Hi all,
Most of you will be familiar with flight level orientation but under some different term like “odd/even rule”. It basically states that your direction of flight determines whether you need to fly at an odd or even flight level.
The problem lies in the fact that different regions use different systems. In one, a northbound flight will require an even level while in another westbound is even.
This results in border regions in which aircraft will need to climb/descent according to the appropriate rule.
When filing a flight plan on flight simulation networks most users don’t bother about the step-climbs they filed and only fly their RFL. This makes the step-climbs unreliable for controllers and results in verifying which level each aircraft actually wants, compliment with the rules.
My suggestion is the following:
When filing a flight plan for any of these networks using Simbrief,
- Stepclimbs are removed. A nice compromise would perhaps be a checkbox a user can tick if they do want to use the actual step-climbs from the FP.
- Users need to explicitly state their new RFL, compliant with the corresponding rule. Simbrief will then add that level as a step climb in the FP at the waypoint closest to the border.
All the best,
M.