The AOPA wrote yesterday about a new rule relating to the Washington DC ADIZ. This rule requires any pilot who flies VFR within 60 nm of the ADIZ boundaries to take a mandatory training course. Apparently, this includes 117 airports and 142,000 cubic miles of airspace. Are you a student pilot at an airport 90 miles West of Washington who plans to never get anywhere near the ADIZ? You'd better get your training done, or else. Do you fly gliders 90 miles North of Washington and always work further North or West? Too bad, you have to complete the training as well.

The free training course, called "Navigating the new DC ADIZ," can be found at the FAASTeam website and supposedly takes about 90 minutes to complete. Thankfully, that is better than requiring a full day course or training that a pilot would have to pay a CFI or professional trainer for.

That being said, how in the world could anyone justify requiring this training for someone who will never fly into the ADIZ? The AOPA is on the record as opposing this rule. They note that most ADIZ violations are DHS complaints of pilots changing their transponder codes when cleared to land at uncontrolled airports, or leaving Class B airspace while still inside the ADIZ. These violations are old habit patterns in pilots who are already trained and approved to operate in the ADIZ...not cases of pilots accidentally wandering into the airspace.

AOPA lead a drive to get over 22,000 comments on the ADIZ rules on the FAA's website. The FAA is supposed to consider these comments and consider adapting ADIZ rules to make sense and be more effective. The AOPA website quoted President Phil Boyer making a pretty pointed comment about the FAA's consideration of those comments with respect to this new rule: 'Proposing a training requirement even before the rules are final "...gives the appearance that the comment process on the August proposed rule is a mere formality with the outcome preordained, despite overwhelming objections in both written comments and at public meetings'.

I acknowledge that we need measures to combat terrorism. However, i feel that Washington ADIZ does not accomplish that purpose. Now, more and more pilots are going to be burdened with extra bureaucracy at the hands of that ADIZ, even though these new requirements won't do much if anything to help prevent airspace incursions. The rule isn't even designed to increase security...it's designed to reduce technical violations by pilots approved to operate in that area.

Am I out to lunch here? Is there some kind of good reason to enact this rule? What do you think?