Temporary Flight Following Deviation

[John_Mitchell]

Doug, if you see this...this new forum is pretty handy.

Anyway, here's my question/scenario.....I have already obtained VFR flight following at 3500', and I see something ahead of me, on the ground, that I want to swoop down (obviously maintaining minimumaltitudes/distances, etc..), circle a couple times, and take a closer look. Also, say that this area is outside of any Class B/C/D airspace.

How is this request made? I was thinking that maybe I should request a temporary release to VFR and then request flight following once a get back on my original path....is this close?

Thanks in advance.

[VicariousLiving]

Originally Posted by John_Mitchell

...I have already obtained VFR flight following at 3500', and I see something ahead of me, on the ground, that I want to swoop down (obviously maintaining minimumaltitudes/distances, etc..), circle a couple times, and take a closer look. Also, say that this area is outside of any Class B/C/D airspace.

How is this request made? I was thinking that maybe I should request a temporary release to VFR and then request flight following once a get back on my original path....is this close?

Thanks in advance.

The required answer depends on whether or not the controller issued any instructions (altitude or heading) to the VFR flight. If not, the pilot is free to change course and heading (IOW, descend and orbit over a point) within the contstraints of VFR flight rules. OTOH, if altitude or heading instructions were issued the pilot must obtain new instructions consistent with the descent and orbit, or have the instructions removed. That said, even if no instructions were issued it is good form to offer a heads-up to the controller if the descent and orbit is much of a deviation from what the controller would reasonably expect given the destination or route the controller was advised to expect.

If, for example, I wanted to orbit my sister's house I'd simply tell the controller, "We will (or wish to if an instruction has been received) descend and make a few circles over a point __________________, after which we will then proceed back on altitude and course", where the blank is an aviation related description of the point. The description might be "1 nm north of the towers on south ridge" for my sister's house, but in other cases "3 south of Smallville Muni", etc. works, too.

[Fox Xray]

VicariousLiving is right on... I will add one thing. Use good judgement on where you decide to start orbit or where you swoop down. Nothing will set off alrams faster then a plane doing turns about a point over a powerplant or something like that...

[Ian J]

I'd also like to add that if you have flight following in a "practice area" where the controller expects you to make many altitude and heading changes for training purposes you should still tell them if you're doing anything whacky. I was doing power-offs one day and decided to take my student almost to landing at a grass-strip. We did a recovery at about 100 ft AGL and as we climbed back up ATC called up a little concerned because we dipped below radar coverage and he thought we went down. Lesson learned for me.

[John_Mitchell]

Thanks to you all for some very valuable information....student pilot here soaking it up!!!

On a side note, I only have 2 hours left until my PPL checkride! Woohooo, hopefully this week I will have my temporary PPL cert!

Thanks again to everyone here on JC!