Washington's Special Flight Rules Area — the map, the rules, and a decision tree that walks any flight to its exact procedure · built from a CFI's seat at KANP, inside the ring · all tools →
Since 2003, flying anywhere near Washington means flying inside national defense airspace — a 30 nm ring where every aircraft must be identified, talking, and squawking, wrapped around an inner zone where GA essentially may not go at all. The rules live in 14 CFR Part 93 Subpart V plus a Chart Supplement special notice, and violating them — even inadvertently — is handled as a security event, not a paperwork problem. This page draws the airspace to scale, translates the rules, and then lets you answer one question at a time until you're holding the exact procedure for your flight.
Every boundary below is drawn from the legal description — the FRZ polygon from §93.335, the prohibited areas from FAA Order JO 7400.10H. Click anywhere on the map and the panel tells you exactly which rules apply at that spot.
Work from the outside in: each ring keeps everything from the ring before and adds more.
§93.339 is a five-item checklist. Miss any one item and you're a track on a NORAD scope with fighters on alert — the rest of this page is just these five, applied.
ALC-405 certificate for any VFR flight within 60 nm. Free, online, ~1 hr, once ever. Show it to the FAA, TSA, or any law-enforcement officer on request.
Its own type — not a regular VFR flight plan. File gate→airport, airport→gate, or gate→gate (Leidos / your EFB). It buys no search-and-rescue and no radar services; it exists so security knows who you are.
Getting the code is what activates the plan. You cannot enter first and sort it out airborne, and you cannot depart VFR planning to pick up an IFR clearance in the air. Squawk it continuously — 1200 is forbidden in the SFRA, even after “radar services terminated.”
Established with Potomac before the boundary and maintained the whole time. “Transponder observed” means the security system sees you — it is not flight following, and implies no traffic services at all.
Altitude-reporting transponder required. ≤180 KIAS inside the ring, ≤230 KIAS from 30 to 60 nm — the limits that keep an unknown track's intercept math workable.
“Whether inadvertent or intentional”: civil penalties and certificate suspension or revocation; knowing violations of national defense airspace can be prosecuted criminally. There is no “I was only a mile inside.”
KANP sits about 17 nm east of the DCA VOR — inside the SFRA, outside the FRZ, non-towered. Every takeoff and landing at Lee is an SFRA operation. The numbers that run a Lee flight:
Every SFRA flight reduces to a handful of questions. Answer them and land on the exact checklist — squawk, phone numbers, who to talk to, and the reg behind each step. The breadcrumbs are clickable if you want to back up and try a different flight.
The SFRA has published answers for every failure — the theme is always the same: stay predictable, talk if you can, and get out by the shortest path if you can't.
Squawk 7600 and exit the SFRA by the most direct lateral route — or return to your departure point if that's closer (in the FRZ, only if within 5 nm of it).
Tell ATC immediately and do what they say. If you can't reach them, same drill: most direct lateral route out, or back to the departure point if closer.
Follow the interceptor's instructions — all of them, immediately. Come up on 121.5 with call sign and position, squawk 7700 unless directed otherwise. Rock your wings back if signaled. This is not the moment to explain yourself first.
Talking to ATC? Tell them immediately that you're being illuminated. Not talking to anyone? Turn away from DC now and call ATC or 121.5.
Declaring an emergency (§91.3(b)) or flying IFR lost-comms procedures (§91.185) is a defense to the training rule and takes priority — aviate first. Expect to talk about it afterward; expect an escort if it takes you toward the FRZ.
GAO found pilot error — not bad actors — behind the overwhelming majority of restricted-airspace violations here. The recurring mistakes:
Feb 2003: with Iraq looming, the DC ADIZ appears overnight by NOTAM — “temporary,” enormous, and instantly the most-violated airspace in the country. May 2005: a lost Cessna 150 gets within 3 mi of the White House; the Capitol evacuates; the pilots meet a Black Hawk, an F-16's flares, and the national news.
Dec 2008: after >20,000 overwhelmingly opposed public comments, the FAA makes it permanent anyway — the ADIZ becomes the SFRA of 14 CFR Part 93 Subpart V, effective Feb 17, 2009, shrunk to the 30 nm ring. The training rule (91.161) lands the same month: proposed at 100 nm, finalized at 60. The Visual Warning System lasers had been fielded in 2005. Nothing about it has been temporary since.
A gate is nothing exotic: it's an ordinary NAS intersection (or navaid — BRV is the Brooke VORTAC) pressed into service as a filing fix. What the gate really names is a slice of the 30 nm boundary, bounded by DCA VOR radials — WOOLY is R-341 clockwise to R-046, PALEO picks up at R-047, and so on around the ring. You file to/from the gate and cross the boundary anywhere in its slice; you never have to fly to the fix itself (several sit well outside the ring — the map draws each fix, its slice, and the dotted tie between them). Frequencies below are from the FAA's ALC-405 course kneeboard (Jan 2020) and are stamped “frequencies subject to change — always check NOTAMs”; the current Washington TAC is the authority:
| Gate | DCA radials | Side of the ring | Kneeboard freq |
|---|---|---|---|
| WOOLY | R-341 → R-046 | N — I-270 to I-95 | 132.775 |
| PALEO | R-047 → R-119 | NE→E — I-95 to Chesapeake Beach (Lee's usual eastbound door) | 132.775 |
| WHINO | R-120 → R-172 | SE — to the Wicomico River | 125.125 |
| GRUBY | R-173 → R-214 | S — to the Potomac at Widewater | 125.125 |
| BRV | R-215 → R-236 | SSW — Brooke VORTAC corner | 127.325 |
| FLUKY | R-237 → R-269 | SW — to VA Rte 29 | 127.325 |
| JASEN | R-270 → R-309 | W — to VA Rte 7 | 127.325 |
| LUCKE | R-310 → R-340 | NW — to I-270 | 127.325 |
Sources — radial ranges, checkpoints & frequencies: FAA ALC-405 course kneeboard (Jan 2020, the last edition to print the table; the current Chart Supplement notice defers to the Washington TAC). Fix positions: FAA CIFP / OpenNav, agreeing to 4+ decimals. The map converts these DCA radials to true bearings using the ≈9°W station declination derived from §93.335's own radial↔coordinate pairs.