By Will Horton
A ten-year deadline was not enough time for Bahamasair to make the avionic upgrades necessary to use United States airspace after Jan 1, 2020. As a result, the flag carrier of the Bahamas cannot fly three of its four jet aircraft into US airspace and may not solve the problem until March.
The US Federal Aviation Administration mandated in 2010 that aircraft be equipped with hardware to use the FAA’s more sophisticated satellite-based air traffic control management system, NextGen, that replaces traditional ground radar technology. This step of the transition requires aircraft to have Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast Out (ADS-B) capability either at time of manufacture or retrofitted with a kit. Read more >>