North Atlantic Organised Track System - NATS

NATS MNPSA has been re-designated to NATS HLA on 4 Feb 2016.

North Atlantic Organised Tracks (NATS) are special tracks (Points) designed for aircraft crossing the Atlantic ocean. These tracks are not permanent and they will change daily depends on the wind condition. The idea for these tracks is daily wind optimization.

These tracks are designed to be the shortest routes to cross the Atlantic ocean within the specific period. The could help airlines save tons of fuels comparing to fly along the permanent routes.
The active altitude is from Flight Level (FL)285 to FL420. in the Oceanic Control Areas.



You can see from the above illustration, there are no airways connecting the dots from the both side of the red circles (US and UK). The airways in-between will be the NATS and is published by NOTAM daily. (Take a peak of the NOTAM here)

The aircraft flying through these NATS points must have RNP 10 or RNP 4.
You will also need ADS-C, CPDLC


NOTAM = Notice to Airmen /Women carrying important information related to your flight.

RNP = Required Navigation Performance means you aircraft at any point of time must fly within the radius of XX nautical miles. RNP 10 will be 10 nautical miles and RNP 4 will be 4 nautical miles.

ADS-C = Automatic Dependent Surveillance - Contract (An on-board avionics which auto broadcast your altitude, position and speed to the nearest receiving station. In this case will be via Satellite)

CPDLC = Controller Pilot Data Link Communications. Is a primary communication system works just like our mobile phone SMS (Short Message Service). Controller will issue instruction through pre-defined text and send to the particular aircraft. The CPDLC screen on the particular aircraft will display the message and an audio chime will sound. The pilot will reply to the instruction by selecting the pre-defined answer.

e.g.
Controller send msg: CLB to FL400
Pilot reply msg: Roger. CLB to FL400

The system in this case will be using satellite as transmitter and receiver. This replace the very very noisy HF (High Frequency) Radio whereby most of the time you can hear the instruction properly. This system bring safety to another level.

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