Air Wagner

milleR said:
It's not. It's more about the release. The hope is that by departing VFR and grabbing the clearance in the air they can't hold your release because you're already airborne. But this really only works once you've worked clear of the congestions that's causing the delay in the release time.
Click to expand...

Ah, so people can't get RELEASED because saturation, so they takeoff and cause even MORE saturation.

Got it.
 
NovemberEcho said:
I freaking hate people who don’t get their clearances on the ground. I don’t care if you depart vfr and activate it in the air later, but I ain’t reading you a full route clearance halfway across the country while you’ve been flying the wrong way from the first fix for the last 30 miles.
Click to expand...
Why does Washington center always give us routing that is nearly identical to what we are doing- but about 1/8th of a mile east (when North/South) and if they are always giving that to us, why not make it the preferred route so that we can file it? I mean we file what they will give us and we get the “full route” back to the preferred, only to have Washington put us back on the slightly marginally different route- which we won’t actually fly at all because they clear us direct to the first fix on the arrival a minute later anyways.

And when are they getting the ability to send route clearances turned back on?

Follow on, If I’m doing .90 and an embraer is doing .78… why can’t we pass them? I promise we will get there first.
 
milleR said:
It's not. It's more about the release. The hope is that by departing VFR and grabbing the clearance in the air they can't hold your release because you're already airborne. But this really only works once you've worked clear of the congestions that's causing the delay in the release time.
Click to expand...
9.5k and point at a class b airport. You’ll
Get hooked right up with routing that gets you out of the way.
 
TUCKnTRUCK said:
Why does Washington center always give us routing that is nearly identical to what we are doing- but about 1/8th of a mile east (when North/South) and if they are always giving that to us, why not make it the preferred route so that we can file it? I mean we file what they will give us and we get the “full route” back to the preferred, only to have Washington put us back on the slightly marginally different route- which we won’t actually fly at all because they clear us direct to the first fix on the arrival a minute later anyways.

And when are they getting the ability to send route clearances turned back on?

Follow on, If I’m doing .90 and an embraer is doing .78… why can’t we pass them? I promise we will get there first.
Click to expand...

Nobody ever knows why centers do center things
 
For every time N90 has been short with me, they've also been incredibly patient fitting me into JFK/EWR/LGA VFR on a busy Friday, in an airplane that does 170 only downhill and with a tailwind.

Occasionally I'll get something weird, like "tune in the LOC so you can follow that in" -- ooohkay, but I'm VFR.

Occasionally I'll get the Five-Borough and Eastern New Jersey Aerial Tour instead of straight in 22 - I get it - you're slammed and I'm slow.

But generally, as long as you seem to know what you're doing, level off at DANDY and WENTZ, and don't try to get flight following or pop up IFR clearances you'll be ok. Maguire, Allentown, Bradley and Providence Approaches are all totally happy to accommodate. They're not that busy.

Fixtur
 
Also, I will admit fully to not knowing that you could pick up a clearance but not activate it until later. I always thought once you picked it up it was activated.
 
Fixtur said:
Also, I will admit fully to not knowing that you could pick up a clearance but not activate it until later. I always thought once you picked it up it was activated.
Click to expand...

Needs to be done with coordination while you’re still on the ground. Technically it should be something like “ok here’s the route to expect” and then when you’re airborne you actually get cleared, but in real life it’s generally here’s your clearance, just depart vfr and when you’re airborne we’ll tell you when you’re IFR.
 
I’ll admit to only going into NYC on what seems to be a busy day or a “weather” day (several hundred miles away…their airspace should maybe be a bit more flexible like the rest of the country). But here’s the difference between the rest of the country and NYC: “unable.” And then most other controllers unkey and complain about silly pilots, just like pilots definitely don’t do about silly controllers. In NYC they leave it keyed.
 
milleR said:
It's not. It's more about the release. The hope is that by departing VFR and grabbing the clearance in the air they can't hold your release because you're already airborne. But this really only works once you've worked clear of the congestions that's causing the delay in the release time.
Click to expand...

...and it is generally busy if there is a long hold for release time. It's probably best just to wait it out rather than blasting off VFR at that point anyways even if the plan is to fly along the proper departure route at a VFR altitude until being able to pick up the clearance.

The same goes for flying in South Florida.
 
NovemberEcho said:
Needs to be done with coordination while you’re still on the ground. Technically it should be something like “ok here’s the route to expect” and then when you’re airborne you actually get cleared, but in real life it’s generally here’s your clearance, just depart vfr and when you’re airborne we’ll tell you when you’re IFR.
Click to expand...
We just launch IFR and stay in class G until somebody plays nice… then we go!
 
To be fafafafaiiiirrrrr….

When the FAA rolled out calling facilities on the phone versus through the rather, um, peculiar 3-way call thing that Leidos was doing, it was really pretty uneven. I had more than one call answered with “Who are you and how did you get this number?” or a shout heard past a cupped telephone “anyone know how to do a clearance by phone?”.

Last I tried it was a few years ago, so maybe it got better.

Just so you guys don’t think I’m casting asparagus, some facilities had it right from the get go, but those were the facilities that were generally rock stars anyway.
 
KLB said:
...and it is generally busy if there is a long hold for release time. It's probably best just to wait it out rather than blasting off VFR at that point anyways even if the plan is to fly along the proper departure route at a VFR altitude until being able to pick up the clearance.

The same goes for flying in South Florida.
Click to expand...
If you're being held at your departure field trying to get inbound to a place like N90 then yeah, you're just stuck unless you can make the whole flight VFR. If you're trying to depart an area like N90 and you're being held for congestion at CDW/MMU/TEB et al then sometimes, conditions permitting, I've had good luck filing from a satellite airport around ABE, departing VFR and then calling the substantially less busy controller there, having exited the N90 airspace already, and getting my clearance in the air. But this only works once you're into airspace that isn't all jammed up.
 
  • Like
Reactions: bp
Fixtur said:
Also, I will admit fully to not knowing that you could pick up a clearance but not activate it until later. I always thought once you picked it up it was activated.
Click to expand...
Your clearance and your release are two separate things. At a towered field they handle it for you. At a non-towered field whoever gave you the clearance will also handle the release, either over the phone or the RCO freq with a clearance void time. I believe the 30 before/2 hours after rule still applies, so once you have your clearance you can wait up to two hours to call for your release but I may be off on that part.
 
pwttogfk said:
Have you ever flown out of a busy untowered airport on a good VFR day and tried to do an IFR departure with a tight void time?
Click to expand...
Yes. And I've even had to call back for a new void time because of a busy pattern. I've also had the experience of an in-air pickup of a clearance markedly different than what I expected in a unfamiliar area. I'd rather be the first me than the second.

But it's not necessarily one way or the other. Since clearance and release are different events, it's certainly possible to get the clearance on the ground and pick it up in the air on a good VFR day.
 
MidlifeFlyer said:
Yes. And I've even had to call back for a new void time because of a busy pattern. I've also had the experience of an in-air pickup of a clearance markedly different than what I expected in a unfamiliar area. I'd rather be the first me than the second.

But it's not necessarily one way or the other. Since clearance and release are different events, it's certainly possible to get the clearance on the ground and pick it up in the air on a good VFR day.
Click to expand...

You're not a real pilot until you've called for release from Flight Service from a phone booth with a 3w light bulb, attached to a cinder block FBO (which is closed), in the rain, and the void time was 4 minutes. Bonus if the bulb was burned out.
 
Richman said:
You're not a real pilot until you've called for release from Flight Service from a phone booth with a 3w light bulb, attached to a cinder block FBO (which is closed), in the rain, and the void time was 4 minutes. Bonus if the bulb was burned out.
Click to expand...
Well in my case, the pay phone was in the non-locked part of the building, but to balance that off, the departure runway was only 1800' long and you were on your own for obstacle clearance since it had no approaches.

No one has ever called me a "real pilot" before, so I thank you. 🙏
 
milleR said:
If you're being held at your departure field trying to get inbound to a place like N90 then yeah, you're just stuck unless you can make the whole flight VFR. If you're trying to depart an area like N90 and you're being held for congestion at CDW/MMU/TEB et al then sometimes, conditions permitting, I've had good luck filing from a satellite airport around ABE, departing VFR and then calling the substantially less busy controller there, having exited the N90 airspace already, and getting my clearance in the air. But this only works once you're into airspace that isn't all jammed up.
Click to expand...

We use to pick up a TEC clearance to get out of a place like LGA and then refile in the air to a normal IFR clearance on to wherever we were going once we got clear of the congestion. It meant a while lot more gas as we would get stick down at 3000 feet for a while though.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top