VFR Flight

If you do not wish to formally follow a flight plan and be fully controlled, you can still use ATC services. You can request a VFR departure instead of filing a plan. Once you are out of the immediate vicinity of the airport, you are free to choose any route you decide.

If you take off from a fully controlled airport, when you are handed over to the Center controller, you will automatically receive Flight Following service (also known as a Traffic Service), otherwise it is up to you to contact them and request it.

Flight Following notifies the Center controller that you are in their airspace, and then you become their responsibility. They will provide traffic alerts and terrain clearing warnings, and may periodically check your location with you. Aside from that, they will mostly leave you alone to enjoy your flight.

You can make a number of requests to the controller providing Flight Following. Most of these are for information, but you can also request to land at an airport under full control of a controller, and they will arrange it for you. Flight Following is considered a safety net for the pilot and a courtesy to the controller, so it should be used whenever possible.

When you approach the edge of their airspace, they will instruct you to contact another controller to continue your Flight Following service. This is an instruction, and you should comply after reading back the instruction. Outside of this handover period, you can cancel Flight Following at any time. You should not simply change frequencies without the controller knowing you are doing so. You can request a frequency change at any time, although usually you will only do so if you wish to contact a smaller airport and request landing directly. Requesting a frequency change implicitly cancels your Flight Following service; being instructed to change frequency to another Center controller does not.

The concept of protected airspace, such as Class A airspace where VFR flight should not enter around major airports, is not currently implemented.

If you use the “Flight ➞ AI Fly Your Plane” menu option, the AI will immediately file a flight plan to a nearby random airport and continue flying according to the plan.

IFR Flight

To conduct a planned flight with full ATC guidance, you must first file a flight plan to inform ATC of the route you intend to follow. In X-Plane 12, this is done by using the third tab in the ATC dialog box. You need to specify your Destination airport, requested cruise altitude, and any details for the specific route you wish to follow. Routes can typically be pasted directly from other flight planning tools, copied from your FMS, or the simulator can generate a route for you. Any issues will be displayed in a red area at the bottom of the dialog box.

The most common issue with routes is a mismatch in Waypoint names or, more likely, procedure names. This data is updated periodically, but the data provided with the simulator is almost always older. The actual version of the simulator data is displayed in the Flight Plan tab of the ATC dialog box as “AIRAC xxxx”. Third parties provide subscriptions to access the latest available data, including charts (if that is important to you).

Once you request a clearance, your flight plan is accepted, and you are now considered a planned flight.

You can also file and clear a flight plan while already airborne, allowing you to change from a contact or un-planned flight at almost any time.

Note that your flight plan is a request. X-Plane will not adjust the route segments of the requested route, but may not assign the specific SID or STAR you requested. This will only be done if the SID or STAR you requested is not suitable for any currently active Runway. It is your responsibility to notice this—the clearance message will include the word “except” as a flag—and change any route you may have entered into the FMS. You may also not receive the exact cruise altitude you requested.

After your plan is cleared, you should fly strictly according to the planned route. Controllers will issue flight instructions, most commonly Heading or altitude changes, to guide you along the planned route during phases of flight where instructions are needed. If you need to take a shortcut, you can use the “Request Route Amendment” command to request it from ATC.

Typical Un-planned Flight

The following is an example of radio communication for a typical un-planned flight. This takes place in the UK, where FISO airports are permitted, and one is used as the starting point.

Denham Tower, N30114, radio check 130.725. The flight begins with a basic radio check. This is as useful in the simulator as it is in a real aircraft—it verifies that you have two-way communication with the controller you are about to speak to.

N30114, reading you 5 In this case, the distance is very close, so even though you are on the ground, the signal is very strong.

Denham Tower, N30114, request departure information. Getting weather information in advance.

N30114, departure runway 30, wind 3 1 0 degrees 11 knots, QNH 9 9 7, temperature 6, dewpoint 1.

Denham Tower, N30114, hello, Piper PA-28R-201 Arrow, from Denham to Cambridge, 1 POB, departing north east. As an un-planned flight, naturally there is no need to file a flight plan. The airport does not have a separate Ground frequency, so Tower handles everything. They only need to know who you are and what your intentions are.

114, runway 30 taxi via 24, cross runway 06, hold short of runway 30. The FISO “Tower” still gives instructions while you are on the ground, in this case providing taxi instructions immediately.

Runway 30 taxi via 24, cross runway 06