The problem was never missing data

The FAA's facility data already exists. It just can't be trusted, reconciled, or used.

It is scattered across four systems, keyed differently in each, decayed on 28-day cycles, and wrong at a measurable rate. AirIndex simplifies the complications that already exist: one key, the corrected delta, and trust that travels with the field.

1 in 5

FAA facility coordinates our index flags as a possible mislocation (1,060 of 5,677).

48.5 nm

How far the FAA database plots one Nashville heliport from where it actually is.

4 → 1

Source systems, each with its own identifier, collapsed to one AIX key per facility.

One facility, before and after

TN60 — WSMV-TV Heliport, Nashville

The same facility, as the FAA record ships it, and as AirIndex resolves it. This is the whole thesis in a glance.

Before · the FAA record

A confident, wrong coordinate

FAA LID TN60 · NASR 5010

FAA plots here

Actual site

48.5 nm apart

×Plotted at 36.14117, −87.86197 — the true site is 48.5 nautical miles away.
×Pad data sits in a separate NASR row; safety and airspace live in other systems, under other keys.
×Nothing flags the position as questionable. It reads as authoritative.

After · the AirIndex record

One key, the error held in the open

aix:hp:WR7ZCFDX

✓One key ties the FAA LID, the NASR pad record, the nearest weather station, and every source to a single facility.
✓The error is surfaced, not hidden: flagged self-reported · suspect for mislocation.
✓Independently cross-checked against USGS terrain and OSM structure — two checks the FAA record does not carry.
✓The correction is human-gated: adjudicated against imagery before it is applied. We adjudicate; we do not silently overwrite.

Not a one-off — a structure

A facility's FAA record lives in four systems, under four keys

None of them share a spine, a cadence, or a trust signal. Reconciling them is the work — and it is already done.

System	What it holds	Format & friction	Key it uses
NASR 5010	facility & pad master record	fixed-width, 28-day cycle	FAA LID + site no.
OE/AAA	obstruction & airspace determinations	separate case system	study number
Chart supplement	published facility detail	PDF	airport name
NTSB	accident & incident history	MS Access database	event id

Across the inventory: 5,677 heliports reconciled from 44,387 OE/AAA determinations, 5,594 NASR pad records, and 448 NTSB safety rollups — plus independent terrain, structure, and weather cross-checks. 950 rooftop pads the FAA elevation missed. All under 5,643 AIX keys.

What the simplification is

Four moves

One key

AIX-ID is the shared spine FAA never gave the industry. The single most literal simplification there is.

The corrected delta

We hold the diff between what FAA says and what's true — the 48.5 nm fixes, the rooftops, the un-nulled dimensions. The un-backfillable part.

Trust travels with the field

Every value carries how fresh and how verified it is, so a consumer never has to re-derive trust.

Machine-consumable & current

Fixed-width files, PDFs, and Access databases become one queryable, provenance-stamped record.