An International Ops Question for Doug Taylor

jwp_145

GhostRider in the Sky
Doug, I read your blog and I hear you talking about coast-out and coast-in. I understand what these mean, and you also speak of oceanic clearances. I also grasp the concept of these, but who are you getting the clearance from? Who is the controlling agency from whom you have to seek permission to fly through oceanic airspace? If it is international waters and international airspace, what is preventing me from doing what I want at FL350 in the middle of the Atlantic?
 
Going eastbound, generally it's Gander Radio. Westbound, generally it's Shanwick.

But there is NY, Rejavik, and a litanny of others.

I have a couple of youtube videos explaining how it works but I can't find the reference and my wife's going to kill me if I don't hurry up because we're going out to dinner! More on this later. The track system that is.
 
And some interesting charts by a ingenious pilot at Lufthansa. I use 'em all the time.

http://planningchart.de

North-Atlantic.gif
 
Thank you very much for taking the time to answer guys, but one question still goes unanswered... Since it is international airspace, is there any sanctioning or governing body trying to prevent me from operating in the oceaning airspace, in the flight levels, without a clearance?
 
Thank you very much for taking the time to answer guys, but one question still goes unanswered... Since it is international airspace, is there any sanctioning or governing body trying to prevent me from operating in the oceaning airspace, in the flight levels, without a clearance?

icao, if i'm remembering right agreements of member states from the chicago convention of 1944(ish?).

the controlling agency of the airspace would refer you to your homestate, in the case i assume the faa for certificate action.
 
Thank you very much for taking the time to answer guys, but one question still goes unanswered... Since it is international airspace, is there any sanctioning or governing body trying to prevent me from operating in the oceaning airspace, in the flight levels, without a clearance?

Yes. If you operate in the airspace without a clearance, and if they're able to find you, you'll face certificate action.

You're not going to get shot down, per se, but if you're crossing say RONPO at 15,000' you're already being tracked by (what used to be) NORAD, but if there's no flight plan that corresponds to your position when Gander or NY Center picks you up, they're not going to think you're a friendly and send a couple of fighter jets to say "Howdy!" to ya! :)
 
Doug my question to you is what happens while flying over the pond and you hit turbulence or need 10-15 left for a build up? I know you have radio contact but no radar. What stops you guys from cheating just a little more?
 
Doug my question to you is what happens while flying over the pond and you hit turbulence or need 10-15 left for a build up? I know you have radio contact but no radar. What stops you guys from cheating just a little more?

and for that matter I just have to ask...what do you do on a 13-hour flight. USA today? Sodoku?

(Besides flying the airplane of course..)
 
Doug my question to you is what happens while flying over the pond and you hit turbulence or need 10-15 left for a build up? I know you have radio contact but no radar. What stops you guys from cheating just a little more?

What stops you from cheating is that you have position points and at each one you have already given an estimate for crossing that point. If you are going to be 3 min or more deviation from that given estimate, you must revise it. They keep track of where everyone is and when they should be crossing the next points. They can call you at any time as well.

As far as buildups, you can ask to get a heading deviation. It takes longer to coordinate since they relay your request to either NY, Shanwick etc but you normally can get deviations and when able you head direct back to your point and give a revised estimate. Same goes for altitude changes. They call you to see if you can accept higher and if so they call you back and give you restrictions to be at the altitude by a certain longitude and report leaving and leveling off at that altitude.

Most of our time is not in the NAT system as we fly a lot of ALTRVs with fighters but even being off NAT's the Atlantic system demands a lot of attention to procedure as you can get violated!

The pacific now..that is completely night and day different. I don't think they much care out there about what goes on at all! You just check in with Oakland at your points and they acknowledge and that is about it.


Here is some interesting reading if you have the time.

http://www.nat-pco.org/nat/MNPSA/MNPSA_2005.pdf
 
also does anybody (Doug/ Polar) have any older Jep Oceanic Charts they wouldnt mind passing along? Ive tried to get my hand on some but they are hard to find. One AC I flew with had some and they are great having all the preferred HF freqs on there etc. All the NGA products blow and have none of this information which always leads me to try to the freq game from the list in our FIH. I would pay for these of course if anyone has them!
 
Are you looking for like the AT1/AT2? When I get to JFK this afternoon, I'll check!
 
also does anybody (Doug/ Polar) have any older Jep Oceanic Charts they wouldnt mind passing along? Ive tried to get my hand on some but they are hard to find. One AC I flew with had some and they are great having all the preferred HF freqs on there etc. All the NGA products blow and have none of this information which always leads me to try to the freq game from the list in our FIH. I would pay for these of course if anyone has them!
I have some, but the link Doug put above has the freqs as well.
 
And some interesting charts by a ingenious pilot at Lufthansa. I use 'em all the time.

http://planningchart.de

Those are pretty much the charts that I used, back when I used to do international flights for Delta in MSFS, until I got Delta's North Atlantic Plotting Chart. Then I flew like two flights using that to which point I got tired of sitting around in front of my computer. :)
 
SOrry to whine, but my question still hasn't been answered... maybe I'll ask it a different way.

If there is no governing body in international waters (international waters not being owned by any one nation), and no one "owns" the airspace above international waters, what prevents me from going out to the very middle of the Atlantic Ocean and going up to FL410? WOuld the FAA say "We heard you were out in international airspace without a flight plan and since you are licensed through the FAA, we are going to take action against you?"

Would it be the equivalent of going out into international waters in the middle of the ocean, committing a murder, then my government arresting me for it?

I know that last scenario is ridiculous, but is that the basic gist of it?
 
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