Fair enough – my question (due to very limited experience), though: Has anyone ever needed a plan B ?
My limited experience has been positive so far. And I just go there and have gottten away with it (as mentioned below)
Exception naturally airspace Alpha – just before someone mentions it.
Same here. Climbing, descending or circumnavigating activ or dense airspace was always sufficient in different European countries so far. If you dare to request you’ll often/mostly get a clearance, especially if it is due to weather.
Has anyone ever needed a plan B ?
Under VFR, very frequently in the UK, where you ask for a CAS clearance but it never comes, or comes too late. I have had the same in Italy. France usually works (as already stated) but you can’t be sure whether the informal “ok” from ATC applies to some military airspace enroute.
Has anyone ever needed a plan B ?
In the UK yes, there the service is disjointed and generally poor. You can go from superb service to no service at all in a minute and you have to be prepared. In France it’s not an issue, they take care of you. If FIS/ATC puts me inside a maze, I rely on them to get me out of it. They couldn’t just dump me in the middle and if they did, I could not be expected to stay clear of airspaces.
Of course Peter is right — why come up with these useless convoluted VFR maps? In Germany they teach you during PPL how to plan a flight around airspaces (dead simple in Germany). I wonder what they do in France? Maybe teach you how to deal with FIS/ATC for clearances?
Peter wrote:
you can’t be sure whether the informal “ok” from ATC applies to some military airspace enroute
Never an informal OK, but explicit “transit approved” often with with altitude/FL and/or heading.
Military is an extra, at least when going through an explicitly activated zone;
either handled by FIS / APP for you or by calling directly.
Italy, Austria (except Vienna), Czech Republic and Slovenia have been similarly easy – although Italian controllers send you often way higher or lower.
Even in Germany it often works with only a little detour.
Weather which the controllers can see on their screen always helps.
UK would be new to me. Yet to try…
achimha wrote:
In Germany they teach you during PPL how to plan a flight around airspaces (dead simple in Germany). I wonder what they do in France? Maybe teach you how to deal with FIS/ATC for clearances?
Yes, one of the big surprises post-exam: you do not have to avoid the carefully circumnavigated areas at all.
Just talk to FIS/ATC and you get much better routes.
Still there are plenty of pilots I know who do not like to fly in FR or IT, because they plan criss-cross paths around, above, below the various airspaces.
Once you know they are not an absolute obstacle, just a relative one, it is fine.
What they always want is a clear path, stated intentions and some flexibility to swiftly help them when they have traffic. No prob.
ch.ess wrote:
Never an informal OK, but explicit “transit approved” often with with altitude/FL and/or heading.
You very often get something like “Continue en route” (I can’t remember the exact words, but it’s pretty Gallic and non-committal. If you then later ask for clarity about a particular piece of airspace they sound exasperated and say “I already said, you may continue on your route.”
From one point of view this is great. What we Brits call the “Freedom to Roam”. But on the other hand, there is always a niggling worry that we may have missed something or not be quite as cleared as much as we think we are…
The Belfast one is interesting for me. It’s so complicated that sometimes ATC doesn’t even know what is controlled and not. I had an incident….must be coming up on 10 years now, when I asked for a clearance through part of the class D. ATC said it was class G and I didn’t need a clearance.
After a bit of back and forth, ATC get fed up with me and decided to give me a lecture on the airspace structure (over RT) and started describing the airspace structure at the area I was asking for a transit of, by describing it from ground level upwards. When they got to the level that I’d requested, they stopped, and realised that it was indeed class D, with something like “Oh….oh…..ahh…Right. I see what you’re talking about. It is class D there. But that’s ok…you can go on through there!”
But on the other hand, there is always a niggling worry that we may have missed something or not be quite as cleared as much as we think we are…
I know I keep dragging this one out but it just happens to be a handy example that the informal clearance may not be what you thought. On this trip I was flying the yellow line here, under the informal “clearance”
and suddenly ATC asks what my intentions are about R138. I had to quickly look it up and do a dogleg. I am sure the locals know this, of course…
That was a rare VFR flight which I did for the benefit of a French pilot sitting in the RHS, who also knew nothing about it 
Back to post #1, can anyone explain why FL055 is next to 5500ft, given that the TA is 6000ft?
Peter wrote:
can anyone explain why FL055 is next to 5500ft, given that the TA is 6000ft?
We can do better than that. We can see it vertically above each other, and ask what the airspace classification is between 5500’ and FL55 (which would be several hundred feet)
