It seems 100% obvious, I know, and I didn't, that to get NOTAM for a specific flight, you have to input your departure date, even planning, as I normally do, the night before a trip.
So I got caught out with a departure airfield closure from 0800 - 1430 local, which I planned the day before. No-one I've asked since has said they routinely input trip date/times on a NOTAM request. Talking to NATS, they were baffled that we don't routinely input the date.
I've found the Norweigan IPPC site quick and efficient - with one request, without having to sign in, one gets NOTAM, MET, TAF, SNOWTAM, SIGMET, KITCHEN SINK etc. for departure, destination, en route airfields etc.
Try: (omit a/c callsign and for VFR just insert DCT for the route, and add en route alternates etc.) for a comprehensive narrow route briefing.
Yes, always put the date in ;-) Sometimes I even check Notam's a week in advance if I want to do something like a channel crossing. A few years ago I didnt, and I had my Dad and my sister all excited about a short France trip. I even sent the GAR form off. The night before the flight, checking the NOTAM's, I found out that channel crossings were effectively closed due to to one of those Bleriot celebrations. Well, that put a stop to the France trip. We did Isle of Wight in the end, and we just pretended it was a foreign country.
Another tip, I picked up from Peter on another site, was that planning a GPS based route via aerodrome ICAO identifiers is not acceptable in the Notam 'Route' section. It comes up with an error anyhow, but I wrongly assumed that by sticking all the aerodromes into the 'Alternate Aerodromes' fields, I was building up a 'Narrow Route Brief' for my intended flight. Well I wasnt. All I was doing was building a brief for a straight line DCT route between my departure and destination, and getting the specif aerodrome infomation for those which I additionally listed. I potentially wasnt getting NOTAM's for anything that was on my actual intended track, which was quite different - routing around some aerodromes.
One other reason why you would want to put the dates in, is because it cuts down on the quantity of NOTAMs. You then don't have to read through the ones that aren't active when you're flying.
Without adjusting the date, the UK NATS system defaults to 12 hours from current time. It does at least show the times that it's using, making it somewhat obvious the period that you're getting the briefing for.
The Norwegian one I think is only open to Norwegian pilots if I remember correctly.
I'm guessing someone from a dark forum is going to come along in a minute and say: - But the aerodrome isn't licensed, therefore they can't publish a NOTAM [we know this is untrue] - That's what PPR is for [we know how much we dislike PPR and the phone lines aren't always manned]
PPR is not the same thing as it being sensible to phone the place before you fly there 
Once upon a time I planned to fly to San Nicolo, near Venice. A very scenic airfield.
The airport info said No Customs but Yes to Avgas.
A pilot forum post, by an extremely high profile pilot forum personality (no longer flying, I believe) said "Customs can be arranged".
The flight was from Wangen Lachen, Switzerland.
Before the flight, I tried to phone them, for a few days. No reply. No fax number or email address.
I decided to skip them and flew direct to Corfu instead.
Shortly afterwards another pilot departed Wangen Lachen and flew to San Nicolo anyway. Nobody around. He landed. Nobody there. Obviously no Customs or avgas, either. He got the message and got out of there damn quick, "diverting" to another Italian airport which did have Customs. For obvious reasons, the quick stop was not mentioned 
Life is too short to have hassle like this. We all work to make flying easy and fun (not a lot can be done about all the hassle on the ground) so why make life hard by flying to an airport which you cannot contact, or which you decided to not contact on principle?
And in the UK it is so easy, because one can just speak English on the phone.
I don't like PPR either but the phone call is a pretty wise thing IMHO.
If there is no reply, it's your risk, obviously.
Once upon a time I planned to fly to San Nicolo, near Venice. A very scenic airfield. The airport info said No Customs... Shortly afterwards another pilot ... flew to San Nicolo anyway. Nobody around. He landed. Nobody there. Obviously no Customs ... He got the message and got out of there damn quick, "diverting" to another Italian airport
Got what message? What would have happened had he left it there?
Simply, flying from Switzerland (non EU, non Schengen, etc) to a non Customs airport, anywhere, is illegal.
What the chance of getting picked up for it is, I have no idea. There are several Italian members here so perhaps they can comment.
My guess is that, in Italy, you might well get away with it.
But, and I am sorry if I am emulating this chap it depends on how lucky you feel.
The VHF comms (departure: Switzerland, arrival: San Nicholo) will be heard by perhaps a few hundred people.
It takes just one person who has the most rudimentary knowledge of aviation protocol and who likes to wear a yellow jacket and he makes a phone call...
There are loads of things which are illegal and for which you can never be picked up (VFR in IMC while enroute, etc) but this is not one of them.
Same if you flew from say Ireland to some little place in the UK. The flight plan will work allright (VFR or IFR - nobody checks them for compliance with the GAR requirements) but from my experience you are 100% likely to be met by the police. If you don't get picked up it's because they didn't get there quickly enough. Only the other day Justine and I got picked up by the police (I filed a GAR but it went to Customs and not Immigration or something like that).
The Norwegian one I think is only open to Norwegian pilots if I remember correctly.
Sort of true, DublinPilot - I applied to register, and they said that I had to show that I fly to Norway regularly (or be based there) - neither of which applies to me. I'm not sure what the advantage is.
But you can still use the narrow route briefing system. I just find it useful to use one site, which gives me everything, MET and NOTAM, in one shot, from any internet connection.
I once got caught by a missed notam when flying from Sevilla to Biarritz. I had brief the flight the night before the departure. Checked all notams nothing was there to worry about. So I took off the next day and literally 5 min. before arrival tower told me they could not accept me as parking was full and the airport closed for overnight stays due to a rugby game. I had to divert to Bordeaux. This has taught me the lesson to check your notams literally before departure. In my case the notam got issues a couple of hours before I took off:-(
Placido
I'm guessing someone from a dark forum is going to come along in a minute and say: - But the aerodrome isn't licensed, therefore they can't publish a NOTAM [we know this is untrue] - That's what PPR is for [we know how much we dislike PPR and the phone lines aren't always manned]
Hi Fuzzy,
A licenced aerodrome has its info in the AIP. So if their opening hours change that are required to issue a NOTAM to give a temporary correction to the published information.
An unlicenced aerodrome doesn't public its information in the AIP and therefore there is no requirement for them to publish a NOTAM to correct this info. As you say there is nothing to stop them doing so, but there is no requirement. There is no requirement because you are supposed to ring them up for permission to use their airfield (PPR) and would find this info out if you do.
As these airports are part of the AFTN network, they have to ask someone else (AIS) to do it for them, and they probably have little experience with that, so they probably don't make the effort most of the time given that there is no requirement on them.
I agree that it would be useful if these airfields did publish a notam (could save some wasted time planning). Just a few weeks ago, I planned a flight to one such airfield in another country (did immigration and customs notice the night before) but could only call for PPR on the morning as airfield admin was closed when I decided to plan the trip the evening before. When I called the following morning for PPR I found that the airfield was closed, and I couldn't get permission from immigration to change my airport at short notice, so I had to scrap the trip. A properly published NOTAM would have avoided the problem, but as the airfield was unlicenced, there was no requirement on them to do so.
While airfields remain mainly private entities funded privately, I think we are probably stuck with that system unfortunately. Fear of damage to airfield property or liability for damage to aircraft on the airfield, after closing hours probably mean that for most airfield owners they figure it's easier to just not allow anyone to use the airfield when they go home. Fear is a powerful inhibitor, wether it's justified or not.
I understand that the FAA put a lot of money into most airfields in the USA. I don't know for a fact, but I imagine that there is either a requirement that they are always avilable to the public (given the public injection of funds) and hence must stay open at night or there is a financial benefit (bigger future grants) if the useage numbers are bigger, and hence the airfield stays open as much as possible to get the number up.
Unfortunately I don't see the same happening in Europe...not many governments willing to put funds into privately owned airports.
dp
