Flight plan/load sheet

Airline Pilot Questions & Answers
1

Hi folks,

When do you receive your flight plan/load sheet? Is it when boarding is done? Or do you get it electronically before the flight? How does it work on multiple legs? For example, if you’re on day two of a multiple day trip, do you check in somewhere at the remote airport to get paperwork? Or is everything done electronically?

Thanks!

2

Ethan,

We receive our flight plans over our iPads about two hours prior to departure. The load sheet comes over the aircraft’s printer right at the end of the boarding process. On multiple leg days, the process simply repeats for each leg.

When I started flying for the airlines, we would go to the Operations office at each airport to get the new paperwork for each leg. Going electronic has made our jobs much easier.

Chris

3

Thanks for the quick reply Chris. Couple other questions if you don’t mind:

Does this mean that you generally head straight to the aircraft when you get to the airport? Are you generally with the same FO/aircraft for a multiple day trip? Lastly, I would imagine this operation is different for a long-haul flight? Do they sit and do thorough weather/flight planning in operations first as oppose to getting everything electronically for say, a transatlantic flight?

Take care,

Ethan

4

Ethan,

We typically go straight to the airplane when we get to the airport, except for the first flight of the trip where we meet in the flight planning area. On oceanic flights, the pilots meet in the flight planning area for all legs of the trip as there are plotting charts that need to be filled out and it is much easier to do that when there is a desk.

Typically the same pilots will fly together for a whole trip, but the cabin crew will change almost every flight. We will also go through several different airplanes during the course of a multi day trip.

Good questions.

Chris

5

Ethan,

We’re still a little behind. Like Chris we get our closeout after we’re all boarded via the printer but the flight plans are still on paper. Interisland we get the round trip in HNL, TransPac the return is brought to the cockpit.

Adam

6

Adam,

Are you dispatching inter island under flag rules? Is the release valid for six hours?

7

No normal 121 domestic, but since our turns are all well under an hour it’s not ever an issue.

Adam