Four Domestic Airports to Have Satellite Based IFR this May

Manila– Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (CAAP) Deputy Director General John C. Andrews has announced that four domestic airports will be installed with satellite based instrument flight rules (IFR) this May.

IFR is a set of regulations governing all aspects of civil aviation aircraft operations. The other set are visual flight rules (VFR).

IFR is defined in the Federal Aviation Regulations (FAR) as: “Rules and regulations established by the FAA to govern flight under conditions in which flight by outside visual reference is not safe. IFR flight depends upon flying by reference to instruments in the flight deck, and navigation is accomplished by reference to electronic signals.”

It is also referred to as, “a term used by pilots and controllers to indicate the type of flight plan an aircraft is flying,” such as an IFR or VFR flight plan.

The four domestic airports to be installed with IFR are Dumaguete, Butuan, Legazpi and Laguindingan.

When aircraft flights are under satellite based IFR, there are no visibility requirements which legally and safely allows flying through clouds or other conditions where there is zero visibility outside the aircraft.

Meanwhile, continuing efforts are being done by the civil aviation to maintain its Category 1 status after US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) decided to upgrade the civil aviation’s rating from Category 2 last April. (PNA) / JDM