I flew yesterday night when there was no tower ATC in Rouen, in Pontoise and in Toussus (also no Avgas in the pumps, no POGO clearances, no SP98 in my car 
)
I can see my tracking in FlightAware but not in AutoRouter for LFPT-LFPN-LFPT which is puzzling? anyone knows why?
My vague guess: no AR tracking as I was not positively controlled with radar vectors? departure and cruise: I flew omnidirectionnel departure, direct overhead, direct initial fixes and own navigation (except vector to intercept LOC25 outbound and inbound), on the way back to Rouen, I was vectored and the tracking reappeared…
Or is this because it’s a short flight? I was on Eurocontrol squawk over Paris at 4kft (not 1000 for ModeS) for about 1h
I think the people who know the exact answer are inside Eurocontrol and prohibited from posting on a forum
What initiates the tracking is some action on your flight plan. This is obvious I guess but if I fly say EGKA-LDLO and I depart VFR to BILGO REM, there is no tracking until French ATC has issued the IFR clearance. This shows it well
EGKA N0145F040 SFD/N0145F080 DCT BILGO/N0150F100 DCT REM/N0152F100 IFR B3 RLP G4 HOC L613 …
However, I would have been asking for an IFR clearance much sooner than REM and may have got it, but I don’t have the sound track for that flight (the mp3 recorder failed to work because it had filled up) so can’t verify it. On balance though I think I probably got IFR at REM only, as filed
There is some ATCO action involved when the IFR clearance is issued. Maybe @Guillaume knows more?
I found this, it seems to be up to ATC to provide regular tracking (some button clicking under radar vectoring and instrument clearance)
N-AC being a good example here,
https://www.autorouter.aero/wiki/flight-tracking/
PS: I used to send these tracking links to UKBF, it goes broken at DVR or DET, they used to phone call asking what we are doing at Rochester
Very funny that page uses N113AC as an example
The Autorouter emails the Eurocontrol tracking links to UK police automatically. Not sure if this is connected with you using the AR to file the GAR (I never used it for GARs for privacy reasons).
I would be curious to know but it seems you need 4 things: EC FPL + EC TXP plus radar ATC giving vectors and sending those trackings
AutoRouter is useless for GAR now (it email NCU with an autogenerated spreadsheet, it does not have an approved API to UKBF computers)
Definitely no vectors needed.
Also tracking works even if FPL lost, AFAIK.
Emailing NCU still works; it is what I do. But AR may be emailing an outdated Excel file format.
There is nothing secret about this : https://www.eurocontrol.int/service/data-collection-service
Interesting.
The site doesn’t actually say what starts the tracking, and the 157 page PDF there is just too cryptic.
@Guillaume What does an ATCO actually do at the point of issuing an IFR clearance?
I went through the PDF, it does not predict if I get a tracking on Y-FPL Rouen to Kortrijk? and when tracking will start and stop? the PDF tells me ATC may send messages on flight progress or live reports under some conditions, these are useful for Eurocontrol monitoring, nothing new under the sun…
My guess I will have tracking on shortcut from Lille Radar ATC on ABB to ROBAL segment
When a FPL is activated, a SSR code is generated via ORCAM.
The FDPS (flight plan data processing systems) associates the XPDR of the aircraft to the SSR code previously generated. The aircraft is now correlated to the FPL.
The FDPS is continously aware of the aircraft present position.
It also sends periodically CPR to eurocontrol to monitor flight progress and enhance air traffic flow prediction.
It’s a background process.
There is no ATCO action involved.
