Evan Reiter

It is my pleasure to formally welcome Jonathan to ZBW's ATC Training Staff! Jonathan joins the team who have the important responsibility of providing training to the air traffic controllers here in ZBW. Jonathan joined our ATC training program on August 24, 2017, completing his first session with none other than Camden Bruno. Poor HS. Surprisingly, the initial feedback was actually positive. That's right...Camden said something nice in a training report. Don't believe me? (I edited out the swear words.) After earning the S3 rating (allowing him to work Approach on the network), HS recently took the plunge into becoming a Mentor. As many of our controllers know, involvement in Mentoring is extremely important in keeping our ARTCC alive and well. New controllers are the lifeblood of the community. Anyone else who is in the process, or has recently achieved an S3: please consider submitting an application. To date, HS has logged 234 hours on the network.

It's my pleasure to share that Jonathan Halverson (HS) is now the newest radar controller at BVA! He handled VFR-IFR requests, a localizer/backcourse approach, and a whole bunch of PVD traffic (with a terrible overlying CTR controller that doesn't know how to space arrivals) in our simulator with ease. The transition from Tower to Approach is typically one of the biggest learning curves virtual controllers face. Well done, and welcome to the dark side! Oh, and pilots: watch out!

A few moments ago, it was officially announced that Orlando will host FlightSimExpo 2019 on June 7-9. Boston Virtual ARTCC is a proud partner of FlightSimExpo, and looks forward to welcoming our members, along with the rest of the simulation community, to Orlando this June. The press release below has been shared with media partners across the industry, and myself and Phil will be working on the next few days on updating our website with information about the 2019 location and some of the new and exciting features of this year's event. As you know, BVA was an integral part of making FlightSimExpo's inaugural year in Las Vegas a tremendous success. We look forward to working with our members once again to make FlightSimExpo 2019 bigger and better yet!

Congratulations PI, and welcome (formally) to the team! We're proud to recognize the great work you've been doing in support of our community, much of it behind the scenes. Now that GDPR is in effect, he'll need to ask each of us for approval before doing that.

Well done to Jonathan Halverson (HS) for the completion of his Class B Tower OTS! Me (and my ISP) threw everything we could at him, including helicopters, go arounds, and a pesky Boeing 777 that didn't want to take off. He handled it all with style, grace, and even a little "flare" (see what I did there?...oh, and that rhymes too!), and is ready to take on the next big ATC challenge: Approach! Well done HS!

Congratulations to our newest Class B Tower On Peak controller! Austin Cirulli (or Circulli, or Cirucli, depending how I'm feeling) passed his OTS on Boston tonight with a strong 4/9 showing that even included a Southwest Boeing 737 doing an overhead break. Join me in welcoming him to the ranks of Class B Tower, and counting the days until he starts colliding airplanes on Approach as well as Tower.

We've got the downloads for KACK/KHYA/etc. here, as part of our "Featured Airports Scenery Enhancement" package: http://www.bvartcc.com/Members/Downloads/RequiredSoftware.aspx. Weren't you flying the Cardinal at KACK? I thought I had to vector you around and land you on Runway 6, opposite direction. Was that someone else?

Lantz -- do you have the KACK update published on our website? I don't know how it plays with P3D but I do know it solves the ILS problem (in FSX).

No, never did. I didn't bother following up; that thing is so old at this point, it wouldn't be worth anything.

It's delissio when a student like DL finishes his Class B Tower training! No dud sessions here, congratulate Benjamin Dudley on his successful Class B Tower OTS. He's a great student to work with and a quick learner. Watch out if you're departing Runway 22R and don't make the RNAV turn, because he knows what to do! See you on radar training...

I'd like to propose that we change RQ's initials to something easier to make puns out of. Either that, or I'm just going to have to stop training him. Either way, I'm happy to say that RQ is our latest Class B Tower controller, having completed the Class B Tower Off-Peak authorization on the network this evening. Thanks to some quality helicopter flying from our ZNY friend AJ, we got everything from helicopters, VFR requests, IFR jetliners, and even a few .wallop requests too! Good times were had by all except RQ, which usually means it was a good session. My favorite line of the night was definitely "takeoff from the beach at your own risk". Good thing they have spare helicopters sitting there...

Seriously...who is ever that hungry that they feel it's reasonable to eat at Arby's? I've never watched television ads that make food look so inedible. What, we're live? Oh, okay...Congratulations to BVA's two newest soon-to-be C1s! Brandon Bergna (BG) and Chris Raabe (RB) recently completed successful off-peak Center OTSs, and will be managing the complex airspace across New England. Becoming a Center-certified controller is the result of a tremendous amount of self-study, hard work, and bothering Mentors and Instructors for training. Brandon began ATC training on February 16, 2015 with ATC Mentor Andrew Miller. Less than a month later, I worked with Brandon on Class B Ground and told him to stop "calling out aircraft for incorrect taxi instructions" and to use more professional "amend taxi instruction" phraseology instead. It's always fun seeing how far we've come: Brandon he passed his Class B Approach off-peak certification on July 28, 2016. Since then, he's worked almost 200 hours on the network refining his skills at the Approach and Center level. An avid enthusiast of BVA's military, Chris actually started his training way back on October 23, 2012. In my first-ever training post, I wrote "Student's first session on position was extremely strong, enough so for the certification. Things started out a little shaky -- not surprising since it was his first on-session experience -- but with heavy traffic in tonight's KBOS/KPWM Regional Circuit event the student performed exceptionally." Not much has changed: Chris continues to excel throughout his local training, many years of regular ATC at the local control level, and eventually his first Approach training session in January, 2016. We thank Brandon and Chris for their dedication to the community, and welcome them as BVA's newest Center controllers. Congratulations, gentlemen!

...and we've now completed the Class B Approach OTS. Bring on Center (on the network, over the next few weeks).

Mark your calendars, stock up on munchies, and tell the family to head out of town for the weekend: October 13-15, 2017 will be the biggest weekend of events in BVA's history! It all starts at 11am ET on Friday, October 13 when we launch 60 Hours of ATC, 60 straight hours of Boston Center coverage. Any time you wish to fly in ZBW, day or night, you will find coverage online. Starting at 7pm ET, we host VATUSA's Friday Night Operations event. There will be a full staff of controllers online at Boston Logan International (KBOS), and staffing at other local airports. The event runs until 11pm ET, but ZBW will remain online overnight and for the rest of the weekend. Then, we kick off Saturday morning early! At 6am, the first departures for Cross the Pond Eastbound 2017 will be connecting to the network. Cross the Pond takes place twice a year (westbound in March, eastbound in October) and is one of the busiest and most sought after events in the VATSIM calendar. It is a mass crossing of the North Atlantic with full ATC offered the whole way, with heavy traffic levels guaranteed for your whole flight. As a departure airport, KBOS will be fully-staffed, and there will be multiple Approach and Center controllers online across ZBW. Whether you're flying across the Atlantic for the event or are just looking for a great chance to fly in a lit up airspace, join us all day on Saturday, October 14. Looking for information on flying this event? Check out our , hosted by Air Traffic Manager Camden Bruno. 60 Hours of ATC continues throughout the day on October 15, and ends at 11:00pm on Sunday, wrapping up what is likely the busiest event weekend our community has ever participated in!

Looking for information on flying this event? Check out our , hosted by Air Traffic Manager Camden Bruno.

Matt Dupree (MD) just aced his Class B Tower OTS, and we'll be working on Class B Approach as early as tomorrow. We're excited to welcome Matt back into the fold and look forward to seeing him on Center again soon.

My mind has been running in CIRcles trying to find a pun on RQ, but that doesn't nULLIfy the excellent work Austin has been doing on Class C Tower training. That culminated today in a successful OTS on Class C Tower at PWM. We threw everything we could at him: VFR, IFR, SVFR, missed approaches, practice approaches, some interestingly-timed VFR closed traffic requests...and he handled it all like a pro. No need for the goal horn or anything. After yet another 100% score on an exam (this time, the VATUSA S2), RQ has been promoted to the ranks of the S2's, and will be looking forward to the next BDL Tuesday to get some Class C Tower time in. Watch out PI!

Welcome Dale Gensler (GR) to the team! GR is a clearance delivery expert now, having seen just about every single mistake possible in our series of training sessions at PWM. Now that you're used to correcting something in at least every flight plan, you're ready for the network! Welcome aboard...I look forward to working with you soon.

Your best bet is to use a program like VATSpy or Vattastic Like Cam said, the list is probably too large (and too dynamic) to be able to provide in advance. In general, I can tell you that we'll have a fully-staffed Boston, several sectors of Center, and then coverage at almost all of the satellite airports. In general, we're always using real-world frequencies, so that can provide something of a guide. But, of course, you don't always know what is and isn't staffed.

The Boston and New York ARTCC's are teaming up for the annual Northeastern Corridor event on 30 June! Join us for four hours of non-stop traffic at Boston Logan airport (KBOS) and New York Newark airport (KEWR), from 1900-2300 Eastern (2300-0300 zulu). All aircraft types and routes are welcome to join us in one of the busiest and most congested air corridors in the world!

Good find! Fixed. Thanks a lot. If there was an award for finding these, you would be in serious contention. Have you considered applying to work as a web crawler for Google? :P

That's so cool! I like the part when they start talking about me...and now I know why there was that awkward silence after I asked D'Andre a question.

Thanks a lot! I've made these updates and released Version S of the General SOP. Thanks! I have passed these on to Phil to review.

The NAV CANADA implementation of "climb via" and "descend via" -- at least where I was -- was a mess. 2 out of the 5 airports I fly to daily were using "climb via", and the others weren't. In one case (Abbotsford), the Tower would use it, but the FSS that provides after-hours service wouldn't. Meanwhile, they also decided that (in Canada), "descend via" wouldn't include speeds (i.e., a previously-assigned speed restriction still applies) whereas in the U.S., "descend via" cancels the assigned speed and returns you to what's published. The inconsistency there likely created a lot of the confusion that led to the suspension.

The old 'bostonvirtualatc.com' domain name has been decommissioned. We no longer use the domain given our new name, and releasing it allows us to save a little bit of money each year in ISP/domain fees. Over the past several months, we have tried to remove all of the references and links we could with old 'bostonvirtualatc.com' domains in them. However, we may have missed a few. If you notice a link that isn't working, please point it out so we can get that corrected. In addition, please ensure you update your contacts. Previously, '@bostonvirtualatc.com' email addresses were being forwarded to the correct recipient. Now, those addresses will bounce. BVA staff members have '@bvartcc.com' email addresses, and the full list is located on the Administration page.