ForeFlight (merged thread)

they do want a fax which is a bit complicated. We will look into this though in the future.

Trivial to do with Interfax. Just format an email with the number in the To: header, and put plain text in the body. They also support PDF and Word attachments but you won’t need that.

The To: header looks like this

I’ve used them for many years although nowadays fax is almost never used. NL ATC must be the last bastion of job protection

They also do incoming fax (fax2email) and we used that in my business for years but have just terminated it. The phone number was costing about £100/year.

Netherlands want a fax??? What‘s that? Is it something like a telex?

If everyone refused to send them faxes („unable, technology phased out“) their skies would get very quiet in a hurry and I bet they would come around quickly.

chflyer wrote:

If everyone refused to send them faxes („unable, technology phased out“) their skies would get very quiet in a hurry and I bet they would come around quickly.

I don’t think so, because the group of “everyone” is quite small. All IFR (so all airliners) flightplans don’t require fax. Any FPL filed at an ARO in another country doesn’t require fax. Any FPL filed through their own website (https://www.homebriefing.nl/) doesn’t require fax.

@Josh_Tahmasebi_ForeFlight wrote:

I missed who mentioned VFR filing in the Netherlands, but yes we are aware and have several conversations with the Netherlands about this – they do want a fax which is a bit complicated. We will look into this though in the future.

I believe SkyDemon has an electronic connection with the Netherlands FPL office, which provides ACK.

Netherlands and fax.

I believe SkyDemon has an electronic connection with the Netherlands FPL office, which provides ACK.

SD uses EuroFPL.eu for FP filing.

Peter wrote:

SD uses EuroFPL.eu for FP filing.

Also for Netherlands VFR? I might have got them confused, but I found definite reference that RocketRoute uses an electronic system: https://www.rocketroute.com/blog/dutch-vfr-filing-update-now-with-an-acknowleldgement

RR does its own AFTN etc filing.

EasyVFR uses RR

So I reckon EuroFPL and Rocketroute have already solved this, and possibly by sending a fax But yes some sort of API would be much better because a fax has to be manually typed-in, which is completely stupid. But there again the UK FBUs (flight briefing units) were keen to get faxes, because it protected their well paid jobs; they got shut down c. 2009.

OTOH, what does an ACK on a VFR FP mean?

Peter wrote:

OTOH, what does an ACK on a VFR FP mean?

I can only guess something like that the FP was received, and processed correctly. E.g. you didn’t put a flight time of 18:00 hours went you meant ETA 1800Z :)

Peter wrote:

OTOH, what does an ACK on a VFR FP mean?

It means that the ARO has checked it at least for formal correctness and some other obvious errors, e.g. a takeoff time in the past.

There isn’t an ICAO meaning to ACK, but where it is used, it is used to indicate that the flight plan has bee accepted verses rejected. In the event of a rejected flight plan, the message that was sent was not acted on and it is the responsibility of the sender to correct any errors.

Josh_Tahmasebi_ForeFlight wrote:

unless the waypoint has a 5 character name like DOMEN

The important part here is that this VRP just happens to have 5 letters, but it’s a coincidence. Many words have 5 letters, this one means “the dome” in Swedish, under which a PSR is hidden in this case. It’s a dome, we can’t really call it anything else. Being near the top of a ridge, that dome is a very visible feature from very far away in all directions, in an otherwise unremarkable environment.
On the NW side of ESMS, the other VRP is called Torup. It also has 5 letters, which is equally coincidental, it’s just the name of the place (that castle is also very visible from afar, and nice too). I can go on with all airports in the area, there are many more examples (ESTL has Vedby, ESTA has Karup, both local villages).

You cannot either go the long way and rely solely on the list of significant points in ENR 4.4 of the Swedish AIP due to the proximity with neighbouring countries. For example in southern Sweden, all eastern approaches to Copenhagen Airport are made over Sweden. SIDs/STARs into EKCH use some swedish points like TIDVU, but also add their own like VENOM, which is not found in the Swedish but in the Danish AIP, although it’s definitely located in Sweden, so you’d have to check for all the overlaps. Unnecessary complexity.

From a software perspective, all you need to do is tag VRPs as such, and then just convert their location to coordinates. How many letters their name has is completely irrelevant.