The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said this week it completed the first phase of a major overhaul of the nation’s Notices to Airmen (NOTAM) system, marking an early milestone in a modernization effort that officials say will help prevent nationwide airspace shutdowns, improve safety, and strengthen communications with pilots.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy announced the milestone on May 12, saying the agency finished phase one of the project more than a year ahead of a timeline set during the Biden administration.
FAA is a component agency of the Department of Transportation (DOT), which Duffy heads.
The NOTAM system, which is decades old, provides pilots and flight planners with critical alerts about temporary conditions such as runway closures, airspace restrictions, and obstructions. More than four million NOTAMs are issued each year, making the system a core part of the nation’s aviation infrastructure.
The modernization effort was accelerated after repeated failures in the aging system, including a January 2023 outage that shut down the legacy NOTAM system and grounded flights nationwide.
The Biden administration had projected that the modernization effort would not be completed until late 2027, the FAA said.
“The last administration handed us a 40-year old aviation alert system on the verge of complete collapse,” Duffy said this week.
“Instead of waiting for another nationwide ground stop, we moved at the Speed of Trump to build a brand new, modern system – and we did it years ahead of schedule,” he said.
In the first phase of the transition, the FAA moved the NOTAM system into the cloud in April 2026 and shut down the legacy U.S. NOTAM System. Thousands of users were transitioned to the new NOTAM Modernization Service, or NMS, in mid-April, FAA said.
The agency said it used a streamlined vendor challenge to speed the procurement process and, working with CGI Federal, developed the new service while consulting with pilots and other stakeholders who rely on the system.
“Our transition to this state-of-the-art NOTAM system strengthens safety and reliability across the National Airspace System,” said FAA Administrator Bryan Bedford.
“We are focused on building a modern aviation system for the future – one that is resilient, efficient, and capable of meeting the demands of the world’s busiest airspace,” he said.
Additional work remains before the overhaul is complete. Later this year, the FAA plans to retire the other legacy platform, known as the Federal NOTAM Service, or FNS.
Once that second phase is finished, the NOTAM Modernization Service will become the single authoritative source for all NOTAMs, providing what the FAA describes as a modern and reliable foundation for the National Airspace System.