Advanced airplane switching

Advanced airplane switching

In advanced airplane switching, it is possible to adjust the departure/arrival routing for departures and arrivals. This page explains, how to adjust preset routing for arrival or departing planes.

Explanation

When an arrival approaches the airport, CTR atc will assign it a runway, where it is expected to land, and an arrival route. This runway and route are assigned according to the current runway in use. However, sometimes it is possible to assign different runway to land (e.g. if more parallel runways are in use, or if more runways are available for the specific kind of the airplane) or to assign a different route. Moreover, it is possible to omit the route and use simple vectoring for incoming planes.

Similarly, TWR atc will assign a runway and standard departure (SID) for departure according to the current runway(s) in use. Again, it is possible to change this runway according to the current traffic situation.

Note that this procedure is only available when a plane is being transferred from CTR to APP atc, or from TWR to APP atc.

Procedure

In a standard switch procedure, an atc sends a request to APP looking like:

LKPR_TWR: 0129 (CSA 1023) via 24/DOBEN2A to you

Then, APP atc confirmation response is:

-0129

After this confirmation, the plane is departed from runway 24 via DOBEN2A departure.

However, APP can ask to change the routing and runway. The generic format is:

+/-SQWK RWY/ROUTE

, where:

• +/- represents either + or - to address desired ATC (see standard ATC communication),
• SQWK represents a squawk code of the transfered airplane, e.g., 1234,
• RWY represents a full runway threshold designator, e.g., 24 or 24L,
• /ROUTE represents the name of the desired route, e.g., BODAL2A. You can also ask for radar vectoring - then use /V instead of the route name.

If no runway is specified and only a route is specified, the runway threshold will be the same as the currently assigned one. If no route is specified and only a threshold is specified, the route will be selected accordingly to the desired runway threshold and the airplane type - if there is no appropriate route, radar vectoring will be assigned. If neither a runway nor a threshold is used, then the current runway threshold and route is specified (so standard switching is used).

Examples for departures:

+1234 - a switch request without an additional route requests,

+1234 24 - a switch request with an additional request to use runway 24 (route is selected appropriately to the plane type and exit point,

+1234 24/DONAD2A - a switch request with an additional request to use runway 24 and then follow DONAD2A departure route,

+1234 24/V - a switch request with an additional request to use runway 24 and then follow the orders of the ATC,

+1234 /DONAD2A - a switch request with an additional request to use the currently assigned runway and then follow DONAD2A route,

+1234 /V - a switch request with an additional request to do not follow any route after deparutre, but follow the orders from the ATC.