The FAA said yesterday that it will stop using floppy disks as part of a long-awaited upgrade that will give air traffic controllers faster access to data needed for crucial safety alerts. The new Enterprise Information Display System (E-IDS) will be installed in 435 facilities, replacing several information display systems dating to the 1980s.
The FAA “is continuing its historic modernization of America’s air traffic control system by replacing outdated floppy disks that contain vital weather and other critical information with a streamlined, 21st-century system,” the agency said. E-IDS will be “deployed to operational control positions at more than 400 facilities across all air traffic control domains,” and “provide operationally essential information for controlling aircraft,” the FAA said.
The change has been in the works for over six years. “No more floppy disks or paper strips,” then-Acting FAA Administrator Chris Rocheleau told the House Appropriations Committee last year.
The FAA said E-IDS will replace older tools that have “technical end-of-life issues” and address two of the aviation agency’s top safety concerns: distribution of weather alerts to pilots (known as PIREP for Pilot Report); and timely distribution of Notices to Airmen (NOTAM), which include information on abnormal statuses and hazards.
“E-IDS gives air traffic controllers the information they need to make timely decisions and keep the flying public safe,” FAA Administrator Bryan Bedford said. “We’re moving away from outdated, manual processes and replacing technology that once relied on floppy disks with a modern system that allows controllers to instantly share critical flight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 across the National Airspace System.”
Upgrades will take a year
It’ll take a year or so to make the upgrades at every facility. The first sites to get E-IDS will be Atlantic City International Airport, Nashville International Airport, Greater Rochester International Airport, and data processing hubs in Atlanta and Salt Lake City. The FAA said it plans to complete the upgrade at 435 sites by the end of 2028.
“Good news America: floppy disks are out, 21st century tech is in,” US Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said. Duffy posted a video yesterday about the upgrade in which a newscaster describing the FAA’s outdated technology says, “the FAA systems are essentially running on Windows 95.”
Like other Trump appointees, Duffy was quick to give credit to the president, although the plan was shepherded through by officials in both the Biden and Trump administrations. “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,” Duffy said.
In August 2020, the FAA awarded a contract to Leidos to design and develop E-IDS. Leidos said in a press release at the time that E-IDS is part of the FAA’s Next Generation Air Transportation System (NextGen) modernization project, which encompasses numerous upgrades going back to 2008.
The FAA said E-IDS will replace the Information Display System 4 (IDS-4), Controller Equipment Information Display System (ACE-IDS), NAS Information Display System (NIDS), and En Route Information Display System (ERIDS).
Obsolete tech “cumbersome for controllers”
An April 2026 report by the Department of Transportation said, “Controllers have used a system that is driven by floppy disks and an antiquated operation system for critical information such as weather, NOTAMs and airport status.” With E-IDS, those controllers will have “a single platform that pulls that data into one view. Instead of searching for info, they [will] have immediate access to everything they need to make split-second decisions,” the report said.
The out-of-date systems were criticized in a September 2026 report by the US Government Accountability Office (GAO). “Legacy display systems rely on obsolete technology (e.g., floppy disks) and interfaces from the 1980s, inefficient data organization, and manual update methods,” the report said. “The systems are cumbersome for controllers to search, retrieve, and display information. Multiple diverse display systems create inefficient activities needed to sustain these systems.”
The GAO report said these information display systems are used in Air Route Traffic Control Centers, Terminal Radar Approach Control facilities, and control towers. The systems display textual and graphical information, “such as flight approach charts, combined with Notice to Airmen and weather information. This information is needed to support controller-to-pilot flight operations,” the GAO said.
Source: Iwpost.com
