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The UK Met Office have launched a new weather app for GA pilots, which eventually will replace the GA Briefing Service. It’s been a long time coming – I remember them talking about it about 15 years ago when I visited the Met Office to research an article for Pilot magazine. It is a PWA (Progressive Web App) – which basically means that the web page adapts to a smart phone device. You don’t get it from Google Play or the Apple store, you simply open the website on your smartphone browser.

It has a fresh clean appearance, and presents weather data graphically as well as allowing access to METARs, TAFs and F214, F215 etc. As yet, it does not translate METARs and TAFs into plain English, and the graphical displays are not as diverse as Windy.com, but they are moving in that direction.

You can access it via this link. It’s worth playing around with it. They have a feedback page, so I encourage you to tell them what you (don’t) like and make suggestions for additional functions.

For pilots whose SEP ratings expire between March and October during Covid-19 lockdown, the  CAA have come up with a pragmatic way of extending ratings, including the SEP rating and IR(R). ORS4 No. 1385 describes what is required. (It also addresses extension of validity of ground exams, instructor / examiner ratings etc).

In essence,  the rating holder needs to obtain a (remote) briefing from an instructor / examiner. On completing the briefing, the rating page is signed with the new expiry date which is 22 November 2020. The content of the briefing is at the discretion of the instructor but should  cover relevant safety aspects of operating the SEP class of aircraft and manoeuvres typically flown. However, since the instructor and pilot are unlikely to be face-to face, and to avoid entrusting a valuable document to the mail, a Temporary Certificate on form SRG1100F can be issued instead.

Note this is only an extension of the rating, not a 2 year revalidation. In other words, before 22 November 2020, the rating hodler will have to renew or revalidate his/her ratings in the normal manner (e.g. 12 hours flight time, 6 horus PiC- ll in the 12 months up to 22 November) and a 1 hour instructional flight.

If you’d like to extend your rating, please get in touch to set up a Zoom or Skype call. To help prepare, look at key speeds and operating characteristics for your aircraft and answer the little quiz below.

Earlier this year, NATS launched a portal for GA pilots wishing to transit Class D controlled airspace in the London area. It allows GA pilots to pre-notify their intentions via a simple, online tool.

The tool is currently a trial and use is not mandatory; indeed, it is perfectly OK to cross class D airspace by filing an airborne flight plan, 10 minutes prior to entering CAS, which you effectively do by calling them up and asking for a zone transit. By giving advance warning (1 hour before crossing), NATS say that it allows controllers to plan for your transit.

Some tips for planning a class D transit:

• Have a route in mind, taking into account the runway in use, which you can work out from the wind direction or by phoning an ATIS telephone line (ATC often prefer you to transit via the landing threshold)
• Plan your route and altitude so as to avoid wake turbulence. You want to be above the approach path of inbound commercial aircraft (a threshold transit does this)
• Familiarize with VRP’s shown on the chart, and other features which ATC may reference (the Diamond hangar at Stansted, for example)
• Be professional in your RT calls: be concise and complete (CARPACER), no waffle, read back accurately
• Have a back-up plan ready, in case the transit cannot be approved
• Fly the cleared routing accurately (heading and altitude) – this reassures ATC that you know what you are doing
• Be ready to fly faster than normal if ATC request it (though in our GA aircraft, you won’t have much speed upside!).

I have used the tool several times. The functionality is quite basic – it doesn’t save data, nor does it allow you to specify your transit route (you simply state which class D CTR you wish to cross). The tool doesn’t guarantee that transit will be approved, but so far it has worked for me even at very busy times.