Menu Sign In Contact FAQ
Banner
Welcome to our forums

Shoreham EGKA to Quimper LFRQ, Aug 2019

This was a quick get-away to a place I have not previously visited.

The airport is 24hr PNR for customs/immigration. This is fine, until you have to re-schedule; see below.

The filed route was

EGKA BOGNA DCT ADLOG DCT AKIKI G27 ARE LFRQ

and was flown pretty directly, IFR FL090, since the Channel DAs (D036 etc) were inactive

Initially London Control issued a departure clearance to SFD which apart from going in the opposite direction would have busted the Eastbourne airshow prohibited area. After departure, I told them this and said I need to go south or south east. They said Ok and wanted me on a southerly track until reaching the base of CAS. Quite strange really.

I think a better way is to file via GWC or SAM, forcing a service in CAS, but IME in the past this results in a handover to Solent Radar which just gives you 4000 or 5000ft and then dumps you because you are OCAS.

Of course I know LC don’t service OCAS and those DAs are Class G at this level. This time we got London INFO who gave us a VFR squawk; another silent IFR clearance termination They reissued the original squawk for the handover to Brest FIS, and from there is was smooth, with a 170nm DCT to ROSPO which is the LFRQ ILS IAF.


Here we are approaching the LOC

Descending 3000ft

Airport just visible

A collection of classy hardware. A nice bizjet briefly arrived with a load of people… They get daily “airline” flights to other places in France, and a few a week to the UK.

The pump is AIR BP only but as usual it needed expert help from the fireman; there is the usual “hidden switch” inside and the instructions on the card machine are a bit useless

The airport cafe shuts 2:30pm

Off into town to get lunch. There were two crude ripoff attempts by the same taxi driver, with the meter showing €17 on the airport collection; we didn’t notice at the time. The second one was a starting €30 on the meter… Clearly you have to watch this and make sure they zero the meter.

Quimper is certainly scenic. The first day it rained; the second was nice. Everyone is really friendly.



I got out 7am and got some pics without the crowds.








We got a taxi to Loctudy on the coast; a nice town with a nice walk along the beach.




My friend is into sailing so checked out the “parking” facilities




Returning, the wx forecast was worsening with some prob30 tempo of TSRA etc. So I tried to move the 1400Z departure to 1000Z. With convective ws it is nearly always better to fly early in the day. The GAR and flight plan move are easy enough, but the 24hr PNR for the airport is a problem when the police never pick up the phone and don’t answer emails The airport could not contact them either. Eventually, after many attempts and messages left of their answering machine etc, I decided to go anyway; if they turn up they will inspect the passports and if they don’t turn up we will be gone. However they emailed back about 8am saying they don’t want to see me and we can go. I am careful with this stuff since I don’t want a repeat of Avignon which was quite a nasty situation.

We climbed up (FL100) through about 8500ft of cloud, with a lot of rain and the last bit being very likely icing conditions, but with TKS this no longer worries me

We got a nice direct to GUR and then the usual good service from Jersey radar. However, later on they got a bit confused with the filed route. A lot of Autorouter routes confuse the hell out of ATC. They asked if we want Q41 (which goes to SAM) because at FL100 we would be infringing CAS othewise (or some such). I pointed out that ORIST-GWC is Class G at FL100 (CAS base FL105) and got that instead. That is the usual route between Shoreham and the Channel Islands. This also just misses D036 which, being Monday, was active.

This is the 1000th example of how much a pilot has to know about the weird UK ATC system, to fly in it IFR in the Eurocontrol system. A foreign pilot would get totally confused and in some cases would get into big trouble. Look at how London Info silently dumps your IFR clearance and then equally silently restores it for the handover to France, who clearly see the transponder codes on radar from way back and wonder what the hell is going on…

I don’t know which one this is



With some “big wx” ahead, I asked for a transit of D036 etc for DCT EGKA and after a while they coordinated, for not below 3000ft

Wild winds and turbulence at Shoreham

You can see how the Eurocontrol tracking got dumped at ORIST. This is interesting since the TXP code didn’t change, so ATC must have performed some action.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom
Look at how London Info silently dumps your IFR clearance and then equally silently restores it for the handover to France

I think it is more correct to say that from the point of view of French ATC your IFR clearance was never terminated.

ESKC (Uppsala/Sundbro), Sweden

I agree

I was an eye opener for my PPL passenger, seeing the UK system and then how France does it…

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

Nice photos Peter, we hope to be there on the end of September again. We miss Quimper, because now it‘s more then 6 month we havent been there.

This is the 1000th example of how much a pilot has to know about the weird UK ATC system, to fly in it IFR in the Eurocontrol system. A foreign pilot would get totally confused and in some cases would get into big trouble.

But this really wonders me. We where flying most of the time IR during the last weeks in the UK, see my trip report and noticed no difference to France, beside that the English of the French controllers was better then the one spoken around London. Kidding. The difference was, that they handed my over to France for decend quite early because of to much traffic to handle for them. Class A, near London City.

EDDS , Germany

That may be because you entered the UK via the south eastern end which has simpler airspace. Plus, you probably were not filing any routings through Class G.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom
They asked if we want Q41 (which goes to SAM) because at FL100 we would be infringing CAS othewise (or some such).

How, if you were IFR?

As I come to the end of my IR training I’ve been playing around with a few routes to France and noticed leaving the Shannon FIR at say FL100 at BAKUR would mean going OCAS into the London FIR as the Strumble CTA is FL145 and up. Is it the case then that I wouldn’t be implicitly cleared to enter Peter wrote:

the N862 at BHD?

EIMH, Ireland
6 Posts
Sign in to add your message

Back to Top