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LZBB FIR - aids, recommendations etc (and Skydemon/EuroFPL VFR flight plans being faxed)

Reason: most of these CFSPs like SkyDemon, EuroFPL, RocketRoute etc does not distribute FPLs in accordance with national AIP ENR 1.11 and 1.10, so if they file a FPL, we will recieve it by FAX and we are waiting for confirmation by the pilot. Another reasons are: late filling (5 min before EOBT), lots of coordinates (even the coordinate is for the VFR exit point for example), many mistakes in the FPL (wrong level, missing EET/, direct route without any point) etc.

I recognise a lot of this as working in the UK, and probably lots of other countries – because nobody looks at the route on a VFR FP unless the plane goes missing. IME, it is mostly in the “Balkan” countries (I am using the term loosely, including former Yugoslavia) where somebody looks at the route.

The problem is that nobody is going to educate VFR-only pilots to file a route via “IFR” waypoints (e.g. SAM, ORTAC, KONAN, MMD, HR) which is the only way to unambiguously do this. Especially “old” VFR pilots which is about 95% of the VFR community; there is little fresh input going in. I was using these waypoints since Day 1… because it made flight planning so much easier with the old tools like Navbox.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

I know very well what ENR 1.11 and 1.10 are about — our daily business. No need to be an ARO to distribute flight plans according to ENR 1.11. The AIP ENR 1.11 targets every participant in the system. Some countries request VFR flight plans to be sent to their ARO (using AFTN), others directly to the relevant ATS units. Slovakia has all ATS units in there so we address accordingly.

Hunnicat wrote:

I am not talking about Autorouter – if you file IFR FPL it goes directly to IFPS and IFPS is responsible for distribution

IFPS only handles the addressing of the IFR portions of a flight plan. If the flight plan is Z, Y or V, it is the responsibility of the flight plan originator (e.g. autorouter) to supply the addressing for those segments. Also autorouter does VFR flight plan filing now although the feature is not publicly available yet and still under testing. For Slovakia we just implement ENR 1.11 in our own description language: https://www.autorouter.aero/wiki/flight-plan-addressing/fpal-document-list/#lz

This whole ARO concept is very much outdated and not necessary for the internet age. Some AIPs are still behind but in reality AOs and CFSPs use AFTN and do their own addressing.

DOC4444:

Flights outside designated ATS routes

INSERT points normally not more than 30 minutes flying time or 370 km (200 NM) apart, including each point at which a change of speed or level, a change of track, or a change of flight rules is planned.

LZIB

achimha wrote:

IFPS only handles the addressing of the IFR portions of a flight plan. If the flight plan is Z, Y or V, it is the responsibility of the flight plan originator (e.g. autorouter) to supply the addressing for those segments. Also autorouter does VFR flight plan filing now although the feature is not publicly available yet and still under testing. For Slovakia we just implement ENR 1.11 in our own description language: https://www.autorouter.aero/wiki/flight-plan-addressing/fpal-document-list/#lz

This whole ARO concept is very much outdated and not necessary for the internet age. Some AIPs are still behind but in reality AOs and CFSPs use AFTN and do their own addressing.

it is your opinion :-) Again I am not talking about Autorouter – till now there is no problem – SkyDemon is causing problems

achimha wrote:

I know very well what ENR 1.11 and 1.10 are about — our daily business

Perfect!

achimha wrote:

No need to be an ARO to distribute flight plans according to ENR 1.11.

we are talking about filing the FPL, not distributing

LZIB

Hunnicat wrote:

SkyDemon is causing problems

Best to contact EuroFPL and raise the issue. They should have an interest to improve the product. We regularly get contacted by AIS about certain issues and always try to address them as far as possible.

Hunnicat wrote:

we are talking about filing the FPL, not distributing

Using an ARO to file a flight plan is even more outdated than relying on it to do the addressing. Probably best using a paper form… That’s really not how pilots work in 2017. Why deal with every country and figure out what the national filing service is, create an account there, try to understand it? That’s a waste of time. Pilots use their preferred software (one for the whole continent) and click on submit. That’s the workflow that should work seamlessly. If there are problems, they should be addressed, the answer can’t possibly be “contact the ARO of your departure aerodrome”.

JnsV wrote:

what tool do you suggest for submitting flight plans originating in Slovakia? IBAF?

To finish this discusion – yes you can use IBAF to file FPL.

LZIB

achimha wrote:

Using an ARO to file a flight plan is even more outdated than relying on it to do the addressing. Probably best using a paper form… That’s really not how pilots work in 2017. Why deal with every country and figure out what the national filing service is, create an account there, try to understand it? That’s a waste of time. Pilots use their preferred software (one for the whole continent) and click on submit. That’s the workflow that should work seamlessly. If there are problems, they should be addressed, the answer can’t possibly be “contact the ARO of your departure aerodrome”.

I understand. Example: I am attending meetings with people from AROs around the Europe. We accept in the route: city names, coordinates, bearing and distance, ICAO points, VFR points – almost everything. BUT in country “A” the system cannot read coordinates in field 15, in country “B” there is problem with city names etc. There is need to harmonise the VFR flying and rules. But if one country says they cannot do it because … it is hard.

I am trying to show you that we accept FPL for example from RocketRoute via AFTN because if there is a problem I know that I can contact the originator and solve the problem and the pilot will be informed. Also they send the FPL according 1.11 for VFR departure from LZBB.

SkyDemon causing a problems so they have to file the FPL via FAX. SkyDemon is wawre of this.

LZIB

achimha wrote:

If there are problems, they should be addressed, the answer can’t possibly be “contact the ARO of your departure aerodrome”.

probably you did not see lot of FPLs from SkyDemon etc that were not correct for the ATC?

LZIB

Are SkyDemon/EuroFPL generally uncooperative?

There are computer algorithms behind all of this so it should be possible to fix issues for future flight plans. The software companies need feedback from AIS to find those problems.

One example we just handled is item 19 of the flight plan (SAR information). Per ICAO standards, it is omitted from the FPL message and the flight plan originator (which in this case is us, indicated by ORGN/) provides it in response to RQS messages. Now Austrocontrol asked us to include item19 nevertheless for all flights departing in Austria. So we did that. I don’t want to do it for all countries because it would technically be a violation of the ICAO standard. Non Eurocontrol flight plans are a messy business…

achimha wrote:

Best to contact EuroFPL and raise the issue

be sure that we tried several times

LZIB
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