Disappearance of Flightwatch

[DXB]

As a new whippersnapper pilot packing a Stratus, I've never called Flightwatch.  But I always figured I would at some point as I get into more complicated flying.  So this surprises me:

http://www.aopa.org/News-and-Video/All-News/2015/August/31/End-date-for-Flight-Watch-frequency-1220-changed-to-Sept-24?WT.mc_id=150904epilot&WT.mc_sect=adv

Curious what this means to the more seasoned folks.  I thought 122.0 had dedicated weather-only briefers who could provide more detailed enroute weather than FSS people.  Should I brush up on how to find the right FSS frequency en route?   The whole transmitting vs. receiving on different frequencies over a VOR still befuddles me a bit.  

[gsengle]

As far as I can tell you'll get through to the same sort of people over the flight service frequency... I've used flight watch but it is downright old fashioned if you have XM or nexrad etc on an iPad... A picture is worth a thousand (staticy) words...

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[FoxMike]

I am one who has not installed any new fangled weather equipment in my airplane so I still use flightwatch.  I am not sorry to see it go.  Over the last 5 yrs or so it has hardly been used by the flying public.  I will simply revert to calling flight service on the published frequency.  Fifty years ago we transmitted on one freq and received on the VOR freq.  It was not the best as you had listen to the morse code but was usable.  Com radios have improved a lot over the years so updating weather is not nearly the chore it used to be.  These days you can also listen to the AWOS at airports that are along your route. Flying is much easier and somewhat than when I started 50yrs. ago.    

[DXB]

Thanks to above.  The failure for this topic to spark much discussion pretty much confirms EFAS wasn't worth keeping.  Just another useless piece  of clutter for my aviation brain picked up during primary training- frankly there's too many of these, and it takes a while to weed them out and replace them with real world knowledge and skill.  I'm gonna go read the much more lively weather decisions thread above to accelerate the process...

[Marauder]

Thanks to above.  The failure for this topic to spark much discussion pretty much confirms EFAS wasn't worth keeping.  Just another useless piece  of clutter for my aviation brain picked up during primary training- frankly there's too many of these, and it takes a while to weed them out and replace them with real world knowledge and skill.  I'm gonna go read the much more lively weather decisions thread above to accelerate the process...

Like everything else in life, they had a moment in aviation history (like NDBs, LORAN, red/green routes). I used them but with the rollout of better ways to get information, they became obsolete.

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[Hank]

Sad to see them go. Didn't use them often, but it was reassuring to check weather ahead and find it breaking up as forecast (or not). Always knowing the frequency was a benefit, too, but recently as VORs shut down, Flight Watch was increasingly hard to reach in those places where I needed it the most (S. WV, VA southwest, E. TN, W. NC), areas where you could count on the weather and winds to change and civilization was far away. Now many of the VORs are gone, and I'll need to look up frequencies to get weather. Many places through there have no AWOS/ASOS within reception distance, or they will be NOTAMed OOS, or have "ceiling unavailable" or "reported winds not reliable."

guess I'll go study up on how to check weather ahead while I'm crossing the mountains . . . It's rarely even similar on both sides, and in the middle is often different from the two sides.

there is little discussion because it has been presented as a fiat accompli, and no discussion will change anything. In fact, the announced schedule has even been accelerated.

[ArtVandelay]

I'm sure this is to help accelerate ADSB adoption

[midlifeflyer]

Flightwatch was created (and not all that long ago) in order to move in flight requests for weather information away from Specialists handling other duties. Just like separating Ground from other Tower functions, multiple TRACON frequencies for the same facility, separate Tower Frequencies for the east and west runways at busier airports, and the National Clearance Delivery number, it was simply a workload shift.

Between Internet weather briefings, online flight plan filings, avionics and tablets with in flight weather availability, etc, it is pretty likely LockMart just decided the in-flight weather workload  no longer required a dedicated frequency and that calling any FSS frequency was sufficient.

It's not a loss of services. Just what numbers to put in the Comm frequency box.

Edited September 10, 2015 by midlifeflyer

[bradp]

I regularly use flight watch to give PIREPS when I see a deviation from something that is predicted or reported. Nothing better than a set of eyes to tell you what is acutely happening. However, I would less often use it to get weather information. Especially with the advent of XM, and now ADS-B my asking for information will become less and less. That said, it was nice having a quick answer and the lack of folks getting full briefings and other services with the dedicated Wx frequency. I'll have to see how many PIREPS I give now when I'll certainly be irking to get back on with App or CTR or whichever ATC I happen to be leaving the frequency for to talk to FSS.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Danb]

especially the loran..thought it was the wave of the future....so much $$$ was spent on those boxes..I'm sure Mr Garmin knew about GPS coming to the fore front but as Mr G goes we got screwed again..

 

we need more players in the market

 

[ryoder]

Never used it.  

[RobertE]

I'm sorry to see it go, mostly because it will cut down on pireps, I bet.  I have XM and, so, didn't use it.  But I often filled pireps.  I doubt I'm alone in being less likely to look up the proper frequency than just dialing in 122.0.

 

 

[Hank]

I'm not even sure where to look up the new freq, or what it's called . . . Guess I can give preps to ATC, but they won't like getting quizzed for what's going on ahead of me.

[Marauder]

I'm not even sure where to look up the new freq, or what it's called . . . Guess I can give preps to ATC, but they won't like getting quizzed for what's going on ahead of me.

Isn't the new process the old process? Dial up 122.1 to transmit, identify the VOR you are listening over and make sure your Nav is tuned in?

To be quite honest, with FIS-B, I haven't called up a FSS other than once to open an IFR flight plan (and that was a cell phone call). I would love to see more digital communication to the cockpit and back. Wouldn't it be cool to file a PIREP from your iPad?

BTW -- talking to humans is over rated. Look at us, we're communicating! Right?!

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[kortopates]

You can open and close a VFR flight plan by email now, so filing a PIrep by email may happen. But they could be concerned about encouraging this enroute and opt not too.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[gsengle]

By email? How?

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[jlunseth]

I have called Flightwatch maybe twice in a few hundred flights.  There are three problems with it.  First, if you are IFR it requires leaving ATC 's frequency or at least putting it on monitor while you listen to Flightwatch, which means you really can't hear ATC very well.  Second, the times I have used it there is always a wait, they are handling other flights, so you are offline with ATC  for awhile.  Third, the don't give you weather that is anywhere near as "route accurate" as NEXRAD that you can get from XM or on your iPad with ADS-B.  That plus the MK I eyeball is, in my view, much better than Flightwatch or Flight Service.  About the only time I use it is to provide a PIREP, and normally it is the local tower that wants the PIREP so I ask to switch to them more often than Flight Watch.  If I were VFR only and no weather in the aircraft I might feel differently.

[kortopates]

By email? How?

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

IMO, Lockeed Martin's Flightservice website https://www.1800wxbrief.com/Website/#!/ has vastly improved their services over DUAT. I am not sure its rumor or truth. But I've heard the FAA won't be renewing DUAT services and they will be replaced by Lockheed Martin's website services - which I think there NextGen briefing services are vastly superior to DUATs for about a year now. Many folks use an iPad or such to interface with Duats, so it will take some time for them to catch up (and they will have too if the rumors are correct.) But Hilton's Wing X just released an update to interface with 1800wxbrief.com as a logged official briefing - so I am sure others will follow suite soon.

You do have to register and set up a profile for use. But once you do, I am sure you'll be pleased to see the many improvements. available to you. One I like is filing a flight plan the night before and getting an email update in my inbox at the designated time I specified in advance, plus the ability to ask for notice of hazards like AIRMETs or SIGMETs that become active after your briefing. (I believe they'll even send them while you are enroute if you are low enough to receive them). Plus I think they have put quite a bit of effort in trying to better organize the wx briefing material and make it more user friendly. I suggest you check it out and get some briefing emails sent to you to see for yourselves. Way to many features to list and everyone has their favorites. One of mine is for international flights coming back into the US VFR. Lockheed not only makes it easy to file international ICAO flight plans over the web, but they will also send me email as part of my wx-brief & flight plan that will include a squawk code to get back over the border. Which is really nice since its takes the pressure off to get Flight service on the radio to get an assigned code before crossing. (However, I am still doing that just to update my ETA 30 minutes out from landing anyway.)

Personally I used to use FlightWatch all the time when that was all we had before the days of satellite weather. Controller got request all the time to go off line to talk to FlightWatch or FlightService and you still hear it occasionally. But indeed, you could find yourself 3rd or even 5th in line for a request when there was weather to be concerned with. But typically when that happened someone ahead of you was requesting the same info - but not always. So sometimes you had to be content to hear how the ride was ahead of you. But when WSI first came on the scene I was an early adopter and have had satellite wx onboard ever since - now I would not want to fly xctry without it unless its severe clear. And like most, I rarely if ever used FlightWatch since having satellite weather. So now with almost everyone having ADS-B wx in the cockpit it only makes sense to consolidate.

[Marauder]

IMO, Lockeed Martin's Flightservice website https://www.1800wxbrief.com/Website/#!/ has vastly improved their services over DUAT. I am not sure its rumor or truth. But I've heard the FAA won't be renewing DUAT services and they will be replaced by Lockheed Martin's website services - which I think there NextGen briefing services are vastly superior to DUATs for about a year now. Many folks use an iPad or such to interface with Duats, so it will take some time for them to catch up (and they will have too if the rumors are correct.) But Hilton's Wing X just released an update to interface with 1800wxbrief.com as a logged official briefing - so I am sure others will follow suite soon.

You do have to register and set up a profile for use. But once you do, I am sure you'll be pleased to see the many improvements. available to you. One I like is filing a flight plan the night before and getting an email update in my inbox at the designated time I specified in advance, plus the ability to ask for notice of hazards like AIRMETs or SIGMETs that become active after your briefing. (I believe they'll even send them while you are enroute if you are low enough to receive them). Plus I think they have put quite a bit of effort in trying to better organize the wx briefing material and make it more user friendly. I suggest you check it out and get some briefing emails sent to you to see for yourselves. Way to many features to list and everyone has their favorites. One of mine is for international flights coming back into the US VFR. Lockheed not only makes it easy to file international ICAO flight plans over the web, but they will also send me email as part of my wx-brief & flight plan that will include a squawk code to get back over the border. Which is really nice since its takes the pressure off to get Flight service on the radio to get an assigned code before crossing. (However, I am still doing that just to update my ETA 30 minutes out from landing anyway.)

Personally I used to use FlightWatch all the time when that was all we had before the days of satellite weather. Controller got request all the time to go off line to talk to FlightWatch or FlightService and you still hear it occasionally. But indeed, you could find yourself 3rd or even 5th in line for a request when there was weather to be concerned with. But typically when that happened someone ahead of you was requesting the same info - but not always. So sometimes you had to be content to hear how the ride was ahead of you. But when WSI first came on the scene I was an early adopter and have had satellite wx onboard ever since - now I would not want to fly xctry without it unless its severe clear. And like most, I rarely if ever used FlightWatch since having satellite weather. So now with almost everyone having ADS-B wx in the cockpit it only makes sense to consolidate.

DTC's contract (DUAT) was cancelled this summer. I was not sorry to see them go. If I didn't use them for a bit, they would cancel my log-in and then make it hard to get it activated again. 

Does anyone know if the Lockheed site will interface or has plans to interface with the iPad apps like Garmin Pilot and ForeFlight? I still see DTC log-in information in Garmin Pilot.

[midlifeflyer]

Does anyone know if the Lockheed site will interface or has plans to interface with the iPad apps like Garmin Pilot and ForeFlight? I still see DTC log-in information in Garmin Pilot.

Flight plans created with ForeFlight are sent to Lockmart. That been the case for over a year. I think it's part of ForeFlight advising of expected clearances.

LM has been working on partnerships with multiple app providers. If you go to the home page, you'll see a list of them (logos) on the left side of the page.

The use of some require special permissions. Log in to LM and go to the Account | Service Provider tab.

[Andy95W]

I've had  a CSC DUATS account since 1992.  I'm really glad they're still around.  Anybody heard anything changing with them?

[carusoam]

WingX sent this link in an email....

https://www.1800wxbrief.com/Website/#!/

claiming weather briefing, flight plan filing, and recorded for prosperity by LM.

Looks like the same phone number that is stored in Andy's flip phone from the 90’s...

best regards,

-a-

 

future addition mentioned in this WingX email... Free fuel price updates!

Edited September 17, 2015 by carusoam

[Andy95W]

I had a flip phone until just last year!  I'll have to set up an account and try it out.  Thanks.

(not a Luddite, but old enough to be set in my ways, I guess!)