Image: Screenshot of the Month winner Aidan M.

Boston Virtual ARTCC's Community Newsletter · January 1, 2025

We start our public-facing homepage with the words “We are an Aviation Family”. In many ways, “like family” is how many of us view the community. Some of us talk every day; others we hear from on occasion, and there are some names we’d still recognize even though we haven’t connected in years. (And don’t get us started on the crazy uncles…)

Like a family, we don’t always agree 100% of the time. Some of us don’t call as often as we’d like. But, like a family, we take care of each other, and we share a unique passion for a hobby that probably seems a little crazy to some of our real families.

As we reach the end of 2024 and turn the calendar to 2025, join the Administration Team as we look back on what made us proud in 2024, and what we aspire to in 2025. 

Let’s Start with the Data

The main reason our family exists is to provide a realistic, professional, and fun air traffic control atmosphere for virtual pilots and air traffic controllers. So, let’s start by looking at how much of that we did in 2024! 

For the year, Boston Center was:

• The most-staffed radar facility on VATSIM with an uptime of over 30%.
• The most-staffed facility within VATUSA, now for the third year in a row.

This happened because of the dedication of our 42 Center-certified home and visiting controllers…who do what they do because our pilots create a rewarding and challenging environment for us every day. Boston Center was staffed for 2,665 hours, 30.35% of the year and a 2% increase from last year!

Boston Center also won VATUSA’s “Iron Mic” award for being the most-staffed facility in September, October, November, and December this year! 

These results are supported by our incredible team of 148 (+13% from 2024) home controllers and 30 visitors. In the past year, more than 170 (+10%) people have controlled a ZBW ATC position for at least 1 hour. And together, our controllers were online for 13,601 hours at airports big and small across our airspace– a 7% increase from 2023. 

We do all this so pilots have an exciting and dynamic virtual flight environment on a near-nightly basis. All that coverage helped our busiest airport, KBOS, finish the year as the second-busiest VATUSA airport. With 59,521 virtual takeoffs and landings as of December 30, KBOS was also the 9th-busiest airport across all of VATSIM. (In real life, KBOS doesn’t crack the top 20 busiest airports in the world.)

We Come Together for the Food Events

Over the course of 2024, we organized 34 events (times where ATC coverage was guaranteed). Our two highlights were Boston Tea Party and 60 Hours of ATC. 

During Boston Tea Party, KBOS saw more than 320 arrivals and departures over 6 hours of ATC coverage in-person from New England. 50+ of our pilots flew in our fun Tea Party Poker prize competition. And let’s not forget this all happened less than a week after our planned venue closed, forcing a last-minute venue change…something of a 2024 trend that we hope doesn’t repeat itself in 2025!

We held 60 Hours of ATC just a few weeks ago. 60 Hours is our annual marathon event that sees us staff Boston Center for more than 60 straight hours. Over the weekend, KBOS saw 554 departures and 604 arrivals. Even cooler: BVA controllers held informal gatherings in Boston, Washington, and Los Angeles to celebrate the occasion and provide the around-the-clock coverage alongside fellow members. 

Our community was also selected to participate in some of VATSIM’s biggest events, including: 

• The charity-oriented World Flight for the second year in a row. 
• Light Up America live from FlightSimExpo in Las Vegas. 
• Cross the Pond, where we helped set VATSIM’s current connection record of 3,208 unique network connections during the Eastbound event this fall. 

Alongside ATC-oriented events, we closed out the year with our All Members Meeting on December 20, for which more than 60 of our members gathered in TeamSpeak to share in updates from across the community before enjoying an informal ATC staff-up across the airspace. 

As we move into 2025, Events Coordinator Cameron Peterson (PX) and the Events Team have plenty more in store, including plans for our annual Northeast Corridor FNO featuring KBOS, KDCA, and KLGA on February 7. We’re super excited to see FlightSimExpo hosted within our ARTCC in 2025. We’re also working to find a new home for Boston Tea Party so our annual in-person ATC gathering can continue to grow bigger and better each year. 

Someone’s Gotta Do The Cooking

Powering our community is an incredible team of volunteers who are constantly tinkering with the recipe to keep everything tasting just right! 

In 2024, the Administration Team welcomed: 

• Justin Blakey (BU) as our Training Administrator, responsible for managing the team of 18 Instructors and Mentors who train our air traffic controllers. 
• Camden Bruno (BN) as our Community Manager, whose impact on the pilot side of our community is being felt through our All Member Meeting and updates to our pilot-facing documentation (more on that in a bit). 
• Szymon Puzdrowski (PI) back to the Administration Team as an incredibly talented technical resource for Webmaster Collin Koldoff (KF). 

The Administration Team is supported by controllers and pilots from across the community who volunteer to make our organization the place it is. Whether it’s managing finances, responding to emails, answering member questions, running Cape Air Virtual, leading BVA’s Military vSOA operation, or putting together the Logan Informer each month, our community wouldn’t be the place it is without you. 

The Administration Team also serves as the liaison between our community and the broader VATUSA and VATSIM organization. In 2024, network-wide changes included: 

• The launch of ICAO-based flight plan filing on myVATSIM.
• The continued trial of airport-specific CTAF in place of a single frequency. 
• The launch of ‘AUTO_ATC’ functionality within vNAS, which now supports automatic assignment of squawk codes and advisory messages in unstaffed airspaces. 
• An updated VATSIM Code of Conduct, which introduced the use of Guard (121.5) across the network, and in December, the announcement of an improved orientation course for new VATSIM members. 
• The introduction of the Global Controller Administration Policy (GCAP) to replace GRP and offer more standardized controller training procedures across the network. 

As we move into 2025, the Administration Team and our ATC leadership will continue to support our controllers with better training materials and enhanced scenario-based learning. As we continue to benefit from the new capabilities offered to us by vNAS (the new suite of ATC technology first introduced in 2023), we expect to see continued modernization efforts in our documentation and procedures to better support and manage increasing traffic levels throughout our airspace. 

…while others are socializing

While our ATC leadership team keeps refining that ‘secret sauce’, our Webmaster and Community team are working to keep all members of our community engaged. 

2024’s efforts included the introduction of a new email client and a refreshed design for our Logan Informer and Event Reminder emails (like this one!). Controller Sean (DY) shared his BVA-themed repaint for the PMDG 737, and is working toward introducing BVA Special Operations (more on that in a separate article). 

The biggest news in the flight simulation community was the release of Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 earlier this year. On November 24, an update to vPilot allowed pilots to connect to the network with MSFS 2024 for the first time. 

Within the community, we’ve made it easier for new members to get up and running with VATSIM with our new Pre-Flight Checks, a series that walks pilots through everything needed to get connected to the network. This involved consolidating several of our previous resources and website pages into an easy, step-by-step community intro for newcomers. We also updated our Airspace Briefing Guide and introduced a new Guide to Nocturnal Operations at KBOS.

As we move into 2025, we’ll be embarking on a redesign of our signature WINGS Over New England program. Flown by 10,000+ pilots over the years, the program was originally designed when you could occasionally find a VOR to navigate to. As VOR decommissioning continues across our airspace, we’ll be re-focusing the WINGS program onto more modern forms of navigation while retaining the fundamentals of flying within the ATC system that WINGS has always been about. 

We’ll also be conducting our bi-annual Member Satisfaction Survey. This would normally have been conducted in 2024, but we wanted to hold off for a few weeks to capture initial impressions about the MSFS 2024 release. Look for the survey link in an Informer near you in the first few weeks of 2025. 

We are an Aviation Family

As those of us in real-world aviation know all too well, not everyone can make it to every family gathering. But what’s great about family is that you’re always welcome. 

Whether…

• You’re flying in every event…
• It’s 3am, you’re up early, so you’re signing onto Boston Center…
• It’s 3am, you’re up late, and you’re still on Boston Tower because there’s just 1 more arrival inbound from Moncton…
• You work behind the scenes to help keep our community running…
• Or you’re losing sleep trying to type out the last few paragraphs of a Logan Informer article… 

If you have a passion for this hobby, love aviation, and care for others who share your passion, there will always be a place for you at our table. So if you’re joining us for your first flight, re-joining us after your hundredth, or just spending another Tuesday in front of a computer screen, it’s a privilege and an honor to manage our unique airspace for you, every day.

To everyone who makes BVA the community it is, including our neighboring ARTCCs and colleagues across VATSIM and VATUSA: thank you. See you at FlightSimExpo, Tea Party, on TeamSpeak, in Discord, and on the network. 

By:  Camden Bruno

Registration for FlightSimExpo—North America’s community-driven flight simulation convention—opened in December. FlightSimExpo 2025 takes place on June 27-29, 2025 at the Rhode Island Convention Center in Providence. 
The show has always been a gathering place for our members, but with the 2025 event being held in our home airspace, we expect BVA and VATSIM/VATUSA to have a large presence at FlightSimExpo in 2025. 

If you’re planning to attend the show, please enter the code “BVA” when you register (or, use this link and the code will be applied automatically). Please also list “Boston Virtual ARTCC” as your organization when you register. 

In partnership with FSExpo, we anticipate that select BVA controllers who volunteer at the event and spend at least 5 hours controlling a rostered position from the show floor will receive a gift card of equal or greater value to their registration. Pilot members who wish to bring a flight sim setup may also qualify, while space is available. Applications to be part of our volunteer team will open in 2025. 

More information about BVA’s involvement alongside VATUSA/VATSIM at FSExpo will be available in the coming weeks. 

By: Sean Doyle

In case you missed our all-members meeting on December 20, BVA formally announced that our internal VSOA, BVA Military (also known as MACE) is set to complete a rebranding and restructuring with a launch date of March 1. 

Now called BVA Special Operations (BVASO), this modernization project of the legacy BVA Military will have a renewed and enhanced presence in the community while also standing up more current technology like a dedicated website and ACARS tracking. Beyond that, BVASO is a departure away from the fictional military air wing structure currently deployed into a renewed focus on the realistic and immersive operations of ZBW’s real world military counterparts alongside a new and unique twist: civilian operations.

Members joining the VSOA will be trained on the proper techniques, phraseology, and operations of the many fixed-wing and rotary civilian special operations that exist in real world ZBW featuring such organizations like: Boston Medflight, Dartmouth Hitchcock Advance Response Team (DHART), Lifeflight of Maine, Mass State Police, and many others.

More information to be provided in the coming months but be sure to mark your calendars for March 1st’s launch coinciding with a celebratory event live on the network!

By: Cameron Peterson

We kicked off December—and another New England Winter—with one of our favorite events: 60 Hours of ATC. Our airspace was lit up all weekend, with controllers offering around-the-clock Boston Center coverage.

While Boston Center was staffed, KBOS saw a total of 1,158 operations. The visualization below, courtesy of StatSim, gives you an idea of how the traffic ebbed and flowed through KBOS over the course of the 3-day event:

By: Cameron Peterson

The Northeast Corridor (NEC) is a linchpin of U.S. transportation infrastructure, connecting eight states and the District of Columbia with unparalleled efficiency. From over 2,200 daily train operations to the bustling complexities of its airspace, the NEC is a marvel of integration.

The Northeast Corridor Atlantic Coast Routes (NEC ACR) project, implemented in April 2023, has modernized the high-altitude route structure with new Q and Y routes, improving efficiency, reducing delays, and providing smoother traffic flow for aviation along the East Coast.

To showcase the intricacies of this remarkable corridor, Virtual New York ARTCC, Washington Virtual ARTCC, and Boston Virtual ARTCC are proud to present the 11th Annual Northeast Corridor FNO on February 7th, 2025, from 7-11 PM ET (2359-0400z).

Join us for a night of high-intensity operations as we fully staff three of the NEC’s busiest air hubs:

• Washington-National (DCA)
  
• New York-LaGuardia (LGA)
  
• Boston-Logan (BOS)

Learn more about the event on our forums.

Pilot Tip of the Month

 Listening Before Speaking

When assigned a frequency change by air traffic control, it's imperative that you spend a few moments on the new frequency building a mental picture of what is going on. This is particularly important during congested events such as Honk and Cross the Pond. There have been many instances of pilots changing frequency and immediately contacting ATC without listening first, thereby stepping on another pilot (or the controller themselves) and blocking a readback or instruction.

If you switch to a new frequency and can't get a word in because it's busy, wait until there is a break and call in. Sometimes, the controller may know you're on their frequency, and they will call you. Conversely, if it's quiet for a few seconds after listening, go ahead and make your call; just know that the controller may be coordinating behind-the-scenes and may not respond immediately.

For more information on radio procedures and other useful knowledge for operating in the Boston area, read our Airspace Briefing Guide here.

You are receiving this email as a member of Boston Virtual ARTCC. Members receive emails from us monthly, including announcements and this newsletter. If you're signed up for Event Reminders, you'll receive more frequent emails. 

We rely on donations from our members to support the community. Please consider making a tax-deductible donation.

To manage your subscriptions, use Settings. To stop receiving all correspondence from us, Delete Your BVA Account Online.