Radar control vs radar coverage

Peter wrote:

will make you cancel IFR below a certain altitude

In the UK isn’t the typical advice from Radar:

EGxx will accept you at altitude/FL x,000 on QNH (if applicable) which is OCAS, you are cleared to leave controlled airspace via descent – traffic service outside CAS – then once you have commenced descent and left CAS they will suggest you change frequency to the relevant radar/approach frequency

or

In 5 miles you are leaving CAS and my service terminates, suggest you free call xxx

It has been some time since I arrived IFR from France below say FL180, but you were always handed over in CAS, and then a UK ATC would descend you OCAS

I have often had a handover directly from French ATC to London Info.

The typical case is leaving Le Touquet – which is why I might file there IFR (to get the ILS more quickly if needed) but on the way back I don’t normally bother because it is pointless, since you will never be high enough to get a handover to London Control.

But it happens most times one is speaking to Lille as the last French unit – which seems to happen below perhaps FL080. Above that you are talking to Paris, and Paris always (IIRC) hands you over the London Control (which is logical since UK CAS has a FL075 base initially).

It’s a great pity that these discussions always go around in circles. Not because of any participant(s) but because nobody who knows the system is willing/able to discuss it. The silence is deafening, as the saying goes.

I don’t think the UK quite knows whether its procedures are legal or not. Actually I think they know they aren’t legal but every committee member is hoping that he will be collecting his pension before some event causes it all to implode

Peter wrote:

And it isn’t IFR flight in say Class G, where allowed, which probably nobody knows you are doing it.

You can perfectly well file an IFR flight plan with Eurocontrol where parts or even the whole flight is in class G and be provided with a proper ATS services all the way. Not in the UK, but we all know that the UK is the exception.

Only two weeks or so ago, I did exactly that. An IFR flight entirely in class G (and partially also in IMC). Flight plan filed with Eurocontrol, opened in the air after departure, got my clearance, discrete transponder code, FIS service the whole way. In this particular case the clearance was rather pointless, but it did mean that had I wanted to climb into controlled airspace above, I would just have asked for higher and – traffic permitting – it would have been granted immediately.

In Sweden you can, of course

I bet you that there are places in Europe where a valid FP will not give you an ATC service. To find them, probe the lower levels Especially where there is terrain. In much of the Alps for example you can be out of radio or radar range, and similar with the Balkans.

RobertL18C wrote:

EGxx will accept you at altitude/FL x,000 on QNH (if applicable) which is OCAS

But if it’s OCAS, what does it matter whether the nearest airport will ‘accept’ you at that level? Or is it just phrasesology to give the pilot an indication that some coordination has taken place?

The latter.

Prob99 London Control have phoned Shoreham (e.g.) to tell them I am coming. It doesn’t actually mean anything, especially if it happens say 50nm out. Shoreham (if Approach is operating) clear you for the IAP after you call them up.

There is no such thing as a UK airport “accepting” a flight. Well, maybe if it is “strictly PPR by telephone”… but then this phone call isn’t going to work either because the pilot has not made the phone call.

This usually occurs when the destination is an airport where IFR procedural service is in place, and therefore they need to coordinate. In the case of Radar service available there would still be a leaving CAS clearance.

The above applies to airports without CAS, eg Gloucester.

Even OCAS, it seems to me the setup depends on other things: Thames/Heathrow Radar do vector traffic direct to Biggin Hill IAP, I think that is clearly different from IFR inbound to Shoreham or Gloucester !

arj1 wrote:

Or Radar coverage is enough (except for the UK)?

Europe has plenty of excellent but too much overlapping (and thus expensive) radar coverage from about 3000 AGL upwards. While you are seen by these radar heads, this does not mean you can be given a service by an ATSU.

One thing to consider is the classification of airspace. With Class G, no IFR clearance is necessary and no ATC service is available – only FIS. With Class E and upwards, an IFR clearance is necessary.

Another thing to consider is the published MEA of ATS routes – anywhere below this and the ATSU may not provide an en-route service.

When you have lost your ATC service, you may continue to receive FIS (callsign “Information”). In fact in all states except the UK, continuous two-way communication is required for IFR in all classes of airspace. With FIS, your continuous clearance may have been broken and therefore a clearance back into CAS is needed.

Also, ATC does not always require radar to provide a service. If it is unavailable, procedural control is used. In such case, less traffic is allowed in the same volume of airspace (compared to radar) and separation distances are larger.