MU2 in Europe - Dispatch services - Local copilots - Trip itinerary

First of all, the bunch of private instrument pilots (i.e those that have to do all by themselves) is a small one in Europe.

Practical flying (going places, frim A to Z) is not really taught at a flying school level. It happens afterwards.

The learning comes from experience. Also, it comes from reading forums like this one, websites such as Peter’s, etc.

Given the lack of instructor knowledge and experience in these matters, how does a private pilot learn to do practical IFR in Europe? The entire process, start to finish.

What a great Q.

Well, not many do. Historically, only about 10-30 instrument ratings were issued in the UK, per year. And most of those never acquired the capability to use it (time, money, own plane or similar access, etc) or they were never intending to be private pilots.

The few that carried on usually picked it up from pilot forums. EuroGA is, I am sure, the one with the most information and experience, in the English language, for Europe. I learnt nearly everything off the internet, when I started in 2005. The instructor I flew with could fly but had virtually zero operational knowledge of the Eurocontrol route system.

Coincidentally, before pilot forums (and before Usenet e.g. rec.aviation.ifr which I am sure you remember, before all that melted down) the European situation was “before Eurocontrol” and back then you could just plan a route using the traditional obvious process, on the IFR chart – just like you still can in the USA. In fact the IFR chart method is still taught on the EASA IR, despite being useless for at least 15 years.

IFR flying in Europe is otherwise just like anywhere else, with the caveats mentioned already which are mostly to do with OCAS operations.

I sent you an email, Mike, with my contact details etc.

May I add a different perspective?

With the difference of not flying a turboprop – I wish :-) – I believe I’m that type of private pilot who wants to just hop in and go IFR to whatever place in Europe. I do just that. Tools like autorouter make it possible and I’ve tried others before but like the autorouter best because it is so simple to use and can I plan my flights within minutes from the phone.

Although I’ve been told that I’m not supposed to do it I’ve planned and filed IFR 15 minutes before takeoff in Germany. After years of refusing that I’ve also airfiled IFR with German ATC without trouble. Pretty much like I know from the US during my training there.

You may have stumbled upon a little detail that has screwed up your experience. IFR routes are dependent on the performance data of your aircraft. The central computer in Brussels (Eurocontrol) was meant to streamline traffic flow and wants to know what your aircraft can do. If that data is not available you may run into issues. Maybe the services you tried don’t know the MU-2 and the performance data needs to be added?

They are here for sure but whether they will post is another matter. The readers:posters ratio is about 20:1.

EAL flies a Jetprop. There are other PA46T people here but I am not sure of their nicknames.

However there is almost no difference between flying a turboprop and flying say a TB20 or SR22, in terms of operational knowledge. The main difference is in the routes flown, obviously, from a given A to B (the upper airways, FL200+, are much more straight, but a “slow” aircraft at FL300 may not get the same routes due to the 500kt traffic) and the capability to get above wx, but you know all this anyway.

I suggest you sign up on the autorouter and stick a few routes in there and see what you get. If there are issues, raise a support ticket. You will need to create a model for the MU-2, if there isn’t one already.

Jason is a good example. He was flying a P46T and now he is flying a Mustang…
I was flying a P46T but the owner sold it… Don’t know what next…

Romain

mciholas wrote:

Aug 10-16: Atlantic crossing east
Sep 10-11: Lille
Sep 16-18: Oslo
Sep 28-Oct 2: Munich and/or Berlin
Oct 14-16: Lausanne
Oct 28-30: Dublin
Nov 9-13: Venice and/or Florence
Dec 8-15: Barcelona, Madrid, Gibraltar, and/or Lisbon
Dec 16-20: Atlantic crossing west

Unless I had a specific purpose with visiting Oslo, I would rather visit Stockholm or some place on the West coast of Norway like Ålesund, Trondheim or Bergen.

I would also try to fit in Strasbourg or Colmar.

The set of pilots who own and fly turboprops, plan their own IFR flights in Europe, and post on this board seems to be very small, perhaps zero.

A number of people on here seem to have offered advice and offered to talk further with you. There is more experience on here relevant to your questions than any other site in Europe in my experience. That is true even if you don’t like the answers….

mciholas wrote:

Relatives I’ve never met. My grandfather was from Halden, south of Oslo.

That’s a good reason.

In that case Rygge (ENRY), the Ryanair base, is closer to Halden and should have customs. They have quite a bit of traffic, mostly international.