NOTAM site 'upgrade'

[Courtman]

Here is a transcript of what I have just experienced, and duly reported to the "AIS Supervisor".

Having just used your new briefing website I have a few comments I would like to make on the service offered.

We are planning to fly a navigational exercise tonight Luton - Stansted - Clacton - Thetford - Cambridge - Luton. I tried both a normal route briefing and a "narrow route briefing". I restricted the flight level to FL050 maximum along the route. Of the 6 pages of NOTAMs that printed out, 2 affected me. No en-route aerodromes were included unless I expressed them in the box (surely if the system knows the route and will be picking NOTAMs from a 10nm radius it could include them). I got NOTAMs regarding UP620 and UT7 Brest Control, and Plymouth Military Radar unavailable, 8.33KHz spacing (in effect since 99 anyway), and use of STS/ indicators in IFR plans when I specified VFR only. All in all, this is not good. I have found no NOTAMs about PJE or kite launching or rocket launching, when I know the route will be routing near them.

Until you switched the old website off I was able to use a fantastic bit of freeware called NotamPlot. This took the A1 and A8 bulletins and drew them on a map so you could visually see where the restrictions were. Notam Plot is the website for this. Now A1 and A8 bulletins are not available this software does not work, and I feel that the current service offered by NATS is a severe degradation in terms of quality and potential flight safety.

This is not what I'd expect. I've only recently realised just how many little NOTAMs there are out there to be checked, and this website seems to take all that away again...

(Edited coz I got the URL wrong....!)