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MOA status website: See and Avoid

bkilby

bkilby

Well Known Member
I was just planning a flight to St. Simons Island, GA tomorrow and was checking the status of all the MOA's along the route. Wanted to post this for those interested. You can type in your state and see a graphical status of the MOA's on a map as either Cold, Pending, or Hot and clicking on the area lists the days/times of the status as well as floors/ceilings.

http://www.seeandavoid.org/

moastatus.jpg
 
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I live smack dab in the middle of the Bulldog MOA and always use Flight Following on cross-countries. They can only provide guidance up to the edge of the MOA if it's hot.

I have had cold MOA's go hot while I was enroute and FF will drop you like a hot potato when that happens, if you're in it at the time.

Best,
 
pierre smith said:
I live smack dab in the middle of the Bulldog MOA and always use Flight Following on cross-countries. They can only provide guidance up to the edge of the MOA if it's hot.

I have had cold MOA's go hot while I was enroute and FF will drop you like a hot potato when that happens, if you're in it at the time.

Best,
Click to expand...
Eh? Does the radar suddenly stop working when the MOA goes hot? Or do they just not want the liability of providing you FF anymore? :confused:

TODR
 
Doug, he told me that there are fighters out there, so be vigilant. Perhaps ATC Terry can chime in.

Recently, I was on an IFR flight plan on the way home from Beaufort, S.C. when he told me that I would be on my own in 5 minutes, when I enter the MOA, so I cancelled since the cloud cover was thinning anyway.

Their radar doesn't stop working, obviously, but perhaps it's just SOP to stop advisories when military airplanes are all over the place...BTW, I never saw any fighters.

Best,
 
FAA SUA Link & MOA's Caution...

Below is a useful link and a video of a MOA near-miss...

http://sua.faa.gov/sua/siteFrame.app

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qLVtstYAZLY

A controller's comments wrt the youtube link above...

"I work at Vance AFB. We protect the MOAs from IFR traffic, via altitude separation by having the civilian traffic at a specific alt. or by caping the pilot in the MOA at a certain alt. VFR traffic we could care less about we have alot else going on, we advise you that your entering a MOA and give you the working Alt's if you want to go in it your choice. We?re not going to provide any separation or even try."
 
Flying Through a Hot MOA is Risky

Yes, flying VFR through a MOA is perfectly legal...but not smart. While in a military aircraft I've been advised of VFR traffic numerous times and had to stop training to see and avoid the traffic. When in the middle of a 8 - 10k ft vertical maneuver with your T-38 wingman in extended trail where your airspeed goes from 450 KIAS to 200KIAS throughout the maneuver, you can't stop on a dime. I've had several near misses with GA traffic in MOAs including twice with the same Mooney that blasted through the heart of the Columbus AFB MOAs on different days. As Forest Gump said, Stupid is what Stupid Does.

Fly Safe! Don't Fly through a HOT MOA without talking to the controlling agency and understanding the activity in the MOA. Sometimes the military aircraft is droning at a set altitude block which you can easily avoid. Other times we are using the complete airspace with rapid vertical changes in simulated combat. That's why the controlling agency cannot provide flight following and advisories because they cannot predict the military aircraft's flight path.

Big Sky theory works most of the time but why risk your life and others.
Cheers,
George
 
Is it Prohibited, restricted areas or MOA's that have artillery fire and or live missile shots?? Had a Marine Corps chopper accidentally get blasted out of the sky by by "friendly" artillery fire in Vietnam a long time ago.:(
 
MOA's don't have live exercises. Restricted areas do and Warning Areas do at times. I have done missile shoots and dropped bombs in all these areas with the exception of MOA's and Alert areas. Stay ever vigilant and get flight following around these areas (we also tend to be maneuvering on our way to these areas as well). MOA's can go hot at any time so while the predictive tool is great be warned that may change at any point (I have countless times gone to one MOA to not have the weather for the mission and then decided to activate a nearby one that did). If you do decide to go in, be sure your Mode C is working so we can at least have a heads up to interlopers and knock of what we're doing. MOA's are MARSA (Military Assumes Responsibility for Safe Separation) however Center or Approach monitors our area common UHF freq and will usually come up it and let us know we have VFR traffic in the area. Please stay predictable if you do this (meaning stay on a constant heading and altitude so we can avoid you). P.S. where's the beer icon?
 
Help

I can't seem to get the map to work properly. It will show me airports, etc, but not the MOA's or the SUA's.

When I click the box for MOA's, nothing happens. If I then click on the search logo to the right, I get error messages.

WhatmIdoinwrong? :eek:
 
Maybe

GHRoss3 said:
As Forest Gump said, Stupid is what Stupid Does.


Big Sky theory works most of the time but why risk your life and others.
Cheers,
George
Click to expand...

I happen to be in the crop-dusting business, smack-dab in the middle of the Bulldog MOA.

Before it was formed, a bunch of uniformed Air Force types called a meeting with the local citizenry, about 30 years ago and I and several other Ag pilots attended. We all voiced our concerns about this MOA, in which 95% of my farmer/customers grow their crops in. We told them that we needed the lower 500' and if they could do that then we'd live happily ever after. So far, so good...we see them all the time, buzzing over us.

The problem arises when I go on a short trip to the coast when half of it is in the MOA. I can't wait 'til Monday and don't fly at night, so I go in being as vigilant as I can be...so far so good.

Best,
 
Gone!

Hey All,

Loved seeandavoid. I noticed months ago that it wasn't being updated any more. Now the site doesn't even exist. Anyone know of an alternate source?

Thanks, Lance
 
donaziza said:
Is it Prohibited, restricted areas or MOA's that have artillery fire and or live missile shots?? Had a Marine Corps chopper accidentally get blasted out of the sky by by "friendly" artillery fire in Vietnam a long time ago.:(
Click to expand...

The local one near Florence, AZ is a Restricted area and is marked as "Intermittent, by NOTAM 48hrs in Advance" and I've rarely seen it closed.

It is a shooting range -

Florence Military Reservation
Camp Florence

Covering over 40 square mile (25,752 acres) of Lower Sonoran Desert, Florence Military Reservation (FMR) is managed by the Arizona Army National Guard in cooperation with other state and federal agencies. The Reservation is home to artillery and small-arms training ranges. Camp Florence is the main training site for the Arizona Army National Guard, primarily for weekend and two-week annual training periods. It supports squad, platoon, company, and battalion-level tactical training for artillery, aviation, cavalry, engineer, military police, maintenance, signal, transportation and explosive ordnance disposal units.
 
Logan,

You can get MOA status here:

https://sua.faa.gov

That data is also available from the ADSB feed. Don't know if anyone is implementing it yet to display it on the map.


Lenny

judoka5051 said:
Hey All,

Loved seeandavoid. I noticed months ago that it wasn't being updated any more. Now the site doesn't even exist. Anyone know of an alternate source?

Thanks, Lance
Click to expand...
 
Flight following through MOA's

Could be wrong about this, but I think the reason ARTCC drops you off flight following when you enter an active MOA is because it's not their airspace anymore. There is a military controller in charge of deconfliction. The frequencies/info are on VFR sectionals. They're happily surprised when GA aircraft talk to them as it makes their job a lot easier and you don't disrupt any training going on. Plus, they'll hand you back to center when you exit the MOA.

You can call the base ops guys before you fly to see what their flying schedule is that day as well.
 
GHRoss3 said:
Yes, flying VFR through a MOA is perfectly legal...but not smart. While in a military aircraft I've been advised of VFR traffic numerous times and had to stop training to see and avoid the traffic. When in the middle of a 8 - 10k ft vertical maneuver with your T-38 wingman in extended trail where your airspeed goes from 450 KIAS to 200KIAS throughout the maneuver, you can't stop on a dime. I've had several near misses with GA traffic in MOAs including twice with the same Mooney that blasted through the heart of the Columbus AFB MOAs on different days. As Forest Gump said, Stupid is what Stupid Does.

Fly Safe! Don't Fly through a HOT MOA without talking to the controlling agency and understanding the activity in the MOA. Sometimes the military aircraft is droning at a set altitude block which you can easily avoid. Other times we are using the complete airspace with rapid vertical changes in simulated combat. That's why the controlling agency cannot provide flight following and advisories because they cannot predict the military aircraft's flight path.

Big Sky theory works most of the time but why risk your life and others.
Cheers,
George
Click to expand...


I second what George is stating. Having a son that did his UPT at Sheppard and his B-Class at Luke, I've learned you really don't want to be in the MOAs that are used for primary training. Remember what it was like on your first cross flight. (i.e. barely keeping up with everything happening) Now imagine you're in a T-38 or F-16. These pilots have their hands full and are practicing newly learned maneuvers. Do you really want to trust them to see you before it's too late?

The good news is that most of the training bases (I know that Sheppard does this) have excellent documents explaining their MOAs, how to flight plan around them, and history of the any incidents that have occurred between GA and Military. I know they were very helpful to me in determining appropriate risk management.
 
rleffler said:
I second what George is stating. Having a son that did his UPT at Sheppard and his B-Class at Luke, I've learned you really don't want to be in the MOAs that are used for primary training. Remember what it was like on your first cross flight. (i.e. barely keeping up with everything happening) Now imagine you're in a T-38 or F-16. These pilots have their hands full and are practicing newly learned maneuvers. Do you really want to trust them to see you before it's too late?

The good news is that most of the training bases (I know that Sheppard does this) have excellent documents explaining their MOAs, how to flight plan around them, and history of the any incidents that have occurred between GA and Military. I know they were very helpful to me in determining appropriate risk management.
Click to expand...

Take a look at the youtube video on post #6 on this thread.
 
My experience around Boise is not positive. I tried calling the controller for the MOA... since I was close to the boundary. They declined to assist.
Another flight south of Mt. Home, I had an F16 join my wing. I was outside the restricted box... but apparently their maps are not as detailed as ours.
West of Prescott we (decades of GA flights) transit the Gladden MOA to get to California. Controllers are getting better at telling you when they see activity. Most is 20K feet or so, but as Bob mentioned, they do aggressive vertical at times. I suspect for that particular MOA, their instructors keep them fairly high. Since they are not in a combat zone, it would be nice if their transponders showed up on my ADS-B. They aren't on a secret mission or anything... just young kids learning to fly. My general impression out west is that controllers are stepping up to safety though. I have had detailed precip reports from their radar in recent times as well as good MOA reports. Kudos to the ATC guys.
(from a FLIB in an RV9A)
 
Looking at the : You can get MOA status here:
https://sua.faa.gov

Are all the MOAs that are shown in red HOT ? And do you assume all the others are not ? Maybe I didn't spent enough time looking around but didn't find info such as effective times and etc. Arrow over the MOA and it looks like just generic info on the site base. ??
 
Interesting to hear the efferent experiences in MOAs. For the MOA I fly over most frequently (Lemoore) flight following routinely hands me off to their controller and then I get handed right back upon exit. No fuss no muss.

Erich
 
MOA encounter this morning

In the interest of full disclosure and crow eating now and then, I file the following PIREP. Today, while returning from Big Bear (great fireworks on the lake) at 9500 ft. in the Bagdad MOA...... a target popped up at 6 miles 12 O'clock. Thinking it was just another Embry Riddle student droning along towards the Republic of California.... I started a stop watch to see how long that 6 miles would take. WOW... he (or she) was cooking right along.
In no time at all I had a visual on a pair of F 35's out of Luke Air Base. The instructor went vertical a half mile out and then rolled inverted to look down on our canopy. His student stayed the course... straight and level and passed to our right about half a mile or so. After passing, the instructor joined back up on the student's 6 and continued on.
This answered one of my questions about ADS-B. I was in anonymous mode squawking 1200. The two fighters appeared as one target and in plenty of time to obtain a visual. I can only surmise from the instructor plane that he saw us clearly and was making a statement.
I usually keep the traffic software in normal altitude mode... so I don't fill the screen with airliners up high. A brief but interesting encounter on the early morning flight.
 
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