Airport Search

One of with aviation weather has always been that in order to get a NEXRAD map for an airport or a METAR report, you needed to know the airport identifier. Identifiers are those three or four letter codes that uniquely identifiy the airport. Most (but not all) airports have a three-letter IATA code (like SFO) or a four-letter ICAO code (like KSFO), and many have both. However, for some US airports the FAA uses a non-IATA designator (like 48XS or 8CA8). Some airports have no designator at all, such as Hafar Al Atk in Saudi Arabia and a few military landing zones at training bases here in the US. The problem is complicated by the limited screen real estate available on a phone and the very limited data input capabilities of a phone keypad.

There are three different searches implemented in AvWx.net: Search by Name, Search by Nearest US Town, and Search by Country, for airports outside the US.

Search by Name - This search option lets you enter a two letter abbreviation for a US state or Canadian province, and the first few letters of the airport name. The more letters you enter the more targeted your search, and you can see all of the airports in a state or province by leaving the state name field blank. You can use the per-cent sign (%) as a wildcard. For example, if you enter %muni for the airport name, you'll get all the airports in the state with "Municipal" in the name. (You'll also get some others, such as anything with "community" in the name).

Search by Nearest US Town - This search works very much like Search by Name. Instead of looking at airport names it searches the name of the town associated with the airport. This sometimes does not return the results you expect when the two towns are very close to the same airport. The FAA database only associates one town with each airport, a search using the other town will likely come up empty.

Search by Country - This search is similar to Search by Name, but instead of specifying a state or province abbreviation, you enter the first few letters of the country name. For example, entering "be" will show you airports in Belarus, Belgium, Belize, Benin and Bermuda. You can use the % wildcard in the country name to minimize typing. For example, un%k will give you airports in the United Kingdom. (Just entering u%k would also give you airports in Ukrane and Uzbekistan.) The airport name field can be left blank in this search, or you can enter a few letters to help narrow your search.

Note that none of the searches are case sensitive, so entering ABC into a search box is the same as entering abc, or aBc.

With the Airport Search capability you never have to worry about remembering the airport designator and you don't have to pull your sectionals or AF/D out of your flight bag just to get a quick weather update.