FAA to Nix Trump-Inspired Aviation Waypoints
Following his scathing remarks about undocumented immigrants in the United States, Donald Trump can apparently no longer be considered "non-controversial," which is why the Federal Aviation Administration plans to drop three navigation codes named after the newly announced presidential candidate, ABC News reported.
DONLD, TRMMP and UFIRD -- codes invented in 2010 by an air traffic controller who was a fan of "The Apprentice," Trump's reality show -- are currently used as fly-over waypoints above Palm Beach International Airport. Like other such designations, they are meant to be pronounceable and have a mnemonic value, so that they may easily be conveyed over radio.
But the FAA announced that the names will being changed because "in general, names are chosen that are non-controversial and relate to the area in which the fixes are located," the federal agency told the network in a statement.
Palm Beach International also has a point named IVNKA ONE, a reference to the real estate mogul's daughter, the New York Daily News noted; the FAA did not say whether that code would be altered.
Many waypoints across the United States are named for celebrities, Reuters explained. "They are named after people all of the time," Carl Calcasola, the air traffic manager at the Florida airport. "It is all in whoever is designing the procedure. It's whatever they can come up with," he told the Palm Beach Post.
The Trump waypoints, however, seem to have caused problems years before the 69-year-old made headlines by saying that Mexico brings drug dealers, criminals and rapists to the United States and his comments caused widespread backlash in the Latino community.
The Palm Beach Post reported as early as 2010 that some pilots objected to honoring Trump, according to Paul Agnew, the head of Palm Beach International's advisory committee on airport noise and himself a commercial airline pilot.
"We actually have had reports of people refusing to fly these departures because they are so offended by the fact that Trump has been memorialized," Agnew noted at the time.
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