Does anyone know if the old Silverlight-based GAR filing facility still works?
I have an icon on my desktop whose URL launches Silverlight with a URL of something.ucollectit.org. But that website seems dead.
Now that one can file the CTA GARs via email, this had not been used for years, but it is always nice to have a backup. Not that one needs a backup for email…
No. It was incorporated into Onlinegar.com as a free account some time ago, sponsored by AOPA. Anyone could use it, but it had certain limitations.
Since them AOPA decided to just make it available for AOPA members. So the free option is no longer available from onlinegar.com
https://www.aopa.co.uk/go-flying/general-aviation-report-submissions.html
dublinpilot wrote:
Since them AOPA decided to just make it available for AOPA members.
Note that it is available for all AOPA members of all countries, not only UK AOPA members. And that in the switch from “free for all” to “free for AOPA members”, it also switched from:
Today, as everyone knows being the 29th March which was the original proposed " B " day
It appears that the GAR SYSTEM has gone down this morning and we are now back to dusting off the FAX machine.
I have tried 3 times this morning and cant get anywhere.
Makes you realise what a good system is has been and how we all get to rely on it.
I am sure Carl is working on it but can imagine what he is up against.
I am flying tomorrow to L2K to test the new system ;) meanwhile you can try thier phone number to fill emergency GAR 0044845723110 or just call branch guy who calls you when you land
I think the system was programmed with the wrong date :)
You can email the GAR
I have been doing this for years – ever since it was permitted for the CTA GARs. Before that you could email non CTA GARs but CTA GARs had to be either faxed (I still have an email2fax facility, but most of the border police fax numbers are dead) or sent via one of the gateways like Carl’s OnlineGAR, or the UK AOPA gateway to OnlineGAR.
Actually I have just read that the govt has brought out a new gateway. It is supposedly here. Not sure if it is anything new. It does seem to work… I have just set up a GAR for the next flight, saved it but didn’t send it, so it should be usable as a template.
Anyway, it looks like the email facility is being retained…
I would not use any GAR filing facility other than the methods mentioned in my post above – due to the people who get to see all the personal details.
Apparently the UK Government now provides the facility to do online electronic GAR forms, for free.
Yes indeed it is what I linked in my post above. I had a go at it and it seems to work. You can set up an aircraft, and set up people. Then you can knock up a GAR from that.
I didn’t try it but it is probably usable on a phone (especially once you have set up the basics) which is obviously more than I can do with my present email based system which needs MS Word, printing to a PDF, etc.
Or you could use an iPhone, where the native Word equivalent provides one-button pdf export to email :-)
Yes; Android has MS Office also and no doubt the same feature – if I learnt how to use it 
The difference is that I don’t keep past GARs on my phone, for obvious reasons.
This new Govt GAR gateway uses just your email address for the login, and emails you a code to enter. There is no password. That is ok if your emails work, and work faultlessly; probably a good idea to whitelist the sender URL with your email system… So even though this is a website, no email = no GAR filing. I can see scenarios where people are going to get caught e.g. trying to do email (other than webmail) on a public wifi which blocks all the various ports except 80 and 443 (blocking SMTP is really common; one has to use a VPN to get around it).
