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Old 3rd July 2012 | 14:12
  #152 (permalink)  
Fuji Abound
 
Joined: May 2001
Posts: 4,631
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From: UK
I do know of pilots in such machines who no longer take or look at charts or even flight plan.
That would be me then.

Seriously, I guess I find it a little easier to get the chart out when I first sit in the cockpit and decide on a route. Its then a matter of plugging the route into the FMS check it agrees with the chart and off we go. I reckon I can plug a route in to any where in the UK in 5 minutes without the need for any more planning. (That is assuming I expect it to be VFR, a little more work otherwise I concede).

Of course for outside the UK a pesky FP must be filed so inevitably there is a little more planning otherwise it wouldn't make a great deal of difference.

Yes I worry about high ground and NOTAMS - I can honestly say I always do a NOTAM brief before and I will take a quick look at the route and have a mental plan of what I will do if the weather doesn't behave.

I will often set off in a direction, decide to go somewhere else or drop into X so its all done on the fly, planning by the seat of the pants I guess.

Do I get the chart out on route? - well frankly not very often. I think the one thing glass avionics lack is painting the airspace limits all that well, so outside CAS I do find I usually aim to be as high as I can and am often looking for the next step up. For me I often find it quick to glance at the chart to work out the next step up or required step downs but that's about it.

It is always an education flying with commercial pilots who spend most/all their time in CAS. My good mate is a BA training captain so I guess he knows his business. He struggles on cross countries outside CAS nipping round, through and under CAS so I wouldn't be too concerned about how our commercial brethren go about it - as he says we are streaks ahead with some of the kit we are lucky enough to have, but then again they as soon as you are on an IFR flight plan its handed to you on a plate.

So in short why oh why do we have to make it so complicated? It really isn't.

When I started flying the planning use to take several hours - everyone soon got fed up with that, including me, but it was necessary at the time. In the end it makes getting from A to B and epic and most of us have better things to do.

I would go about things differently without a moving map and if my backup moving map both quit on me I would go about things differently but I am pretty comfortable with the mark one eyeball and the other radio navionics.

Large scale color moving maps with topography, weather, airspace and traffic all painted on the map give you unsurpassed situational aware - why wouldn't you want it. Of course the more kit you have the more head down time you can be lulled into, but actually AS LONG as you are comfortable with the technology it translates into less head in time that PLOGing your way across the country side.
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