response.

If you're wondering how this affects the average pilot, keep in mind
that virtually all EFB and planning software (flightprep,
seattleavionics, etc.) get their raw data from this source. I have no
idea how these companies will source their data if the NGA refuses to
distribute it to anyone but the "military and its contractors" like
Boeing -- ahem, I mean Jeppesen.

I hate to sound like a conspiracy theorist, but I also find it
interesting that they've chosen to do this right now...when the eyes of
AOPA and other watchdogs are busy fighting on the user-fee front.

I'll forward any response I get from the NGA.

-Doug

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Doug Vetter, ATP/CFI

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Hi Doug,

You can get all the same data from the FAA in the National Flight
Database, but it would cost you $150 a year to receive the CD ROM.
Also, the data in in the ARINC 424 standard format, so you you want to
know how to interpret and use this data, that will cost you an
additional $252 to buy the ARINC 424 standard from ARINC.

Isn't progress wonderful?

There are definitely forces at work that are moving to price aviation
out of existence. Between fuel prices, user fees, and rising fees for
services and data, I think that GA is going to become only for the
very wealty. Driving a car is getting to be as expensive as GA used
to be... fuel prices have nearly tripled since 2000, but I haven't
had a pay raise since then.

Dean