Crosscountry nav advice

[Big_Johnno]

During training and articles in magazines the emphases is put on thorough flightplanning. This can take several hours depending on your skills and experience. My question is how do pilots of EMS or media pilots who have to be on the scene in as short a time as possible manage to do such detailed flight planning and still get there in such a short space of time? By the time it takes me to do a flight plan it would be yesterdays news.:(

[SASless]

When not busy sleeping or whining about flight nurses and paramedics, most EMS pilots spend a lot of time looking at maps and preplanning as many flights as possible until they become very familiar with their area of operations.

Throw in GPS and other navaids and it gets a lot easier. Setting the cockpit up as if it were an IFR flight helps as well should the weather deteriorate.

I find marking my map in "miles to run" to the destination and using the GPS to "count down" the distance makes putting a finger on your location much easier.

One could always use the home base as the waypoint and then "count up" along the bearing shown by the GPS.

Most EMS bases have a big wall map with a string and protractor that allows a pilot to quickly plot a direction and distance to the scene....or for frequently used sites, a gouge sheet with all the information for the trip.

[canookpilot]

:ok::E:DG.P.S.

[paco]

You got so used to the area in N Ireland that you ended up working out grid references in your head. Used the same trick with lat & long in N Alberta.

phil

[ShyTorque]

IFR = I Follow Roads (and railways, rivers and ridgelines).

Go "Big Nav" to "small nav", using an initial point, as per military tactical low flying prior to GPS.

[Thud_and_Blunder]

Many EMS jobs are on roads (nature of the beast) so deliberately aim slightly off to one side of your target on the road. Then, when you reach the line feature, you know which way you have to turn to find the target. Which works fine 'til the police report the accident as being in Romney but it actually turns out to be in Hythe - ho hum.

Knowing your groundspeed in miles per minute, making a simple plan then flying that plan accurately, being able to judge angles (bearings) to within 5 degrees "by eye" - all help when you're flying an EMS aircraft with just stopwatch and compass. Anyway, sad old duffers like me can't really see a moving map on t'other side of t'cockpit in the more modern aircraft. Even if we could, there's the quandary of "how do you change the Track Line from blue to magenta?" (the blue is difficult to make out with the viewing angle on some screens...) which no amount of going through the book can uncover (answers on a postcard, please)

[Revolutionary]

In our area, many ground units have GPS and will relay scene coordinates. Plug 'em into the GPS and Bob's yer uncle. It helps of course to have a general idea where you're going, just in case the gentleman in the fire truck passing on the lat/lon is dyslexic!

[Gomer Pylot]

I have seldom spent more than a couple of minutes planning any flight, even IFR. With experience, it just doesn't take that long. A glance at the map gives approximate distance and heading, and you should be able to calculate the time required in your head from that. With current GPS units, it's easy to crank up, take off, and navigate to a destination with little or no prior planning. You really need to know the fuel burn for the aircraft you're flying, and be able to figure the required fuel for almost any distance, with reserves, close enough, without even needing a calculator. Long offshore IFR trips can require more detailed planning, especially at the limits of fuel range, but even those should only take a very few minutes with experience. Getting the experience, of course, does take time, and long involved planning for the first flights, until you really know what you're doing.

[800]

Big Johnno, Gomer Pylot said it all.
One thing the responses have not enlightened you on is that they have been navigating for quite a while. They learnt the basics (which you appear to be doing now), then with their experience they study the area and do varoius PRE - Flight study. This may include driving around the area, storing standard plans on file, completeing nomograghs of many standard routes with tracks & distances within their operating area (AO), organising their cockpit and gear so its ready to go at a moments notice.
Quite often outsiders (non pilots or crew) will not see or know of all the behind the scences planning that has already taken place.
Have fun flying and remember that the compass and watch are your freinds. When all else fails, thats all you have.
800

[ForkTailedDrKiller]

I don't fly choppers but what the heck!

My Motion Computing LS800 tablet computer and mobile phone let me flight plan from anywhere (in Oz at least) to anywhere else and submit it in a matter of a few minutes only. I can access NAIPS, wheather maps etc. My flight planning program has all of the details of my particular aircraft and the std parameters that I use for flightplanning.

I would have thought EMS crew would be able to spit a flightplan out of a computer and get themselves underway, then amend as required once airborne

Surely these days GPS and moving map have removed any hassle with navigating to a particular point, provided you know an accurate position of your target. For $2k a Garmin 296 will take you anywhere in the world you want to go +/- a meter or so.

Yes, and before someone jumps down my throat, experience lets you throw all the technology away and find your way around by looking out the window (and at a map if you have to).

Technology has taken the hassle out of flightplanning!

Dr:cool:

[SASless]

800,

Ask Gomer how many years he did in 206's with exactly the clock and compass for his only navaid's!

Many a million hours have been flown in the Gulf of Mexico with just that kind of equipment.

[malabo]

At its most basic, flight planning is only to determine if you have enough fuel. Unless you are stretching range to the limit, like crossing the Atlantic, it really doesn't matter. Who cares what the wind is at 5000'? Or the temperature, or what the track and corrected heading is. If you think you have a headwind, put a little extra fuel in. Flying an EMS or ENG helicopter you pump on a couple of hours of fuel and go out 45 minutes in any direction you want. If the trip is further, put a little more in. After a week on a helicopter in a role, most pilots have it figured out pretty close. Nobody in Canada ever runs out of fuel and nobody ever fills out a flight planning form. You're going to Uncle Bill's cabin and you know its going to take you .8, 1.6 return, add a .2 for weather and another .4 reserve and you need 2.2 hours of fuel. Do it in your head. Navigation is 100% GPS. You don't care what the wind is because you fly whatever heading gives you a ground track to where you are going. You don't need a map because the map with all the details is displayed on the GPS screen. As in an earlier post, fuel is in minutes and you can tell exactly to the minute when you will arrive. With some of the newer FMS systems like on the 139 you can work out return fuel considering winds, but it takes about as long to calculate as it does to do the trip, and in the end just doesn't make any difference. IFR isn't that different either, just a check on weather at destination, alternate. Most guys just penciled in some numbers on the Low Altitude chart, and erased them at the end of the trip.

Different story if you are trying to comply with a CL1 or CL2 and have weight limitations and max payload goals that drive the fuel to a minimum. But that's a whole other kind of flying.

Malabo

[paco]

Sorry, got to jump in here.....

"Quite often outsiders (non pilots or crew) will not see or know of all the behind the scences planning that has already taken place."

Quite true - I often got into trouble by doing it in my head and not wasting time putting a pageful of coordinates in the GPS! if you don't use the GPS these days, the customer thinks you are incompetent, even when he is 300 m away from the target and you have map read there exactly overhead!

"Nobody in Canada ever runs out of fuel"

Yes they do! Especially one "consultant" who came to inspect us who had run out of fuel in a Llama in the air, which is presumably why he ended up as a consultant. Then there's the guy who ran out of fuel in a LongRanger round a fire, also in the air.... I could go on. There are many others.

"You're going to Uncle Bill's cabin and you know its going to take you .8, 1.6 return, add a .2 for weather and another .4 reserve and you need 2.2 hours of fuel."

Hmmm. On longish trip offshore, or anywhere, you'd better work out a PNR. If you estimate the same fuel for each leg of an out-and-back trip, and assume that the head- and tailwinds will cancel each other out, you will run out of fuel not too far from home. As soon as a wind gets involved, you need more fuel than you would in still air.

Example: Every day, you fly a Bell 206 from Rainbow Lake (where there is no rainbow and no lake!) in N Alberta to Shekhili compressor station, at which there is no fuel. The distance is 50 nm each way and cruise speed 100 kts. Fuel consumption is 29 US gals per hour. On a nil-wind day, therefore, it should be half an hour each way but, with 20-knot tailwinds outbound, you get there in only 25 minutes. The journey back, on the other hand, takes 37.5 minutes, which is 62.5 minutes total. This may not sound much, but with 60-knot winds, you would be flying for 35 minutes longer than expected, and the figures get worse with longer stage lengths. Adjust as necessary for your prevailing wind.

"Navigation is 100% GPS" "You don't need a map because the map with all the details is displayed on the GPS screen"

B*llocks. I know in Canada you don't legally need to carry a map when VFR, but what happens if the GPS goes tits up? The antenna is a separate electrical device whiah also reserves the right to quit at a drop of a hat, and there are areas in Northen Canada where you won't get decent reception - I've even lost it around calgary.

For the original poster - learn to do the basics and it will get quicker as it goes along!

Phil

[psyan]

PACO is correct.....if you rely on electronic methods totally then you will eventually learn the error of that concept. There simply is no viable replacement for fully understanding the basics of navigation and map reading. With practise and many hours of tooling about regular routes/areas' then retained information from previous experiences will make the fundamental process quicker.

If you are doing the same route the same way continuously, well even then to set off without a line on the map and the rest of the basic data is not only foolhardy but damn stupid. IMO the minimum is that which is sufficient to allow you to transit the planned route safely without any electronic aid.

Best Wishes

[heliduck]

Big Johnno,
Once you get going you will surprise yourself at how quickly your flight planning time required goes from hours to minutes. I spent a few years on maps before moving to GPS & the best advice I could offer to you would be to plan your flight along the required route, but make sure you are aware of the terrain & significant points either side of your intended track. It is very easy to fall into the trap of focusing on the line on the map & not lift your head, look around & enjoy the view. For example while looking around you may notice an odd shaped mountain in the distance. If you were to become "unsure of your position" & you came across this mountain while blundering around trying to get home you would have a bit of an idea where you were & hence which way to go.
I have had 3 GPS failures to date, all in the middle of nowhere, & it is merely an inconvenience if you know generally where you are at the time. I use 3 golden rules -

Always know where you are.
Always cross check that you are where you think you are.
Always, always know where you are.

If you follow those rules & still get lost, then you should have followed your GPS instead of listening to me!!

[Big_Johnno]

Thank you all for your advice. i will be taking it all on board and go from there.
i appreciate your help, thanks again.
Big Johnno

[Bladecrack]

Agree totally with heliduck, anyone who relys on GPS is asking for trouble, I had an GPS antenna fail inside a busy CTR in bad weather, instead of showing me tracking south as it should, it showed me tracking east, about 10 miles out to sea! :eek: (just as well I knew where I was, and a glance at the compass confirmed it) ALWAYS cross check with the chart, nav-aids and the old MK 1 eyeball! When I took off later that day it showed me flying backwards on the screen..... Most amusing :hmm:
BC.

[malabo]

Yeah, pilots can still run out of gas, bucketing a 5 minute cycle until the low fuel light comes on, "one more" quick maintenance flight with low fuel, external load ops where you wait for real low fuel to pick a heavy load....and, as I said of long distances offshore you'll plan it pretty tight. I've bucked enough 60 knot headwinds to know its going to take more fuel, but those are a rarity and if they hadn't been forecast then all the fancy pencil work still wouldn't have saved you.

I'll say it again, ENG and EMS pilots never put a pencil line to a map for any short little trip of less than an hour. They never fill out a trip log with all the little boxes for CAS, TAS, Actual Wind, etc. Ever try filling one of those out while you're flying an Astar or Jetranger, with the cyclic in you knees?

You can rely on your GPS about as much as you rely on your tail-rotor. Both can quit but rarely do. If you end up going 90 degrees off your direction you are flying an illegal aircraft without a wet compass, or you've forgotten where the sun rises and sets. Gimme a break, even if it quits ten minutes after you've departed, you still have a heading and ETA good to within a couple of minutes. The rest is looking out the window.

I believe the original question was by a new pilot that was trying to resolve the detailed flight planning that he did in training with what is to be expected in the industry. My answer is that you don't do the same, you employ any number of shortcuts, but the principles learned from the planning exercises are what help give you the judgement to safely get to your destination and back on a day-to-day basis without the pencil work.

Malabo

[heliduck]

Nicely summarised Malabo. Case closed.

[Russell Sprout]

Oh and make sure you check all the NOTAM's for the day prior to getting airborne.....

[Bravo73]

...or at least call 0500 354 802 to find out about the REALLY important ones.