Mode S & Flight Plans

[3FallinFlyer]

Hi all - I don't know if this has been discussed before, but does anyone know whether you still enter "C" after the forward slash for sec 10 (equipment) on FLP Form CA48 or does it become "S" (or something else) if you are squawking Mode S??
:confused:

[S-Works]

no you enter /S mode S has A/C and alt as standard.

[IO540]

European ATC don't seem to look at the equipment list in the flight plan; they assume you carry the legal requirement for the airspace you are flying in (which varies from country to country).

I read somewhere that filing a flight plan above FL245 or whatever but not declaring 8.33kHz channel spacing does reject the flight plan, however.

I have been filing S/C since day 1 and never had it questioned.

[rustle]

Don't know if you saw the input about this on the FLYER thread on the same subject, but that might change soon IO.

[3FallinFlyer]

Thanks for your replies - I also have entered S/C since day 1 but figured that this may now be rejected for airways - so its S/S from now on then (including VFR I suppose)

[IO540]

Do you have a URL, rustle? It takes hours to find a post on the flyer.co.uk forum...

Anyway, as I said I don't think CFMU will reject a flight plan for anything on the equipment list other than 8.33.

Whether ATC will give you a different routing according to your declared equipment list is a separate Q. In Europe, this doesn't currently happen, either. Anyway, what are ATC to do if somebody does not declare BRNAV equipment and asks for a climb through FL095? Refuse it??

[rustle]

Do you have a URL, rustle? It takes hours to find a post on the flyer.co.uk forum

Here it is (http://forums.flyer.co.uk/viewtopic.php?t=31037)

Shall I make you a nice cup of tea whilst you read it, too? ;)

[Fuji Abound]

Just a splash of milk and one sugar please.

[IO540]

As usual, there is zero real information in that flyer thread that is relevant to this discussion. By "real" I mean coming from people who know what they are talking about. Apart from Bookworm's post on the 8.33 issue; he is invariably right and that must be where I read it originally.

Sure, Mode S will be mandatory for many areas in due course and everybody knows this, but this thread is about the degree to which Mode S equipment declarations in flight plans matter.

[rustle]

As usual, there is zero real information in that flyer thread that is relevant to this discussion. By "real" I mean coming from people who know what they are talking about. Apart from Bookworm's post on the 8.33 issue; he is invariably right and that must be where I read it originally.

Several of those posters "know what they're talking about" - I know this for a fact: Whether that knowledge coincides with what people want to read I don't know.

[3FallinFlyer]

Whether ATC will give you a different routing according to your declared equipment list is a separate Q. In Europe, this doesn't currently happen, either. Anyway, what are ATC to do if somebody does not declare BRNAV equipment and asks for a climb through FL095? Refuse it??

What I am unsure about is if a FP would be rejected on the basis that it was filed in airways with section 10 entered as S/C. Otherwise, at what point will you be stopped (if indeed you are stopped) from filing and flying an airways route with a Mode A/C only transponder (or would the FP be approved and clearance declined once ATC become aware that you are not squawking S)

Not that it matters to me as I forked out for Mode S anyway :ouch:

[PPRuNe Radar]

At present, the UK NATS internal flight data processing system only looks in FPLs for 8.33 and RVSM equippage, and then only when relevant to the airspace where it is required. Everything else is left to the pilot to ensure the equippage requirements are being met.

Not to say that Mode S 'warnings' might not become a requirement within the NATS kit in the future but it is not looked for at the moment.

[jabberwok]

Anyone know how many Mode S radars are currently operational out of the 23 planned? The last Raytheon newsletter suggests six are completed but that doesn't mean operational.