I’m your flight planning partner.
I can do 3 things;
- identify the safest time to fly.
- provide a comprehensive briefing so you can be safer.
- automatically generate a weekly flight category forecast.
My job is to surfaces risks for your proposed flight so you can mitigate / implement countermeasures. Think of me as a “Threat Assistant”.
You fill in a short and simple form and I’ll generate one of these:
- Window Recommendation
Proposes the best weather windows for your flight, looking up to 14 days ahead. - Pre Flight Briefing
A detailed briefing using the CAA’s CPL standard, so it works best within 24 hrs of takeoff when the weather forecasts are more certain. - Weekly Planning Forecast [NEW]
A regional forecast of the likely flight category in your area for the week ahead (UK by default).
Want to try / test it?
Why this exists
It can take a lot of time to go through the various data sources looking for a weather window to book the aircraft, or indeed getting together a comprehensive pre-flight briefing.
You might be trying to build a full weather picture (cloud base, freezing level, wind, wind gusts, en route wind, etc) alongside any air space changes or NOTAMs as you try to assess threats across multiple sources (Windy, Met Office, SkyDemon/ Foreflight/ Garmin Pilot).
You may be flying a regular route, but can you fly it next Wednesday at 0900z in your PA28?
Is it worth booking Friday off work to go flying?
| In scope | Out of scope |
|---|---|
| Advice, e.g., where VFR may be marginal, or IFR preferable | Briefing pack generation (Autorouter, Foreflight & SkyDemon, Garmin Pilot all do this) |
| Qualitative risk assessment, e.g., wind gusts trending outside crosswind limits | Flight plan filing (done by existing solutions) |
| Basic calculations, e.g., TODR, LDR | Routing (existing solutions) |
| Check various accessible documents, e.g., tech log, POH | |
| Long range weather window identification |
Important Notes
- It takes a few minutes to run.
- Advice only – you’re still PIC, so follow up and check.
- Right now it is often very cautious; if there’s a risk it will flag it, e.g., icing, gusting crosswinds all get flagged and may not occur.
- This is a beta system so really follow up and check. It’s a fun test system, obviously no warranties (express or implied) are made.
- At the moment the processing of each request is manually approved so I can monitor processing costs, so be patient, I’m probably walking the dogs or something.
How does it do it?
It uses raw meteorological, geographic, aircraft POH, UK NOTAM and UK AIP and NOTAM data it can access. If it doesn’t have your POH data it’ll try its best. I even connected it to our aircraft tech log.
It takes account of all the things that might affect your full route; cloud at various pressure altitudes, freezing level, convection activity, density altitude, cross wind components, wind at various pressure altitudes, all the NOTAMs on/near your route, including any alternates that are likely or specified, etc.
Of course, you are responsible for the flight. There are risks this software couldn’t possibly know about. It’s designed to surface those risks that you might miss in your preparation.
It can’t get Eurocontrol NOTAMs – they’re coming soon.