Definition
An FAA category covering the physical infrastructure and hardware that support the National Airspace System — including navigation aids, communication systems, radar installations, control tower equipment, and the buildings that house them. The term is most commonly seen in FAA budgeting, planning, and NOTAM contexts, where outages, upgrades, or construction affecting these assets are reported.
Plain English
The buildings and gear the FAA uses to run air traffic and navigation services — towers, radar sites, radios, navaids, and the structures that hold them.
Context Anchor
Seen in FAA acronym lists, airport planning or maintenance material, and aviation notices that refer to operational infrastructure.
Why Pilots Care
When an F&E item is out of service, it can directly affect a flight — a VOR offline, a tower radio down, or a radar site under maintenance can change how a pilot navigates, communicates, or files a route.
Intuition Check
Do not read F&E as general office supplies or loose tools. In aviation use, it usually points to the facilities and installed equipment that support real flight operations.
Example Sentence 1
The NOTAM listed an F&E outage affecting the localizer at the destination airport.
Example Sentence 2
F&E improvements helped restore full operations after the storm damaged several hangars.