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Customs and Immigration in Europe (and C+I where it is not published - how?)

VFR FPs are indeed easy, even with a phone.

IFR ones are harder, potentially with some spanners thrown in. You have the Autorouter, or Foreflight (Iphone only), or Rocketroute, and these sometimes just fail to work. But that is how the Eurocontrol system is set up. No way around it.

Every so often this bites you in the bum, really badly. I’ve had many occassions of tearing my hair out, unable to get a route to validate. Best remembered is walking up and down the harbour at Hania LGSA trying to get a route to Odessa UKOO (those were the days), 5am, and eventually capitulating, scrapping most of that trip and flying to Brac LDSB. This was years ago but can still happen, though less likely.

That’s why I carry a laptop on any nontrivial trip.

I am off to Le Touquet this weekend. I will file IFR so that

  • I talk to Lille right away (the IFR clearance is implicit although as you start on 7000 you ought to ask for it)
  • if there is any cloud I get the ILS/RNP

Re immigration, the police is there HRS AD so no PN (they told me this although the website says 2hrs PN). So this is an example for the OP where things are slightly vague but “work out in the end”. As he is in Sweden, he will in practice need to deal only with Norway or the UK; everything else is in schengen + EU.

This thread is really about how to brief before a flight in Europe. C+I is just one of a number of things. There is potentially a lot to do, even within EU+schengen. Airport AIP, airport NOTAMs (you can get these from the EuroGA airport database) so there is PN/PPR to do. The flight plan. And of course checking the wx.

For the UK, you need the FP and the GAR which you file via the govt site. With the GAR, practically every airfield in the UK has C+I. But many are also PN/PPR. You can just call them. They all speak English The trick is what to do if you forgot to do it the day before and you are departing before they open.

Europe has endless ways of creating pointless requirements. EU+schengen has taken out some of these but only in the sense of opening up the list of destinations.

Thread merged into an existing one

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

I don’t understand why some people consider filing flight plan great hassle. Especially in today’s world when you can simply submit it from your mobile phone. When you decide to fly somewhere I guess you somehow plan it, so you check the en-route and destination weather which means you probably entered this route in some planning software. From there to submitting plan is just one click. I can’t understand that it’s so hard.

LDZA LDVA, Croatia

Silvaire wrote:

However it is true that I could no more imagine my VFR flying limited to a kind of preplanned and filed quasi-IFR in which ATC contact and direction is mandatory than I could imagine doing the same with a motorcycle or car.

Well, things are as they are. As far as Norway goes, inside Schengen, outside EU, meaning customs, I cannot really imagine the requirement for filing a full flight plan when crossing the border will ever be revoked. But I have been surprised before, so who knows. Driving a car or MC, walking or swimming, you can expect to be stopped by those customs dudes when crossing the border anyway. Statistically, not so much though. During my entire life, I have been stopped once in a random check.

There is no 1:1 connection between a flight plan and contact with ATC. There are no requirements for radio or transponder in Norway. You can fly all the way from Lindesnes to Nordkapp without those two gadgets, and you can do it that way with or without flight plans. This is fully optional. You can do it any way you like. Instructing cross country flight we always teach filing flight plan and staying in touch with ATC (information mostly in G), because this is something every pilot should know. It’s the preferred way cross country, because it makes SAR work optimal, and it also simplifies the A to B flight for you. And it’s the only way when flying to other countries.

I don’t see how this is anything like IFR though. But then I don’t fly IFR so I don’t really know.

The elephant is the circulation
ENVA ENOP ENMO, Norway

Ah yes Hazek, please don’t post excerpts from regs that prove I’m wrong.

Got it chief!

ELLX, Luxembourg

(b) A flight plan shall be submitted prior to operating:

Hazek, can you stop posting these long extracts from the regs. In the context of this thread they are disingenuous. Some (very few) airports require a FP for all movements. For the rest, you can use filing over the radio. AFIL is supposed to be implemented but it doesn’t work.

These long quotes, which also sometimes don’t correspond to actual practice, are completely useless to anyone asking the original question.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

I mean we can argue this up and down but if you read the above or, hey be my guest, come to ELLX, and try departing and leaving Luxembourg and see what happens if you don’t file prior to your “request startup”. You have to file, formally. It’s mandatory.

ELLX, Luxembourg

Which is for example exactly what my home airport mandates is done, unless the flight is ELLX – ELLX and doesn’t cross borders, i.e. a local xc.

Again, calling a radio call a flight plan for the purposes of entering controlled airspace is normal practice worldwide.

Anything beyond that as a mandatory requirement for VFR in Europe (as per my Innsbruck example) is as dumb as the requirement for pre-submitted VFR cross border flight plans, because in both cases nothing similar is required when making the same trip on the ground. It’s theatre serving no genuine purpose.

Last Edited by Silvaire at 28 Mar 17:49

Silvaire wrote:

The issue under discussion here is the necessity to file a formal flight for crossing (many or most) national borders in Europe.

Which is for example exactly what my home airport mandates is done, unless the flight is ELLX – ELLX and doesn’t cross borders, i.e. a local xc.

5 VFR FLIGHTS
5.1 General
A flight plan is compulsory for all VFR flights to and from ELLX (see ENR 1.10, § 1.1).

ENR 1.10 FLIGHT PLANNING
1 CIVIL
1.1 Requirement to Submit a Flight Plan (SERA.4001)
Information relative to an intended flight or portion of a flight, to be provided to ATS units, shall be in the form of a flight plan. A flight plan shall be submitted prior to operating:

any IFR flight;
any flight or portion thereof to be provided with ATC service;
any flight above FL 660;
any flight at night, if leaving the vicinity of an aerodrome;
any flight across international borders. VFR flights remaining within the Schengen Area do not need a flight plan as far as the Brussels FIR is concerned (for requirements applicable in other Schengen States, please consult the relevant AIP).
It is advisable to file a flight plan:

when flying over sparsely populated areas, where SAR operations would be difficult;
if the aircraft is not equipped with radio.
A flight plan may be filed for any flight in order to facilitate the provision of SAR services.

Note: A pilot who has submitted a flight plan for a flight departing from a private aerodrome is responsible for the forwarding of the associated messages either by TEL or by radio to the ATS unit to which the flight plan was sent.

1.2 Categories of Flight Plan
A distinction is made between three different categories of flight plan:

Full flight plan submitted prior departure
A flight plan in line with the formatting requirements of § 1.4 below, submitted prior departure in accordance with the procedures specified in § 1.3.4 below.
Full flight plan submitted during flight (AFIL)
A flight plan in line with the formatting requirements of § 1.4 below, submitted to an ATS unit during flight in accordance with the procedures specified in § 1.3.5 below.
Abbreviated flight plan
Limited information provided to an ATS unit with the purpose to obtain a clearance for a minor portion of a VFR flight, such as to cross a CTR, to take-off from or land at a controlled aerodrome.

1.2.2 In Luxembourg
An abbreviated flight plan transmitted in the air by radiotelephony for the crossing of controlled airspace contains, as a minimum:
call sign;
type of aircraft;
point of entry;
point of exit;
level.

For domestic VFR flights (no border crossing), an abbreviated flight plan may be submitted at least 30 MIN prior departure. It comprises the following information:
aircraft identification;
departure aerodrome and estimated off-block time;
destination aerodrome or operating site and total estimated flight time;
mandatory reporting point for CTR exit;
fuel endurance;
total number of persons on board;
name of the pilot in command.

Last Edited by hazek at 28 Mar 17:34
ELLX, Luxembourg

‘Flight plan’ is used the same way worldwide to provide compliance with ICAO standards when entering e.g. Class D airspace with a radio call and nothing else. This is a work-around and is not relevant to the topic, which is pre-filed flight plans.

The issue under discussion here is the necessity to file a pre-filed VFR flight plan (nothing to do with ATC communication) for crossing many or most national borders in Europe, when the same borders are completely unmonitored on the ground.

Having said that @Airborne_Again, on my last flight in Europe we were required to file a flight plan for a 30 minute-ish VFR flight from Zell am See to Innsbruck, when Innsbruck was completely deserted and no national borders were crossed.

Last Edited by Silvaire at 28 Mar 17:34

hazek wrote:

The term ‘flight plan’ is used to mean variously, full information on all items comprised in the flight plan description, covering the whole route of a flight, or limited information required, inter alia, when the purpose is to obtain a clearance for a minor portion of a flight such as to cross an airway, to take off from, or to land at a controlled aerodrome.

I think we should emphasise this part, otherwise Silvaire will think we have to prefile a complete flight plan form every time we use a controlled airport.

ESKC (Uppsala/Sundbro), Sweden
363 Posts
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