VFR Flight Tracking

kryan11

kryan11

Well-Known Member
I read that you can get VFR flight tracking on sites like FlightAware by filing an IFR flight plan but putting VFR/XXX where altitude goes so that they know it's VFR as well as put VFR in the remarks. Does this work, and is it legal?

I would think that it would make it easier for controllers because then they could load your route of flight and have a squawk code ready for you before you even call up. I'm not sure if it would be considered an attempt to fly IFR though and cause problems.

Does anyone know the answer to this?
 
I have also heard this idea but don't know if it works. I can address your second paragraph, though, and tell you it is about the same amount of work (for Center at least) to do a VFR pickup as ferret out an IFR flight plan already in the system.
 
It will work and there's nothing illegal about it. It can be even more cumbersome for the controllers though because filing the IFR flight plan subjects you to automatic routing assignment for that area. Once your plan prints out at the ATC facility, it would require editing by the controller to make it a direct VFR flight. It's easier just to type it in fresh.
 
...and every flight I have ever cared to look at where I requested flight following has shown up as a track on flightaware.

https://flightaware.com/live/flight/N2074Q most recent track was yesterday on a short 45nm flight, the track ends when my flight following was canceled.

Edit: Top 3 flights on that list are VFR with flight following
 
90% of my VFR flights with flight following don't show up on FlightAware. It's just nice to have for friends to track you if they're coming to pick you up from the airport. I've also heard that you can request flight following from the ground and that will usually get you in the system. Is it better to request to be put into the the NAS system and that will get you tracking like an IFR flight would?
 
If you're traveling outside of your airport's local area (let's say roughly a 60NM radius or less), you are getting put into the NAS whether you ask for it or not. If you're calling a Center for FF, I think you're getting put into the NAS every time (someone from center please chime in if I am wrong on this).

I'm not sure why FlightAware tracks some flights and not others. For my own flights, I've had cross country NAS FF flights not show up.
 
FM_Weasel said:
If you're traveling outside of your airport's local area (let's say roughly a 60NM radius or less), you are getting put into the NAS whether you ask for it or not. If you're calling a Center for FF, I think you're getting put into the NAS every time (someone from center please chime in if I am wrong on this).

I'm not sure why FlightAware tracks some flights and not others. For my own flights, I've had cross country NAS FF flights not show up.
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That isn't entirely true for a NAS code for terminal. A plane could feasibly fly through my airspace for 90 miles on a local code, get manually handed off to another approach control and from there get worked in house for another 200 miles terminal enroute. Not knowing the airspace down range a further 80 miles plus is possible at the other end of the state and deep into the next.
 
Two airports lie in my airspace by matters of feet. One of which requires coordination with up to 5 sectors. A busy class D airport is 15 miles away from another TRACON boundary, and a further 2 uncontrolled fields are so close by the time I get a RADAR return on them they're already in the other TRACON's, or maybe center's airspace and/or about to drop out of my coverage.

I don't always have time to solicit, OK where are you going, OK what is the 3 letter identifier for that, point out code 1200...

A clean call up sure thing. The 20 questions call up of Approach N123, N123 wants flight following, N123 is at 1,000, N123 is a skyhawk, N123 indound XYZ, N123 is blue and white, when this exchange starts at my boundary, its either local code and manual VFR handoff or N123 is at 1,000, neat, radar contact lost.
 
The only way to get tracked VFR on FlightAware is to have a ACTIVE flight plan in the NAS and be TRACKED by radar using the beacon code assigned to the flight plan. To answer a question a patch on the DSR in the early 2000s allowed center controller to enter VFR flight plans from the radar key board to generate strips down the line and it took only a few key stroks unlike the ARTS 3 which in my opinion took way too much heads down time when busy so i didnt use it much.
 
I know I've had flights where I didn't file a flight plan but still got tracked on FlightAware after receiving FF from ATC.
 
FM_Weasel said:
I know I've had flights where I didn't file a flight plan but still got tracked on FlightAware after receiving FF from ATC.
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Then they probably created a flight plan for you when they put you into the system. I have had flights that I received flight following on, where they put it in as if I was flying on an IFR flight plan, and then I tracked on Flight Aware.
 
Maybe it's different for centers then, because in the terminal environment we having nothing to do with flight plans. That's a Flight Service function.
 
FM_Weasel said:
Maybe it's different for centers then, because in the terminal environment we having nothing to do with flight plans. That's a Flight Service function.
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You must have worked at an ARTS 2 facility because the ARTS 3E allows us to enter VFR flight plans through the key board that generate a strip in the NAS an allow handoffs to the centers and approach controls.
 
queeno said:
You must have worked at an ARTS 2 facility because the ARTS 3E allows us to enter VFR flight plans through the key board that generate a strip in the NAS an allow handoffs to the centers and approach controls.
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ARTS 2E allows that too. If someone wanted center flight following at my last facility, I could generate a NAS code from the scope keyboard. Same entries are used for STARS.

FM_Weasel said:
If you're traveling outside of your airport's local area (let's say roughly a 60NM radius or less), you are getting put into the NAS whether you ask for it or not. If you're calling a Center for FF, I think you're getting put into the NAS every time (someone from center please chime in if I am wrong on this).

I'm not sure why FlightAware tracks some flights and not others. For my own flights, I've had cross country NAS FF flights not show up.
Click to expand...

I've been under the assumption that every NAS vfr flight plan shows up on flight aware unless the airplane owner has disabled tracking in the flight aware database.

Not always true on getting put into the NAS whether the pilot asks for it or not. If the pilot doesn't say he wants flight following, I assume that he only wants to talk to departure and then terminate service at/near the airspace border. So I give a local code, and then if I'm feeling generous and the altitude is high enough, I ask if he wants further flight following.
 
queeno said:
You must have worked at an ARTS 2 facility because the ARTS 3E allows us to enter VFR flight plans through the key board that generate a strip in the NAS an allow handoffs to the centers and approach controls.
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I've used ARTS 2e and STARS. Both allowed the same functionality to generate FF NAS codes. But those are *not a flight plan*.
 
Stinger said:
I've been under the assumption that every NAS vfr flight plan shows up on flight aware unless the airplane owner has disabled tracking in the flight aware database.
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This is what I thought too. But I have had some flights not appear on Flightaware that should have.

Not always true on getting put into the NAS whether the pilot asks for it or not. If the pilot doesn't say he wants flight following, I assume that he only wants to talk to departure and then terminate service at/near the airspace border. So I give a local code, and then if I'm feeling generous and the altitude is high enough, I ask if he wants further flight following.
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This isn't what I was talking about. I mean someone requesting flight following in the first place. Not someone requesting local services.

I've already been corrected on this earlier in the thread. In areas where terminal airspace joins for thousands of miles, apparently you folks do local hand offs and don't assign NAS codes to those aircraft. Where I work, our terminal facility abuts two separate terminal facilities. We still input most VFR FF aircraft into the NAS even if they're landing within those adjacent facilities. Local codes are reserved for operations solely within out area of jurisdiction or a few fringe examples where repetition and letters of agreement cover use of local codes for aircraft transferred between us and the adjacent facilities.

Your mileage may vary.
 
Yeah that makes sense. My last up/down facility (class C) didn't border any other facility other than one sector of center that was totally surrounding us. Aircraft had to specifically ask for "flight following" to get put into the NAS. Even on someone taxiing out for departure, if they said they didn't want radar service, they were given a local code, tower still switched them to departure and then departure would terminate them at their leisure (between 10-35 miles away depending on altitude and traffic.)
 
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