1. Aircraft Owners & Pilots Association
AOPA
General Aviation Perspective
Rune Duke
Director, Airspace & Air Traffic Services
Aircraft Owners & Pilots Association

2. AOPA’s 26th Annual Nall Report
Identify accident trend for targeted education effort
2012 51
2013 41
2014 32 23 22 20 17
Analysis of 2014 weather accident data – VFR into IMC results in most fatalities
Available late-summer
ALL WEATHER ACCIDENTS
VFR INTO IMC
FATAL VFR INTO IMC

3. NTSB PIREP Special Investigation Report
Recommendations published March 2017
AOPA, FAA, CAA, NATCA,
Leidos
AOPA PIREP course to be
updated in 2018
Improvements to pilot guidance
Outreach
RTCA Tactical Operations Committee proposed to host a working group

4. 2017 AOPA Weather Survey Overview
Desire to better understand GA pilot needs
Survey ed to medically current AOPA Alaskan members and a sample of
20,000 members in CONUS
28 questions
379 total respondents; 103 for Alaska and 276 for CONUS
48% instrument rated and current
39% have CPL or ATP
Most pilots have held their pilot certificate at least 20 years
72% flew single-engine piston airplane in last year

5. Weather source(s) used for initial weather briefing
during flight planning
90%
80%
CONUS
Alaska
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10% 0%
Aviation application
Aviation Weather
Flight Service (1 800
Weather Channel
CSRA or Weather Leidos online Underground
Other
TIBS
FAA weather I do not get cameras weather
Alaska Aviation
(e.g. Center online WXBRIEF) Foreflight)
briefings Weather Unit

6. For those using FIS-B, knowledge of transmission interval for
SIGMETs and AIRMETs
70%
CONUS
60%
Alaska
50%
40%
30%
20%
10% 0%
I don't know
Every 15 minutes Every 2 minutes Every 10 minutes
Real-time
Every 5 minutes

7. On average, how old do you think the NEXRAD (radar)
information provided over FIS-B is?
40%
CONUS
35%
Alaska
30%
25%
20%
15%
10% 5% 0%
Real-time
Less than 5 minutes
5-10 minutes minutes minutes
More than 20 minutes
I don't know

8. How much weight do you typically assign a Flight Service
specialist's caution that "VFR is not recommended"?
60%
CONUS
Why lower weight
50%
Over used, liability reasons, can make decision without their input, briefer uses different criteria than I do
Alaska
40%
30%
20%
68% believe it would be moderately to extremely useful for “VFR not recommended” to be provided with a web briefing
10% 0%
1 - No weight at all 2 3 4
5 - A great deal of weight

9. How important would you find each of the following
improvements to aviation weather products and services?
25%
20%
15%
10% 5% 0%
Incorporation of
non-aviation weather stations into aviation products
Improved DUATS
resources
Enhanced FIS-B products
Easier PIREP submission method
Improved Flight Service (telephone or radio)
Improved Aviation Weather Center products
More intuitive graphical weather products
More surface observations (
e.g. AWOS)
CONUS and Alaska Pilots

10. Weather Improvement Requests20 18 16 14 12 10 8 6 4 2
Increased
granularity, frequency of updates
Increased More Easier to infrastructure graphical/FIS-B access (e.g.
products website, FIS-B)
Easier to
understand (plain language)
More PIREPs
Mobile friendly
Better pilot guidance
FSS briefer improvements (e.g. local knowledge, consistency)
CONUS and Alaska Pilots

11. Comparing Graphical and Textual Products
Pilots highly desire graphical products
Similar comfort level with interpreting graphical product
80%
Product Value
Comfort Interpreting
70%
60%
60%
50%
50%
Graphical product
40%
40%
Textual product
30%
30%
20%
20%
10%
10% 0% 0%
1 - No value 2 3 4
5 - A great deal of value
1 - Extremely uncomfortable 2 3 4
5 - Extremely comfortable

12. AOPA Pilot Education and Support
AOPA Air Safety Institute
AOPA Flight Planner updates
New courses and videos
All videos are on YouTube and are free
Made possible with grant by NOAA
and NWC
PIREP course update in 2018
NEXRAD latency and FIS-B latency articles
Assist WTIC with outreach and increasing pilot participation

13. AOPA Weather Advocacy Future Flight Service Program
Ensuring availability of briefers
Future of “VFR not recommended”
Increasing awareness of FIS-B benefits
Increasing PIREP submittals
Improving access to surface weather observations
Pilot surveys

14. AOPA
Air Traffic Services
Thank you!