I did wonder! Not knocking it though...
Perhaps I should remove that post :O

Good morning prunners!

Thank you for everyone's replies to my post. I just thought that I would let you know that on saturday I successfully completed my trip to Ireland ... hurray! A friend and I flew from Sleap to Newcastle in Ireland. We were very lucky with the weather, and I was watching the weather like a hawk all week! We had some great views of Wales, and then it was really cool heading out over the coast, roughly 10 miles South of Caernarfon. We went via LIPGO. It was cool to see the Irish coastline. It was my first landing on grass, and I was a bit surprised at how slippery it was ... icerink springs to mind :ooh: . Newcastle was a nice airfield to visit, and we were made so welcome by John Nugent (Manager) and his staff. I wish I could have stayed overnight and enjoyed some of the legendary partying that the Irish are famous for :) . I'd love to do a tour of Ireland someday.

When it was time to leave, we got airborne and asked for the flightplan to be opened up for our flight back. Dublin couldn't find it .... :eek: . I had filed it through AFPex, and had a hardcopy with me, but they still couldn't find my flightplan ... agghhhh! After returning back to Sleap, I found out that my friend's dad had this problem too, and he nearly got interecepted by the military :uhoh: . So it's not the first time that Dublin have not been able to find a filed flightplan. I was very surprised to found out that in UK you don't have to close a flightplan???? I triple checked this, as I always believed that you HAD to close a flight plan. On the outward journey Dublin closed it for us, so that was fine. I was told that here you don't have to close a flightplan, but I was worried that if you didn't, then SAR would be scrambled? I was told that this isn't the case. My point was 'what happens if you crash and die ... then you can't alert the authorites either'? No one knows and assumes that you got back safely as 'no news is good news'??? Apparantly you don't have to close your flight plan anymore because so many people forget to do it? I think (despite still being lowish hours) that this is a flawed system. I guess that we could have closed the flightplan with London Information before we changed back to Sleap????

I tried that (though with Farnborough Radar, and not London Info) but they rejected the idea and said it had to be closed on the ground after landing, which seems fair. And yes, you dont have to close them, it happens automatically. What triggers search and rescue I dont know...

About time we had another thread on Pprune saying how pointless and stupid the Air Law examination is and how it will all be forgotten immediately upon qualifying ;)

(Not getting at the above two posters by the way - "request closing flightplan' followed by "negative cannot do so" are VERY commonly heard on London Info)

PiperArcher - Thanks for sharing your experience, i'm glad to know that i'm not the only one who had this problem

Mariner - It was the first time that i'd ever filed a flight plan, so it was all new to me. I'm learning about new aspects of flying (as is everyone) all the time, that's what I love about it.

If the flight plan is not closed in due time - i.e. after the "endurance time" you wrote - then they basically have to trigger SAR, yes. Over the years they have learned that people tend to forget, so before trigering such an expensive operation, with no certitude that you'll be able to pay for it, they'll go some length to make sure you didn't simply forget. Normally they will try to call your filed destination and alternates, and if you mentioned your mobile number in the flight plan they will call that too.

In many cases your flight plan will be closed for you, normally by the tower of the field where you land, but I am never sure if this is mandatory. It never hurts to ask, so as to be on the safe side! If in doubt, call one of the adressees on the phone after landing.

In all theory, closing a flight plan can only be done after landing. For non-radioed/non controlled fields, some countries allow closing through the FIS, when "destination field in sight" is reported.

The UK is out on its own in not requiring positive flight plan closure. Personally, I don't see that as a good thing.

What you are supposed to do is nominate a "responsible person" to call out SAR if you don't arrive. At a manned airfield who have received your flight plan, the responsible person is likely to be ATC/AFIS but not if you arrive after hours, or to a farm strip, or wherever.

Jan that is true everywhere that I'm aware of, EXCEPT the one under discussion here! The UK does not have that system, and will not do S&R unless someone specifically requests it (known in the UK as a responsible person). Simply not closing a plan won't result in S&R in the UK.

Most countries (UK included) go through clearly defined Uncertainty and then Alert Phases before despatching SAR assets in the case of an overdue arrival.
In the OP's case, a phone call to Sleap during the Uncertainty phase would have revealed he'd landed, even if some "responsible person" had requested assistance due to an unclosed FP.

Closest I ever came to a SAR launch on my behalf was on crossing the Alps from Italy into France, and having to orbit for an hour with no radio reception awaiting clouds to clear the Pt St Bernard Pass. Phoned the French flight plan number to close upon arrival at Bourg (after hours by then so nobody around) to be told I had been on Uncertainty phase :eek:

Hmmmpppff. What then is the !@#$%^&^&*** reason for filing a flight plan? Suppose I actually DO go missing, how will "the powers that be" realise?

On a recent flight through Germany, that went awry due to low cloud, I was much reassured by the FIS inquiring whether I was still on the frequency! I'm not sure she would have done that if I were not an a flight plan. It is nice to know one is being looked after.

Jan - ATC automatically provide an Alerting Service if you are in receipt of a FIS regardless of whether or not you are on an FP, so you would presumably of got that call in any event.

As to Q regarding the point of an FP if SAR is not automatically launched, consider some of the mandatory requirements for FP filling:

Crossing International Boundary
Entering or leaving controlled airspace.

Neither of the above 2 categories are specified just for locating overdue aircraft, as it is of course just as serious if a local OCAS flight goes missing and no FP is required for that.

Whereas, for direct safety issues encompassed by for example:

More than 10 miles from a coast
Crossing dangerous and/or remote terrain

FP's are only recommended and are not mandatory.

This suggests to me that FP requirements are more geared to admin than safety requirements.