I can confirm that an email sent to
twice, and followed up by a phone call to +33970274711 does work to reduce the PN, to less than 24hr.
EDIT: While this seemed to work, the whole system there is broken and liable to drop you in the $hit right when it is least convenient. I got caught by a 3 day old NOTAM for EGKA that EGKA closes 1800L on a given day, which I didn’t spot, and this resulted in a mad hectic runaround, phoning the above number, and chasing around the airport terminal because their ETA was a bit vague. They also say that they really do not want people to go less than 24hrs (they do not recognise the 48hr in the AIP!) so reports of it working in the past are basically worthless because you are taking a chance.
The stuff is now in the AIP; the NOTAM has been cancelled. They now seem to recognise schengen, however…
Quick update on this trip:
I emailed [email protected] and [email protected] on 05/10 for our departure on 08/10.. I sent a follow-up on 06/10 but received no reply. As this was for outbound stamps we elected to go anyway (brave or stupid?).
During the flight from LFAT to LFBH on 07/10 I got an email in flight to say that they would meet us at 1115L on 08/10 for departure. A 15 minute delay on our request but no big deal. An agent came out as agreed and we got our exit stamps.
The agent that met us said they could usually accommodate requests with 24hr notice but 48 is better. Given their volume of non-Schengen traffic this seems reasonable if annoying for those for us outside.
Long and short, everything worked.
Yes I saw the same; heli notam only.
After sending the email, and especially if you didn’t CC the email to the other addresses, I recommend calling the police there on their top secret number, posted above:
+33970274711
Yes, I’m going to request later today anyway to be on the safe side. There is a NOTAM with 48HR in the text currently, but that is PPR for non-based helicopters!
Hopefully it all goes smoothly, will report back after the weekend.
Be careful. I could swear I saw it missing too (I specifically remember searching the entire block of text for “48”) on a given day, only for it to be back the next day.
And the police there think it is 24hrs!
The bottom half of the email lists all the addresses which I habitually CC it to, and it was only because one of those addresses returned this auto response that they “found” my email!
The whole place is basically dysfunctional and nobody knows what else is going on, and nobody knows about the 48hr notam even though it’s been there, on and off, since April 2022.
And they treat the PN as PPR, which is not supported by French law.
At the end of the day, everybody is friendly, but the S European tradition with these places is that you never know what happens if you p1ss off somebody “big”.
The 48HR PNR NOTAM seems to have disappeared. Hoping to go to La Rochelle on Saturday, departing Sunday.
is that the douanes at Metz alway politely confirm the PPR
There are reports of that from LFBH too. Guess it depends on who is on duty. But there are far more contrary cases e.g. on the LECD fly-in just now, of LFMU LFMP LFMT, none replied to emails. So I went to LEGE which worked just fine – will do a report in the right thread later. Actually I will not bother with those airports again.
The really weird thing is that the police at LFBH think it is 24hrs, when the AIP says 8 and the notam says 48! What are these people smoking? But for sure this has the smell of LFBH refusing a landing clearance if they didn’t get the email.
Dan wrote:
So what about introducing these measures to all cross border traffic?
To play the devil’s advocate someone should challenge the freedom of movement for the other cross border traffic quoting the way GA is treated as the example how cross border traffic “should be done by the book”. 72 hour PPR for every car, truck, boat, pedestrian which crosses the border, forms, e.t.c. This would most obviously be dismissed or cause a complete breakdown and closed borders so it would have to be stopped within hours of implementing it. On those grounds then a next challenge could be launched to stop the b.s. for GA.
Ok, one thing I have to add to my moaning post above, is that the douanes at Metz alway politely confirm the PPR, at least for LFSP:
Bonjour,
votre préavis est bien reçu et transmis aux services localement compétents
Cordialement
Direction régionale des douanes de Nancy
Centre Opérationnel Douanier Terrestre
25 Avenue Foch 57000 METZ
Tél : 09.70.27.74.01
douane.gouv.f
All of Europe is Schengen these days, except the UK, plus a few irrelevant other bits.
Oie!!!! Small – perhaps. Low volume of traffic – sure. But irrelevant!??!! Not sure that’s fair! 
(I know what you mean )
