LFPT used to use Le Bourget SIDs, and this was mentioned in the French AIP but was not mentioned on the Jepp terminal charts. I am re-writing one of my old IFR articles and looked for this stuff again but it seems to have gone.
POGO is the Paris group in IFPS. This is a special arrangement for Paris and is processed manually by Eurocontrol outside the standard IFPS system. The reason is that the standard SID/STAR system in Paris does not allow you to fly from one Paris airport to the other without making a Tour de France. For this reason, there is an agreement to completely circumvent IFPS and file a DCT between two Paris airports (members of the POGO group) and you have to add a “RMK/POGO” in the flight plan. This flightplan will not validate with IFPS but you are still supposed to file it and it goes into the manual processing queue.
The autorouter actually knows about POGO, we have special code for it. It’s a weirdness in the Eurocontrol system. I just tested it and we generate it correctly but we try to validate it and obviously get an error from IFPS. We’ll have to handle that and not do any validation.
I can imagine how this POGO stuff came to life:
- “We need a simple way for traffic between the various LFP* airfields”
- “That is not possible with the IFPS rules around Paris.”
- “But we need it.”
- “No, sorry, can’t do.”
- “We’re France and Paris is the capital. I will get the President on the phone!”
- “OK, just file invalid flight plans and add POGO as a remark, we will hire staff to process it manually.”
POGO is the IFR route that loops around Paris, often used for training via Pontoise, CDG, Melun, Orly, Toussus. I don’t have the exact details right now but it is well known to all Paris IFR training students.
snap. Achim managed to write 3 times as much and give all the relevant details at the same time. He wins!
the POGO routes are in the ARR/DEP pages of the AIP for LFPT and LFPN
