As for giving 30min flight suggestions from London:
- For museums: Old Warden (Vintages), Duxford (War Aircraft), LeeOnSolent (Hoovercraft)
- For beaches: LeeOnSolent, Shoreham, Clacton & Bembridge
There are plenty of places to land and eat something while talking about flying but don’t abuse them you will get fat, lose your medical and lose your partner interest in flying 
have you bought the VFR Complimentaire pack yet
I guess not. What is it and where do I buy it from? I have bought quite a lot of things, including the “Documents VFR” which comes with the “complements aux cartes” – is this what you mean?
Going back to SIVs etc – so can I enter a TMA just by talking to the SIV? Or do I need to switch to another frequency for that?
If it’s a plastic folder containing 2 books plus the 1:1million charts and often they add other bits like the map of low flying fast jet corridors and the Paris 1:250,000 chart, then that is the one.
You can treat the SIV a bit like the flight following service in the USA, it’s a traffic and deconfliction service (if you want it to be) as most have good radar coverage etc.
Regarding entry into a TMA just ask them. Sometimes they can and sometimes not. Often you find TMA and SIV on the same frequency. What the AIP says about it is that SIV will provide the services but when SIV and ATC are the same, the control service takes priority.
But you can always leave an SIV service to get a downstream clearance, you don’t need to tell them you will be off frequency but it is best to do so when receiving a traffic service and tell them when you are back on frequency.
It is very rare that any of the C or D controllers will refuse you transit. They may want to vector you. I can’t offhand think of a class B zone and whereas A is usually forbidden to VFR “E” is open and only dependent on weather.
So around Nice for instance it doesn’t matter whether you are in C or D airspace the difference is only in the way separation is handled.
As for the military areas the frequency to call is in the, what I call the complimentaire it might be the old name for it, and on the 1:500,000 chart. Often the SIV can get clearance for you through these but sometimes they can not. I remember reading why, somewhere but can’t remember where. Again the information on which ones can help you is in the "complimentaire " along with their ceilings and floors. The military controllers are better spoken to in English (in my experience) due to the great difference in French accents, pronunciation and speed of announcement from one area of France to another. In other words coming from the Vendée I don’t always understand someone from Marseille.
“P” The prohibited zones should be avoided. Not all “P” zones are ZITs and some are also transferable under certain conditions, again the complimentaire says which are which. But in VFR the best is to keep out of all of them if you don’t want a long and arduous police interview.
Merci beaucoup! Yes, I have the “complements aux cartes”, the 1M:1 charts, the RTBA chart, also the 500K:1 IGN charts (4 of them) and the 250K:1 charts where available, also Cartabossy and Cartabossy Weekend. None of which I ever for flying use since SDVFR does it all for me – though I enjoy reading them, like all maps, when I’m sitting in an armchair :-)
French (and other European) use of the ICAO airspace designations seems weird when coming from the US. There, EVERYTHING is E above 1200 AGL, sometimes lower, up to FL180 where A starts. You fly in E without talking to anyone (unless you want to). B/C/D are used ONLY in the immediate vicinity of airports, B for huge ones (e.g. LAX, SFO, New York area), C for big ones, D for little ones. So the idea that Heathrow, for example, is D, is just bizarre. (I did read the reasons for this but they didn’t make much sense).
Funny what you say about English/French. I try to use French, because I have to be able to for my PPL anyway. At Cannes, even if I speak French they reply in English. On the other hand, with Marseille Info it took me half a dozen tries to get my tail number even recognizable, never mind right, in English. I was tempted to switch.
@flyingmatt As a US pilot who moved to NL a few years ago, I’d like to counter some of the negativity and offer a slightly different perspective. As a few others have said, don’t worry so much about the rules and mechanical differences, because most of them will become quickly apparent when you start flying. I would recommend downloading SkyDemon and playing around with it, as this will give you a nice understanding of airspace and access to AIPs (get in the habit of reading it for any new country/airfield) and charts. You can also get a better sense for the kinds of places you can fly reasonably.
But my general observation is that flying in Europe is MUCH more interesting than flying in the US, unless you happen to come from one of the handful of areas in the US with a lot of amazing local scenery. There are so many cool places to go in a reasonable distance—an almost endless supply of destinations really. From southern London you can get to France, Belgium, or the Netherlands in an hour-ish in a typical rental aircraft, or to one of the islands. Of course you could take the Eurostar or EasyJet, but that’s not the point right? What’s not that interesting in most places in the world is just punching repeated holes in the same bit of sky. So my two cents is you will want to actually go places, because you’re an American in Europe, and you have a pilot’s license!
For actually going places, it’s extremely helpful to be able to fly IFR. This eliminates the airspace complexity issue and gets rid of a lot of planning overhead, especially for cross-border flights. And weather in Northern Europe is not particularly VFR friendly. If you have sufficient IFR flight time and plan to be in the UK for at least a few years, getting your IR converted is probably worth it.
johnh wrote:
So the idea that Heathrow, for example, is D, is just bizarre. (I did read the reasons for this but they didn’t make much sense).
Well, the Heathrow control zone (“surface area” in FAA parlance) is class D, but the terminal control area above it is class A…
@flyingmatt, welcome!
My thoughts:
1. Yes a lot of it is needlessly over-complicated compared to the US but it’s not difficult to get your head around what’s important (not infringing airspace) and what’s not important (most of the rest of it).
2. Work out what you want to do first, before you choose somewhere/something to fly and a licensing regime to operate under. If you want to do IFR touring, including to Europe, then you will definitely need to grapple with some licensing paperwork unless you can find a suitable N-reg for rental. These are not so common unfortunately, most rental is G-reg.
3. Rental, even of G-reg aircraft, is generally a pretty restrictive setup. With a few exceptions prices are high, aircraft condition/selection/availability is poor and freedom is limited. Don’t expect a “here are the keys, bring it back next Tuesday and don’t crash it” situation. Checkouts will be required, likely for any individual type you wish to fly, and currency requirements will be tight. Typically they will insist on 28 day currency not just on SEP, but on the type, and probably not just on the type but on their example of the type. All flights and all destinations will typically have to be approved by an instructor or staff member who will also consider the weather, so you won’t really be making your own go/no-go decisions. If you can get approval for a multi-day trip then it’ll likely come with some minimum billing, either per day or in total, so popping up to Scotland for a week can get very expensive. The root causes of all this are a fervent desire to avoid any chance of you either having a prang or getting stuck somewhere and an equally fervent desire to extract as much money from you, for as little practical use of the aircraft, as possible.
At most places it’s less ‘rental’ as you’re likely to understand it and more “pay to have a go with the aircraft under some very closely-controlled conditions”. Finally, your rental booking will be cancelled on the day without warning if another aircraft goes tech and an instructor with a student needs it, because dual makes more revenue. If you must rent then you must find one of the relatively few exceptions to what I describe here.
4. Don’t place your flying endeavours fully in the hands of a ‘school’ or a ‘club’. Most UK clubs aren’t clubs at all, they are businesses. You’ll generally find yourself quite restricted in what you can do and it’ll cost a lot, see above re rental. If you’re here for a while and want to do a fair bit of flying, you’re better off buying, buying a share, or befriending someone who’ll let you fly their aircraft. If you are going to ‘join’ somewhere, suss them out properly first.
5. There are plenty of decent airfields to fly from in reach of central London, but all of them involve significant time on public transport so it can be a pain when you’re trying for an early start. Those I’ve known who fly and live in London have generally found the hassle of getting back and forth restricts their flying a bit.
@flyingmatt willkommen/bienvenido
In terms of atmosphere, although not so easy to get to, I would recommend White Waltham. VFR grass runways west of Heathrow, but with a lot of history and with quite a few syndicate aircraft based at the airfield.
The syndicate route seems to be the most practical cost effective model in the UK, unless you are seriously going to fly around one hundred hours a year, then ownership becomes a better option.
RobertL18C wrote:
In terms of atmosphere, although not so easy to get to, I would recommend White Waltham. VFR grass runways west of Heathrow, but with a lot of history and with quite a few syndicate aircraft based at the airfield.
Agree, it’s a great place. Even the rental setup there can be made to work if you ingratiate yourself with the right people (they issue chits for more generous recency requirements once they trust you) and unlike a lot of airfields, it’s a great place to hang out even if you’re not flying that day. There are lots of comings and goings and you’ll inevitably fall into conversation with someone who’ll offer you a ride, or introduce you to someone who is selling a share, or whatever. Nice bar, lawn with furniture, and you can always settle in for the day with a laptop and ‘work from home’ around a bit of flying.
I maintain membership there because it’s a requirement of owning a share in a based aircraft, and I consider it good value.
Although it does have the dreaded overhead join (which is actually dead easy, and even if somewhat archaic does work fairly well at an uncontrolled field) it is operationally very flexible. Some portable lights come out on certain evenings in winter, but generally it’s a sunrise to sunset operation with almost no restrictions on your ability to come and go. If renting they will want you back before the office closes and similarly you won’t be able to depart before there’s someone to give you the keys, but in our own aircraft we come and go as we please – often very early or very late in the summer. I never have to even think about opening or closing times.
What is perhaps to be avoided is the combination, at a few places in the UK, of overhead joins and ATC. Then if it gets busy the tower controller just dumps you all in the overhead and you aren’t his problem – you go round and round with half a dozen other demented bees all doing very different speeds – while he calmly picks off one aircraft at a time to allow down into the circuit.
AdamFrisch wrote:
4. Many airfields have a guy who speaks to you as a controller in tower, but he isn’t actually. It’s a FIS service. He’ll say things like: “You’re number one for landing” or “No other known traffic” = cleared to land.
More often than not, they aren’t even FIS, they are just a random dude that happens to be near a radio, or someone else in the pattern. It is called Air/Ground Radio, the callsign is usually “Airfield Name Radio”.
Some argue that A/G can issue clearances on the ground, but in reality I believe they are non-binding, and thus advisories, not clearances.
Most agree that A/G cannot issue clearances in the air, but they do issue advisories, based on their view.
Ultimately it is PIC responsibility not to hit anything. But that is the same everywhere.
See: https://skybrary.aero/articles/uncontrolled-aerodromes-communications
Having written all that, it’s really not that bad. As a very experienced pilot once told me – just don’t do anything stupid.
