I worked on modernization in the FAA specifically around digitizing NOTAMs.
I would urge you not to consider this modernization from the perspective you may be familiar, as someone who may work on the bleeding edge and sometimes sees a lack of caution from engineers pushing for change.
The FAAs safety risk management is built around a rigorous process, but that is also a massive slowdown to reasonable progress.
One of the eng I worked with was 80+ years old and just didnt want to retire. He did not understand modern systems at all and the risks we were looking at were not (imo) realistically balanced.
I get the idea that the current administration is pushing safety to the side, but there is another risk where safety becomes a blocker to reasonable change.
When I left that work (more than 15 years ago) it was clearly a blocker.
show comments
creativeSlumber
> $12.5 billion to fix the aging US air traffic control system and Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy wants another $30 billion for additional upgrades as the FAA deals with numerous technology issues.
Why does it cost this much? wouldn't any modern consumer grade computer be able to handle these tasks?
show comments
jonhohle
More information needed. Was this a sneakernet? No one thought of replacing with a floppy emulator and SD cards? All of the data can fit into 1.44MB?
If the last one is true, devs take note. If FAA can rely on slow, small storage for safety critical applications, you probably can reduce the resource requirements for your app and improve your customers’ experience and extend the life of their hardware.
show comments
bita_nidir
Anyone who's worked around systems in that category knows that the fact that they're replacing floppies is more scary than the fact that they're still using floppies.
Yes, the system is old and warty, but we know it. It's old Jim the warthog.
show comments
driverdan
The politically grandstanding is gross. From what I can tell E-IDS has been in development since at least 2020 with a planned rollout starting in 2025.
Unfortunately web search has gotten so bad that it's hard to find past information about it.
I have absolutely no understanding of ATC systems, though I would’ve thought that having a well established and (I would assume at this point) robust process of using a somewhat ancient media would reduce the attack vector of anything malicious finding its way into ATC systems.
I would love to know how often floppies are used day to day in ATC to warrant this?
alex_suzuki
> replacing outdated floppy disks that contain vital weather and other critical information with a streamlined, 21st-century system
What does this even… mean?
show comments
Dwedit
At the very least, physical media is airgapped. Floppies still aren't a good choice though, since they develop bad sectors so easily.
show comments
MomsAVoxell
When I was 10 years old, way back in 1980, I got my first 5.25" diskette from the salesman of a COMPUTER AGE shop. He got tired of watching me type in the same old BASIC listings after school and spared me the damage of it by giving me the diskette, on the provision that I let other customers use the demo APPLE II's.
Sitting here now in 2026 I have a box containing almost 3000 3.5" FHD floppy disks.
Each about 1.544 Megabytes, unless you cut the notch.
I literally dumpster dived this resource after being invited in to do so at a local electronics shop closure, some years ago now, on the proviso that I did not leave empty handed.
There are about 12 devices in my living room that can use these things, but I'll never use more than 30.
Some day, I'll see the last one go. That'll be weird.
show comments
acobster
> The country's air traffic facilities cannot talk to one another and operate on individual analog computers.
I assume they just mean _old_ computers here. Unless they have some specialized analog air traffic computers? That would be pretty cool.
lp92
>The FAA cited an October 13 event where a fiber optic cable connecting Houston George Bush Intercontinental Airport to the FAA’s network was cut outside an airport gate, leading to the loss of data services between FAA facilities and requiring a ground stop.
Do they seriously not have a backup connection? I would have expected them to have a backup stelite or maybe even a 4G/5G mobile data system in place.
If I can use my phone as a Hotspot when Comcast is doing some service so I can work, I don't understand what idiot designed an airport without backup connections.
show comments
charlieyu1
I’m surprised that they still find floppies to use considering the youngest floppy is now going to high school
flerchin
I was in a tower last year. They were sequencing aircraft with little loops of paper placed onto a wooden dowel. It can and should be better. Doesn't need to be whiz-bang, but it should not be paper slips and wooden sticks. (and floppy disks)
show comments
jdelman
I'm not sure I've ever laughed at a headline from a Hacker News post before.
sjia
I'd like to have some old computer accessories in home office.
show comments
swiftcoder
Is it the last of the truly air-gapped federal agencies?
show comments
ungreased0675
These are not serious people.
MadrasTh0rn
If it aint broke don't fix it
jp57
This is a headline from 1996?
show comments
adamsb6
wow never thought i would outlast them
bvan
I just hope they are not replacing the system with Claude
show comments
tonymet
I'm more interested with the data integrity protections before the data got onto the floppy, and why those protocols (e.g. signature verification) couldn't be completed via email at the endpoint.
snvzz
Replacing the drives with FlashFloppy would not be a crazy idea as a first step.
show comments
roundup
Can we phase out pennies instead?
tencentshill
I don't want the FAA to make changes at "lightning speed" or "rapidly moving to make upgrades" or "record pace". Safety must be further down the list for these guys.
show comments
hacker_88
They should use rust instead of floppy disks
usacoder
It makes me wonder: what gov't agency is still using punch cards.
amelius
> “We’re moving away from outdated, manual processes and replacing technology that once relied on floppy disks with a modern system that allows controllers to instantly share critical flight alerts, restricted airspace schedules and pilot reports,"
So they make their systems run on the internet now?
What could possibly go wrong?
PeterStuer
In my carreer I have seen plenty of system integrations working on ftp'ing request response documents to file folders on "SaaS" systems while the SV boys were considering SOAP obsolete and overnight Cobol and RPG mainframes document sincs while they were waxing about microservises and noSQL.
idcrook
I love the idea that the headline suggest that Sean Duffy and his family at the completion of their multi-month road trip going on another one.
This one, where the tour stops are ATC data buildings, where they only stop in to swap out floppy disks for USB drives.
munchler
The folks over at The Onion are kicking themselves right now because they didn't think of this headline first.
d--b
arent they supposed to phase out punchcard computers first?
alt227
> The greatest nation in the world deserves a state-of-the-art air traffic control system, and under President Trump, we’re delivering just that
They are signalling Trumps involvement so I will assume it must be another vanity project he wants to stamp his name on. I look forward to hundreds of grounded planes due to cloud based weather reporting not being available because of a borked server update or misconfigured wifi adapter.
show comments
whalesalad
Next they will be migrating off Internet Explorer 6
c0rruptbytes
great thing to read before a flight
InsidiousWombat
hopefully not with pendrives
show comments
gosub100
I have heard of exploits that can root a machine from inserting a USB device (in fact, this has been used by attackers to conspicuously leave thumb drives in the parking lots of organizations they want to attack).
I have never heard of a sploit that roots your machine from inserting a floppy.
show comments
superxpro12
why is this "historic"? the thirst for this admin to use the most bombastic language possible is so tiring.
Just... modernize the thing already. thats your job. It's not impressive that you did this. You're supposed to do this. You dont get extra kudos for doing the thing you signed up to do...
and dont forget to put Trump's name at the beginning. Or he might get cranky
I have a bad feeling that this is not going to end well. Especially given that this administration is... Rather incompetent. I hope that safety is like number one on their list of priorities but somehow I doubt it
I worked on modernization in the FAA specifically around digitizing NOTAMs.
I would urge you not to consider this modernization from the perspective you may be familiar, as someone who may work on the bleeding edge and sometimes sees a lack of caution from engineers pushing for change.
The FAAs safety risk management is built around a rigorous process, but that is also a massive slowdown to reasonable progress.
One of the eng I worked with was 80+ years old and just didnt want to retire. He did not understand modern systems at all and the risks we were looking at were not (imo) realistically balanced.
I get the idea that the current administration is pushing safety to the side, but there is another risk where safety becomes a blocker to reasonable change.
When I left that work (more than 15 years ago) it was clearly a blocker.
> $12.5 billion to fix the aging US air traffic control system and Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy wants another $30 billion for additional upgrades as the FAA deals with numerous technology issues.
Why does it cost this much? wouldn't any modern consumer grade computer be able to handle these tasks?
More information needed. Was this a sneakernet? No one thought of replacing with a floppy emulator and SD cards? All of the data can fit into 1.44MB?
If the last one is true, devs take note. If FAA can rely on slow, small storage for safety critical applications, you probably can reduce the resource requirements for your app and improve your customers’ experience and extend the life of their hardware.
Anyone who's worked around systems in that category knows that the fact that they're replacing floppies is more scary than the fact that they're still using floppies.
Yes, the system is old and warty, but we know it. It's old Jim the warthog.
The politically grandstanding is gross. From what I can tell E-IDS has been in development since at least 2020 with a planned rollout starting in 2025.
Unfortunately web search has gotten so bad that it's hard to find past information about it.
FAA website on EIDS: https://www.faa.gov/air_traffic/technology/eids
Another article with some more details: https://www.pcmag.com/news/the-faa-is-still-using-floppy-dis...
I know they are saying IDS-4 is a "1980s" system, but it appears IDS-4 was actually developed in the early 1990s; it uses MS-DOS and 3.5 inch floppies: https://sysatl.com/systems-atlanta-inc-awarded-faa-ids4-sust...
I have absolutely no understanding of ATC systems, though I would’ve thought that having a well established and (I would assume at this point) robust process of using a somewhat ancient media would reduce the attack vector of anything malicious finding its way into ATC systems.
I would love to know how often floppies are used day to day in ATC to warrant this?
> replacing outdated floppy disks that contain vital weather and other critical information with a streamlined, 21st-century system
What does this even… mean?
At the very least, physical media is airgapped. Floppies still aren't a good choice though, since they develop bad sectors so easily.
When I was 10 years old, way back in 1980, I got my first 5.25" diskette from the salesman of a COMPUTER AGE shop. He got tired of watching me type in the same old BASIC listings after school and spared me the damage of it by giving me the diskette, on the provision that I let other customers use the demo APPLE II's.
Sitting here now in 2026 I have a box containing almost 3000 3.5" FHD floppy disks.
Each about 1.544 Megabytes, unless you cut the notch.
I literally dumpster dived this resource after being invited in to do so at a local electronics shop closure, some years ago now, on the proviso that I did not leave empty handed.
There are about 12 devices in my living room that can use these things, but I'll never use more than 30.
Some day, I'll see the last one go. That'll be weird.
> The country's air traffic facilities cannot talk to one another and operate on individual analog computers.
I assume they just mean _old_ computers here. Unless they have some specialized analog air traffic computers? That would be pretty cool.
>The FAA cited an October 13 event where a fiber optic cable connecting Houston George Bush Intercontinental Airport to the FAA’s network was cut outside an airport gate, leading to the loss of data services between FAA facilities and requiring a ground stop.
Do they seriously not have a backup connection? I would have expected them to have a backup stelite or maybe even a 4G/5G mobile data system in place.
If I can use my phone as a Hotspot when Comcast is doing some service so I can work, I don't understand what idiot designed an airport without backup connections.
I’m surprised that they still find floppies to use considering the youngest floppy is now going to high school
I was in a tower last year. They were sequencing aircraft with little loops of paper placed onto a wooden dowel. It can and should be better. Doesn't need to be whiz-bang, but it should not be paper slips and wooden sticks. (and floppy disks)
I'm not sure I've ever laughed at a headline from a Hacker News post before.
I'd like to have some old computer accessories in home office.
Is it the last of the truly air-gapped federal agencies?
These are not serious people.
If it aint broke don't fix it
This is a headline from 1996?
wow never thought i would outlast them
I just hope they are not replacing the system with Claude
I'm more interested with the data integrity protections before the data got onto the floppy, and why those protocols (e.g. signature verification) couldn't be completed via email at the endpoint.
Replacing the drives with FlashFloppy would not be a crazy idea as a first step.
Can we phase out pennies instead?
I don't want the FAA to make changes at "lightning speed" or "rapidly moving to make upgrades" or "record pace". Safety must be further down the list for these guys.
They should use rust instead of floppy disks
It makes me wonder: what gov't agency is still using punch cards.
> “We’re moving away from outdated, manual processes and replacing technology that once relied on floppy disks with a modern system that allows controllers to instantly share critical flight alerts, restricted airspace schedules and pilot reports,"
So they make their systems run on the internet now?
What could possibly go wrong?
In my carreer I have seen plenty of system integrations working on ftp'ing request response documents to file folders on "SaaS" systems while the SV boys were considering SOAP obsolete and overnight Cobol and RPG mainframes document sincs while they were waxing about microservises and noSQL.
I love the idea that the headline suggest that Sean Duffy and his family at the completion of their multi-month road trip going on another one.
This one, where the tour stops are ATC data buildings, where they only stop in to swap out floppy disks for USB drives.
The folks over at The Onion are kicking themselves right now because they didn't think of this headline first.
arent they supposed to phase out punchcard computers first?
> The greatest nation in the world deserves a state-of-the-art air traffic control system, and under President Trump, we’re delivering just that
They are signalling Trumps involvement so I will assume it must be another vanity project he wants to stamp his name on. I look forward to hundreds of grounded planes due to cloud based weather reporting not being available because of a borked server update or misconfigured wifi adapter.
Next they will be migrating off Internet Explorer 6
great thing to read before a flight
hopefully not with pendrives
I have heard of exploits that can root a machine from inserting a USB device (in fact, this has been used by attackers to conspicuously leave thumb drives in the parking lots of organizations they want to attack).
I have never heard of a sploit that roots your machine from inserting a floppy.
why is this "historic"? the thirst for this admin to use the most bombastic language possible is so tiring.
Just... modernize the thing already. thats your job. It's not impressive that you did this. You're supposed to do this. You dont get extra kudos for doing the thing you signed up to do...
and dont forget to put Trump's name at the beginning. Or he might get cranky
What is this, a joke‽
alt link: https://www.yahoo.com/news/us/articles/us-faa-says-phase-flo...
I have a bad feeling that this is not going to end well. Especially given that this administration is... Rather incompetent. I hope that safety is like number one on their list of priorities but somehow I doubt it
Out with FDD, in with GPT! (!)