Definition
FAA Order 8260.3, titled United States Standard for Terminal Instrument Procedures (TERPS), is the official FAA document that prescribes the criteria used to design, evaluate, and approve all instrument approach, departure, and arrival procedures in the United States. It defines the obstacle clearance requirements, protected airspace dimensions, descent gradients, missed approach surfaces, and minimum altitudes that every published instrument procedure must meet.
Plain English
TERPS is the FAA rulebook that procedure designers follow when building any instrument approach or departure. It tells them exactly how much room must be kept clear of obstacles, how steeply an aircraft can be asked to descend, and what minimum altitudes are safe. Every approach plate a pilot uses was built using these rules.
Context Anchor
You may see this term in instrument approach discussions, especially when a handbook explains why an approach has certain altitudes, minimums, turns, or protected areas.
Derivation
TERPS stands for Terminal Instrument Procedures. 'Terminal' here refers to the airspace and operations near an airport (the terminal phase of flight, where aircraft are arriving or departing) rather than the building passengers walk through. 'Order 8260.3' is simply the FAA's internal document number.
Why Pilots Care
Every instrument procedure a pilot flies is built to TERPS standards, which directly determine obstacle clearance, minimum altitudes, and flyability.
Analogy
TERPS is like a building code for instrument procedures. Pilots usually do not use the code directly in flight, but the chart they fly was built from it.
Intuition Check
Do not read “Order” as an air traffic control command. Here, an FAA Order is an official FAA instruction document. TERPS is not the chart itself; it is the design standard behind the chart.
Example Sentence 1
Every instrument approach in the U.S. is designed under FAA Order 8260.3 TERPS, which is why the minimum altitudes on the chart can be trusted to provide obstacle clearance.
Example Sentence 2
Controllers and pilots rely on procedures that meet FAA Order 8260.3 TERPS requirements for safe descent paths.