Question for US controllers...

[palgia]

Quick question for US controllers...

What is the procedure if a VFR aircraft under radar contact who was receiving advisory services (flight following) were to suddently disappear from the screen? Lets say both primary and secondary targets are lost (and that you have no reason to believe it was caused by a radar malfunction).
What would you do? Would you alert search and rescue or not?

What if in the above scenario the secondary return would disappear but the primary return was still there for a couple of minutes before disappearing in a region where there is no airport. Would you send someone in this case?



The reason I ask is because I am trying to determine how useful filing a VFR flightplan can be if one plans to request flight following (I know, you can' count on always getting it) and conducting the entire flight in a region where you have radar coverage. In the event of a sudden emergency, where the pilot is unable to make a distress call, would someone go looking for him if he goes down (and he had not filed/opened any flight plans)?

If I am flying over non-radar areas and without talking to ATC, I would definately file a VFR flight plan, but I was wondering whether filing was a little redundant if one is under flight following.

Thank you for your answer.

John

[av8boy]

File the flight plan either way. The VFR flight plan is the formal arrangement between you and the FAA that gets people to hike through the mud in the woods at night in the rain looking for you. VFR flight following is more impromptu.

This is not to say that your sudden disappearance during VFR flight following won't concern anyone. The 7110.65 makes mention of this very eventuality...

10-2-5. EMERGENCY SITUATIONS

Consider that an aircraft emergency exists...(snip, snip, snip) when...(more snipping)

b. There is unexpected loss of radar contact and radio communications with any IFR or VFR aircraft...


The thing is, if you're getting VFR service from me all I know about you is your callsign and type. On the other hand, filing a flight plan provides SAR with lots more info, not the least of which is number of persons on board and a phone number that somebody can call when you don't cancel the flight plan.

Consider the fact that if you suddenly disappear whilst getting VFR radar service from me, the info in your flight plan will still be of great value. The same questions are going to be asked... what color is the airframe? How many persons on board? How much fuel? Route of flight? Contact info? I can't see any of that on the radar.

In short, it's not redundant. Two different tools doing two different (although overlapping) things. You'd be silly not to avail yourself of both when possible.


Dave

[atcea.com]

I concur with what AV8 has written, but would like to add a caveat: don't count on ATC to initiate a search if contact is lost. True, if the loss of contact is "unexpected", action will be taken. But in reality, controllers routinely lose contact with VFRs - especially en route controllers - and don't consider it to be "unexpected".

In other words, a guy wanders off radar and communication and the controller files away the strip (if there was one) and that's that. Happens all the time. Flight plans are good for search-and-rescue, flight following is good for traffic advisories and safety alerts.

[Scott Voigt]

Palgia;

What the others have said <G>, however, we are supposed to and normally do notify the watch desk if we show that you are overdue or if you disappear from our radar. In a perfect world SAR procedings would start after you disappear, however, as has been stated, we have a LOT of VFR's who just quit paying attention and go off into lala land while getting advisories. They quit talking to us as well as sometimes then going into areas of non radar, so that we can't follow them anymore.

That said, there is nothing written that states that we must do any kind of SAR procedings if we lose radar and radios with you. Will we do this? I would say that we will start looking around for you, but this will be determined by just how busy the facility is at the time... Your best bet is filing a flight plan, but I have found that doesn't always work either, since I have called to cancel VFR flight plans and had AFSS not know anything about me <sigh>. For backup, I would always have a family member or friend know what route you were going to take and where you were going just in case you don't show up...

regards

Scott

[av8boy]

I had actually written something to the effect that it isn’t rare for folks to wander off freq/radar without saying anything because of things like coverage and bad technique. However, in that I was about to fall asleep (no, not at work), I was having trouble saying it in a reasonable way and so deleted it. Thanks to the others that picked-up the slack on that part.