Peter wrote:
Last time I was in Spain (several years ago, apart from Salamanca in 2014) I filed electronically but they still wanted a fake paper copy which they rubber-stamped to confirm I had paid landing charges, to be allowed airside I can’t believe they still do that…
I can tell first-hard from Sabadell (LELL) that you do need a paper print-out of your flight plan to get past the security guard. Explanation is that you do prove to be a pilot this way. On the other hand showing a pilot license would also do. But I guess they unified the evidence to be shown to the guard to be a single paper that has a rubber stamp from the operations office.
I have not tried yet to enter CAS without any on-the-ground-procedure before for lack of a need. But I doubt there will be problem. However, on a VFR flight from La Cerdanya (LECD) back to Sabadell my passenger who is a pilot student at Sabadell did call Barcelona ATC on the phone to file a VFR flight plan. He gave them the same details you would tell over the radio. He is being taught to do it this way (on the phone before taking off).
Have you tried 100ALAS handling Stephen? A totally different experience and great value considering the lift in the car. That was Sabadell.
Peter wrote:
Have you tried 100ALAS handling Stephen? A totally different experience and great value considering the lift in the car. That was Sabadell.
No. Never. I now have my car parked there. I see their sign close to the exit every time I leave.
DavidC wrote:
Divided opinion on whether good or badOverhead joins
At the wrong airport, they can be deadly, because they would lead directly through a winch launch. I like them, too, but only if there is no glider avtivity. The old JeppVFR/GPS charts had those airports marked, and I thought that was great. The DFS would chatter about the map getting too unreadable (in contrast to their airspaces in some regions, I suppose). If you take a look at Oerlinghausen for instance, you just can’t cross the field overhead. Even on a “circuits only” day, you might fly through a flock of 10 gliders circling the field.
Rwy20 wrote:
Steve6443 wrote:
Adding to that, the need to have a “Flugleiter” present to allow take offs and landings.
That is AFAIK not correct. The aerodrome operator is obliged to provide a Flugleiter during the opening hours, but this is no obligation for you as a pilot. If the aerodrome operator fails his obligations to provide a Flugleiter, you may still decide to land and there is nothing that prohibits this. You might of course get some over zealous official to try to prosecute you for a general clause about “bad airmenship” and endangering someone etc., but they would have a hard time holding this up IMHO.
This is where it gets very messy and you’ll find yourself in hot water very quickly. First things first, there is a difference between a “verkehrslandeplatz” where the operator publishes his opening hours, but there are also Sonderlandeplätze where the Operator can choose his opening times (PPR). If you land at such an airfield where the Flugleiter is NOT present, then you can be charged with landing an aircraft at a closed airfield without an emergency, irrespective of whether you gained PPR or not. An example was Helgoland where I spent 10 minutes circling, trying to contact the Flugleiter, with 3 other aircraft in the circuit as we all considered what to do. The issue turned out to be a dead battery on the handset of the Flugleiter who’d gone to the Cafe for a coffee, taken the handset with him without realising the battery was dead….
There were exceptions to the rule, airfields where you could go and land without a Flugleiter, EDVR (Rinteln) was one, and a personal favourite of mine – I say were because the Bezirksregierung in Niedersachsen have successfully changed the rules for a number of these exceptions and most BRs are actively pursuing eliminating these exceptions….
Your example Helgoland is classified as a Verkehrslandeplatz, so they have to operate during the published hours. What did you do then?
Interesting enough, my experience with Helgoland was why I posted this remark. I did a trip to Germany some time ago where we visited Helgoland as well. Cautious as I am, I called the Flugleiter on the phone before taking off from Lübeck to inquire about the state of the aerodrome, weather, anything that would be of interest. He only said that weather was OK, which runway would probably be in service and that was it. Once we were approaching Helgoland, nobody answered the radio, so we made our position reports and landed. It was only when we came back later that he lectured us that we landed during the lunch break (one hour after I spoke to him on the phone and said “so we’ll take off then, see you soon”), how dangerous and illegal and expensive this was etc. That is why I researched the whole issue of opening hours for runways, which was completely unknown as a concept to us before.
And, in order to know this, you need to read some german law texts and look in the annex of the Jeppesen chart folder, and interpret the times listed there in the right way.
Any german pilot will tell you that it is obvious, but for someone who was trained in France it is not obvious at all. It’s not stated in the AIP for example.
Rwy20 wrote:
Any german pilot will tell you that it is obvious, but for someone who was trained in France it is not obvious at all. It’s not stated in the AIP for example.
How are you going to distinguish between comfailure and the Flugleiter being in the bathroom?
Reading all these operating differences from all the European pilots who have posted, it seems that the idea of SERA is just that – an idea. It will never be implemented fully.
PROPMAN wrote:
Reading all these operating differences from all the European pilots who have posted, it seems that the idea of SERA is just that – an idea. It will never be implemented fully.
I wouldn’t say that. Most of the operating differences we’ve been reading about in this thread are either not addressed by SERA or things that SERA explicitly leaves to the national authority to decide.
The only common discrepancy is the requirement of filing a full flight plan before takeoff. You shouldn’t have to according to SERA.
PROPMAN wrote:
Reading all these operating differences from all the European pilots who have posted, it seems that the idea of SERA is just that – an idea. It will never be implemented fully.
The idea of SERA was explicitly to allow for national differences at certain places, while keeping a common set of rules.
If anything good has come out of EASA, it is SERA.
