Skydemon EU heatmap

Frans was being specific about Switzerland. And it’s true. For ULs anyway, but also for certifieds, it is just that extra amount of hassle that deters.

• flightplans
• many small airfields are PPR
• need to organize customs in Germany (not at all airfields any longer, as we know, but if you are at a Besonderer Landeplatz, you still need to do that)
• need to organize customs in Switzerland (often with long leadtime for weekend operations)
• need to do all this for both legs
• ideally need to get hold of the Swiss VAC and familiarize yourself with the sometimes quirky procedures
• need to deal with French speaking people in some places

Nothing of that applies for flights to the usual Austrian aerodromes for example, and ones really notices when following FIS on a nice day.

The Dutch fly to Germany a lot to fuel up their airplanes and have lunch at the same time.

I disagree. When flying in France, and also when checking on FlightRadar occasionally, I feel that a large share of traffic participants are D-registered. Much more so than F-registered in German airspace.

I disagree. I think some of this is due to EASA-wide regulation – there are 4x D-reg aircraft on our small airfield of less than 20 CofA aeroplanes. The hassle of switching to F-Reg is the reason, apparently. There used to be 2xG-reg aswell, but they were forced to change.

Regards, SD..

I think you mean they were flying G on some other country’s papers; the planes themselves can remain (if certified) indefinitely. There is also a large PH-reg non-certified community, for reasons already much discussed…

There are many reasons for basing a foreign reg plane somewhere but they will represent a tiny % of the traffic shown in the screenshot.

The place to look for travel patterns is FR24 or Flightaware. You see a lot of interesting stuff there, not relying on what SD is showing, and what is not seen is just as interesting as what is seen OTOH, like the use of SD, this yields selected data too (Mode S).

SD will also have aircraft registrations but I am sure they don’t want to publish that data, even if anonymised, because it would reveal their sales in different countries.

Very well said @boscomantico!

That PPR thing is indeed another main reason. Those who do fly to Switzerland often go to places like Altenrhein or Locarno, which only requires a flightplan, since customs is on-site and the airports have no PPR requirement. Austrian flying schools also fly regularly to Samedan for mountain introduction flights, but that’s also only a matter of FPL (besides mandatory online briefing, which they do as part of the mountain course). The real Swiss GA fields are almost all PPR. Sometimes it’s just calling a prerecorded tape, telling you the airfield is open. But it can also be a real phone call, a message through WhatsApp, online form etc. Each airfield does these things in their own way, making it intransparent and a hassle for pilots from abroad.

boscomantico wrote:

The Dutch fly to Germany a lot to fuel up their airplanes and have lunch at the same time.

Absolutely, because everything is cheaper in Germany. Especially restaurants offer way better value for money. It’s also common to fly to Germany during PPL training. Even a lot of non-flying Dutchies drive to Germany as a day trip, in order to refuel, buy stuff, and going out for lunch/dinner.

Frans wrote:

Even a lot of non-flying Dutchies drive to Germany as a day trip, in order to refuel, buy stuff, and going out for lunch/dinner.

I grew up doing that the other way around.

Does anyone know where skydemon publish this?

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