achimha wrote:
Easier to prepare, there is usually no guidance on how to do a DCT connection from the last enroute waypoint to the airport. There could be restricted airspaces, uncontrolled airspace, etc.
This is not verified along with my flight plan? So when I get a route accepted, I still need to check all direct segments myself for restricted areas etc.? Or would there be a difference between an en route direct and a direct between my last (first?) waypoint and the airport?
There are airports which lie in controlled airspace (CAS) and ones which don’t (OCAS).
Those in CAS have SIDs and STARs published, and those are used to connect the start and end of your filed route with the airport. And, being in CAS, you will normally be in radar control the whole time anyway. This is how “classical IFR” works. You take off, depart on a SID, fly the filed route, arrive on a STAR, fly the IAP, and land. All in CAS.
Those airports which are OCAS have no SIDs or STARs (Biggin EGKB is one exception, that’s for another time…) and the only way to “connect” the start or end of your filed route with the airport is by using a DCT. And being OCAS you may not get radar control. In these cases you are in practice “VFR” on those DCT legs and you have to look after yourself in terms of CAS, obstacle clearance and prohibited areas. In some places (e.g. the UK) once your filed route ends and you come off London Control, you cannot re-enter CAS.
The above is generic advice and has various exceptions.
A really good example of getting screwed would be arriving from an IFR flight from say Prague LKPR, to Shoreham EGKA. You will get vectored into the UK usually (I drew it arriving at LYD but it varies) and they give you a descent below CAS which means below 5500ft
Then they hand you over to Shoreham. You must not climb back above 5500ft and must stay clear of the 4500ft bit of CAS, etc.
Low let’s say there is the annual airshow at Seaford (SFD). If you didn’t get notams, you could just bust that… £5000 fine in one such case. Whereas if you did what most people (myself included) don’t do and call up Farnborough Radar East, they would have warned you.
This is one of many cases where a GA pilot flying enroute Eurocontrol IFR does need very good VFR mapping. Many pilots don’t have that. Especially Americans who are used to Class E (which is CAS for IFR) down to say 1200ft. The only time you can fly safely in Europe without VFR awareness is if the whole flight is end-to-end in CAS e.g. Gatwick to New York. The 747 pilots sure don’t carry VFR charts…
Most IFR flights in Europe are OCAS at some stage and then if it also happens you are not under radar control, you can have all kinds of “fun”.
If you flew say Bournemouth EGHH to Birmingham EGBB then you could be in CAS the whole time, even in a C150, but that is not the majority of GA flights.
Rwy20 wrote:
This is not verified along with my flight plan? So when I get a route accepted, I still need to check all direct segments myself for restricted areas etc.? Or would there be a difference between an en route direct and a direct between my last (first?) waypoint and the airport?
It depends. First of all, we are under radar guidance so it’s irrelevant. Some countries do a very good job putting restricted zones in IFPS (UK comes to mind), others are sloppy about it (Germany), knowing that all IFR is controlled and under radar guidance in the whole country. If you connect from/to an airport with a DCT, you have to do extra due diligence. Hence autorouter prefers STAR/SID over DCTs.
PS: autorouter ensures terrain clearance on all routes, this is an extra check performed in case there are IFPS data errors.
Peter wrote:
Those in CAS have SIDs and STARs published, and those are used to connect the start and end of your filed route with the airport.
Many airports have SID/STARs published but still allow DCT connections. LFBH is one example.
This is one of many cases where a GA pilot flying enroute Eurocontrol IFR does need very good VFR mapping.
That’s 99% a UK problem. The service level for IFR is very poor in the UK. You can do a lot but you’re very much on your own. In continental Europe, those traps do not exist.
Many airports have SID/STARs published but still allow DCT connections. LFBH is one example.
I think one can use a DCT with almost any airport (as far as Eurocontrol validation is concerned) so long as the DCT MAX in that airspace allows the DCT (or a series of DCTs as necessary).
For example the UK has a DCT MAX of something like 100nm below FL100.
Albania has a DCT MAX of 0 which means that the only way to file to Tirana LATI is via a SID/STAR. That in turn means LATI has to be in CAS, which it is.
N France has a DCT MAX of 10nm…
This is one of many cases where a GA pilot flying enroute Eurocontrol IFR does need very good VFR mapping.
That’s 99% a UK problem. The service level for IFR is very poor in the UK. You can do a lot but you’re very much on your own. In continental Europe, those traps do not exist.
They exist all over the place! Take for example any number of French airports after ATC has gone home, or at weekends. You can file IFR as much as you want but in the absence of an IFR clearance into CAS, you have to remain OCAS after departure, and you may have to work the radio like a one armed bandit trying to wake up a nearby radar unit. Often the #1 option is asleep so you have to remain below CAS while trying the next one.
It is the same as departing “Z” as e.g. here You have to remain OCAS until you get the IFR clearance.
Is it really true that at every German airport you can get the IFR clearance into CAS before takeoff?
My main point was that VFR awareness (CAS and terrain and TRA awareness) are required on most GA IFR flights. It’s not a big deal (most IFR pilots started life with a plain PPL so they have some sort of VFR GPS device kicking around) but those who think they can fly with just a waypoint list and ignore where they actually end up will eventually get bitten.
Peter wrote:
I think one can use a DCT with almost any airport (as far as Eurocontrol validation is concerned) so long as the DCT MAX in that airspace allows the DCT (or a series of DCTs as necessary).
It’s not the airspace DCT, it’s the airport connection limit. That is stored separately in the Eurocontrol system, i.e. it is a deliberate decision for each airport.
22f36b17-8508-47e3-a0ee-b7642009ecb3 flightrestriction N46 10.74989 W001 11.71667 N46 10.74989 W001 11.71667 2015-08-11T05:37:09Z
2003-12-25T00:00:00Z unlimited ident LFBH51610B allowed adcp operational (SK)
description LFBH ARRIVAL DCT LIMITATION
TimeTable[0] 2003-12-25...unlimited exclude no
set 00:00...24:00 weekday SUN MON TUE WED THU FRI SAT
ConditionArrivalDctLimit{3} dctlimit 50 RefLoc
8587c98f-7ddb-46d8-943d-5935ded64df1 LFBH
Airport DCT limit arr 8587c98f-7ddb-46d8-943d-5935ded64df1 LFBH dctlimit 50
This means you can arrive at LFBH from any waypoint within 50NM. If you want to depart from EGLL, you are forced on a published SID:#
3eb5b843-8cce-44a1-bc46-26f114ccf0c6 flightrestriction N51 28.65005 W000 27.68333 N51 28.65005 W000 27.68333 2015-08-11T05:37:34Z
2013-10-17T00:00:00Z unlimited ident EGLL50680A allowed adcp operational (SK)
description EGLL DEPARTURE DCT LIMITATION
TimeTable[0] 2013-10-17...unlimited exclude no
set 00:00...24:00 weekday SUN MON TUE WED THU FRI SAT
ConditionDepartureDctLimit{3} dctlimit 0 RefLoc
d7a0c778-83c9-4c84-b678-b837def71e47 EGLL
Airport DCT limit dep d7a0c778-83c9-4c84-b678-b837def71e47 EGLL dctlimit 0
Albania has a DCT MAX of 0 which means that the only way to file to Tirana LATI is via a SID/STAR. That in turn means LATI has to be in CAS, which it is.
Yes but if the airport in Albania has an arrival DCT limit of 50NM, then you can leave the airway at any point within 50NM and connect to the airport. So don’t mix the two DCT limit.
Is it really true that at every German airport you can get the IFR clearance into CAS before takeoff?
No, the opposite. But that is only Y/Z. On IFR flight plans I am usually safe outside the UK, no surprises.
Peter wrote:
Never fly a procedural (called “standard” outside the UK) approach. Nobody does it except during training. Always ask for radar vectors.
This is not quite true. There are a number of airports where you do not get any radar vectoring and need to fly the full procedural approach. For example LFQA, LFQB and LFOP. Otherwise you will always be offered radar vectors because that is what allows the controller to get rid of you the quickest possible (efficiency) 
Did you get vectors to the ILS at LFOP last Saturday? I bet you got DCT ROU and did one turn in the hold to intercept the ILS (unless you “radar” vectored yourself to a convenient distance on the LLZ).
Rwy20 wrote:
Why is that?
There may be very good reasons why there are no airways in the most convenient direction, and ATC may end up vectoring you along a path that is similar to the one you would have filed had you refrained from using DCTs. In that case, if you planned you fuel requirements according to the much shorter DCT route, you may end up being low on fuel. You may also start getting embarrassed questions like “what is your desired routing after ??” before you end up being vectored on a wide dogleg, and ATC may be forced to do some unusual coordination with the neighbouring sectors. This happened to me returning from the PPL/IR social weekend in Mannheim/Heidelberg. On that trip I opted for DCTs because the alternative was MUCH longer. But I ended up with the longer route anyway.
So in my view it is better to plan an airway route and end up with pleasant shortcuts than the other way around. But sometimes, like in your case, some DCTs are almost unavoidable, and that is fine by me too.
For the record, I almost completely object to what @Aviathor writes
The route network is not designed for low flying GA, airways are sparse which is why the DCT allowances are given in many airspaces. If it’s allowed, then make use of it. It’s the future anyway, called FRA (free route airspace). In Hungary, all airways are gone, in Poland in the night, in some countries in the upper airspace. It’s coming more and more and eventually this is how we are going to fly — DCTs only. The moment we stopped using radio aids for navigation and the moment ATC got complete radar coverage, airways have become an obsolete concept.
achimha wrote:
It’s the future anyway, called FRA (free route airspace).
It may be the future, but it is not the present.
As often, the truth is in the middle.
If you use a tool that uses official routes with validation, you are pretty much guaranteed a route that keeps you in appropriate airspace.
If you use DCTs, you are on your own. If you know what you are doing, this is great, and you are very likely to fly the route as planned.
If you don’t know what you are doing, you might use the DCT to take you through an approach path of a major airport, a restricted area, or outside an area where ATC willingly provides you with a service, and you might end up flying something differently.
As long as you look at a chart and see what the DCTdoes in relation to airspace and other traffic, they are completely fine.
In practice, unless the automatic route is truly atrocious, I can’t be bothered to eke out a few percent because in practice, ATC tries to give you expeditious routes anyway.
Did you get vectors to the ILS at LFOP last Saturday? I bet you got DCT ROU and did one turn in the hold to intercept the ILS
I got the DCT ROU but didn’t do any turns; I was cleared for the ILS so just self-intercepted. I guess that was “procedural” rather than “vectored” – fair enough
As often, the truth is in the middle.
Indeed, and Cobalt should know, being one of the two people who brought out the earliest Eurocontrol routing tools, c. 2008. I remember beta testing it. It worked brilliantly and transformed European IFR.
