To get this back on topic:
The bottom line is that IMHO many/most people won’t fly to an airport which is “PN” unless they can get a confirmation/receipt. They may not say that openly but the uncertainly is too much of a hassle. The PN stuff is a fast spreading disease which is indirectly driving a lot of people to get out of flying.
And this receipt is not easy to get, especially as most of the employees processing this cannot speak a word of English.
Traditionally, “PN” stuff has been coordinated by the handler, who walks along the corridor, or calls the police in their language, and deals with it. That is how the bizjet community has always worked. And the pilots communicate only with the handler. But GA ritually doesn’t want to pay for handling (it can be very expensive) so they deal with the airport OPS staff (which largely doesn’t speak English and is often – particularly in certain countries – dysfunctional, treating the airport as just a place to sit and get paid) or they send the PN to the police contact email address (which almost never elicits a reply since a) the police ELP tends to be below zero and b) they – again particularly in some countries – also have zero interest in supporting the airport.
So, to save money / make GA travel more affordable, we get this stupid hassle, but that is how the system has always been set up.
At a few well-run airports the OPS staff is good and they sort out the PN for you. I’ve seen many examples. In former Yugoslavia this generally works. It is in the “old Europe” countries where it is broken.
Just had two completely opposite examples in France. The La Rochelle fly-in collapsed partly because the police absolutely refused to communicate re their ridiculous 48hr PN. They even, apparently, refused to communicate with the airport OPS staff. And I’ve just been to Lille where it works perfectly, with OPS smoothly sorting it out and with immediate replied by email.
dublinpilot wrote:
If there is no departure message, then you haven’t gone missing
That depends. You can in the flight plan say that EOBT is considered as ATD. For instance taking off without radio and/or phone cover. In those cases I instead activate the plan in the air when high enough. The opposite is more difficult and more prone to unwanted S&R. I usually close it in the air. Radio cover to ATC on the ground is zero, so the only way to close it is by phone. Phone coverage is usually not the problem (but could be). Rather it’s forgetting to call by phone once landed, which is insanely easy to forget.
What, file a FP and without a DEP message (so obviously you never got airborne) you get the full S&R process?
There is a bit of detail missing which is a pity because it will confuse the hell out of somebody. The problem with one-liners 
The French too.
Of course they don’t.
And yet they do.
This is getting well off topic, except for the specific angle of what happens if you file PNR/PPR and don’t turn up.
I would not worry about this because it is easy to just email them to say you aren’t coming. That’s what I do. That’s easy because the trip has been cancelled, so there is plenty of time.
But starting over due action for a filed but not activated flight plan is a stupid thing to do. I’d be really surprised if the Germans routinely did this.
Of course they don’t. A FP without a DEP message (within a certain time, say 1hr) is just dumped. Once a DEP has been issued, different things happen. But that is not relevant here because you are now airborne and on your way to the destination, so this is off topic
Ibra wrote:
German AIS/ARO will start searching for you if you file VFR FPL and you don’t depart or activate or cancel…
Why? If there is no departure message, then you haven’t gone missing. Before the days when EasyVFR could file a free flight plan at a moments notice, I regularly had flight plans filed that were never activated. I’d file one (by fax or phone) from home and then turn up to the airport to find a tech problem. Or file it the night before only to wake up to find the weather wasn’t suitable.
Someone once told me that I should cancel the plan if I wasn’t going. So I called AIS (in Ireland) to ask if it was necessary.
Their answer was that it was not necessary to cancel it, but it would be useful if I did. Their explanation was that it’s always possible that an unused flight plan gets activated by accident when someone mistakes the call sign and then it never gets closed and causes overdue action.
But starting over due action for a filed but not activated flight plan is a stupid thing to do. I’d be really surprised if the Germans routinely did this. In any case, their first call of action in an over due situation is to call the departure field to make sure that the aircraft actually departed and didn’t return. So it wouldn’t be a very long search!
dublinpilot wrote:
if you don’t activate the flight plan, they know you haven’t departed so won’t bother turning up.
German AIS/ARO will start searching for you if you file VFR FPL and you don’t depart or activate or cancel…
Something just passed my mind when reading this threat.
PNR / PPR imposes to notify.. not to actually go.
What would the adverse reaction be if you notify/request when you intend to go?
I’ve dont that a gizillion times. Nothing happens. Particularly so for international flights where a flight plan is required, if you don’t activate the flight plan, they know you haven’t departed so won’t bother turning up.
Edited to add:
If you being stupid like PPRing for everyday next week, then using the first one and not bother to cancel the others, that might be different!
Since everywhere in the UK requires PPR I tend to PPR at places ahead of time even if there’s only a slim chance of going. A couple of times I have PPRed at two places a couple of days beforehand and cancelled the one I didn’t want to go to on the day.
The only place I haven’t been able to visit due to PPR was Old Warden as their slots filled very quickly on the day.
And maybe Cosford because they seem to be completely and utterly clueless.
Because everywhere in UK requires PPR I rarely do trips planned on the same day. The few exceptions are places with online automatic PPR, like Llanbedr for example.
With regards to SAR alerting, I PPRed at Cranfield and didn’t show up due to Wx. I got a call an hour after my ETA and the guy was quite annoyed at me for not calling to cancel, and he said they would alert SAR if he couldn’t get hold of me.
