Handoffs

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tripleseven

Well-Known Member
This may be a simple/dumb question but its been bothering me for days!

How does each controlling agency know who and what you are and your intentions are while flying on your route?

For example, I flew from SBP to BUR one day. Requested VFR flight following with Santa Barbara Approach and was on my way. How did LA Center, Point Mugu Approach, and SoCal Approach know what I was planning on doing. Did they check my filed flight plan?

Thanks in advance!
 
You'd be surprised to know that controllers will talk to each other about an aircraft, before, during, and even after a handoff has occured. Which is most likely what happened to you. . . or they generated a flight strip for you, and made notations on it as it moved from sector to sector.
 
Flight strips baby. The first controller you talked to grabbed a blank strip, jotted down your information and request, then (maybe) had his D-Side punch it into the computer, or if they are understaffed like every other facility in the country, he did it himself while he was talking to 13 other airplanes, 6 of which were being vectored for an approach. It was then processed, transmitted, and printed to the two approach control facilities and PRESTO! Everything they needed to know about you was right there on the flight strip.

If it wasn't a flight strip, he just picked up the shout line (interphone) and made the coordination with the next facility. The information continued on down the chain after that.

If you sign up on AvWeb and read Don Brown's latest article, he discusses this very point with VFR flight following and their flight strips.
 
If you have a control tower at your airport you should go check it out sometime. I took a ground class before and they took us up to the tower on a field trip. Its very neat see what the "flight strip" looks like, the light gun and just everything in general.
 
flyguy969 said:
If you have a control tower at your airport you should go check it out sometime. I took a ground class before and they took us up to the tower on a field trip. Its very neat see what the "flight strip" looks like, the light gun and just everything in general.
Click to expand...
On the subject of light gun, I recommend that on quite days, you let your tower personel (and yourself of course) get some pratice with the light guns by asking for it. It's a good idea to know what to look for and what they look like especially since you'd be suprised how hard some of them lights can be seen, especially the green.
 
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