Along with introducing its new European service, ForeFlight has added new features to simplify flying and improve safety for users of its “Integrated Flight Application” ForeFlight Mobile app.
The European service, developed in partnership with Jeppesen (supplier of digital IFR and VFR navigation data), brings a full suite of ForeFlight Mobile features to pilots flying in European airspace, including Eurocontrol-optimized routing and flight-plan filing.
European subscription plans display Jeppesen IFR and VFR navigation, terrain, and obstacle data on the Aeronautical Map and also include AIP procedures, charts, and Eurocontrol documents. Subscribers can add options such as Jeppesen VFR terminal procedures (formerly Bottlang charts) and IFR chart subscriptions. Also available are host-nation VFR data packages, with the initial availability of German DFS aeronautical information publications and charts.
Subscribers to ForeFlight’s Business Performance Plan can access a library of aircraft profiles covering a variety of popular turbine airplanes including models by Bombardier, Cessna, Daher, Dassault, Embraer, Gulfstream, Pilatus, and many others. The profiles “include climb, cruise, and descent models defined for multiple altitudes, weights, and temperatures using the manufacturer’s published flight-planning performance data,” according to ForeFlight.
Flying in European airspace is complex, and ForeFlight’s planning engine uses the aircraft profiles to calculate a recommended route, taking into account Eurocontrol constraints and weather conditions.
The routes offered by the Graphical Route Advisor are validated by Eurocontrol and displayed on a preview map. Routes can be filtered based on IFR, VFR, YFR, or ZFR. Once the user picks the optimum route, ForeFlight can file the flight plan via AFTN at no additional cost, then receive a calculated takeoff time notification via email in case of traffic management initiatives.
For single-engine turbine operators flying commercially, EASA requires a route risk analysis, which can take hours to create by hand. ForeFlight makes the SETOPS risk calculation much simpler, and it can be accomplished in minutes, depicting glide range graphically and also providing a SET-IMC risk threshold analysis table.
Pilots flying datalink-equipped aircraft can use ForeFlight to upload flight plans into the FMS for aircraft with Honeywell and Satcom Direct routers. To use this feature, ForeFlight provides a recall number in the navlog, and this number is used to upload the routing into the FMS.
ForeFlight introduced the Trip Assistant in the latest version of the app. Trip Assistant is a tool for dispatchers and pilots to create an itinerary for a trip that includes time needed for ground transportation at either end.
When planning a trip, the user can input either a desired departure time or arrival time, and Trip Assistant will calculate what how best to meet the specified time by looking at drive times as well as flight times based on weather forecasts.
Another new ForeFlight feature is map declutter icons are now in the map view; these allow the user to add or remove certain features to make the map easier to view. Included are airports, airspace, airways, flight information region (FIR) boundaries, terrain, and roads.
Pilots can now set a boundary on altitudes used for flight planning, so ForeFlight won’t suggest an unusable altitude for a planned route.
Other new features include flight delay notifications; automated terrain alerts from any page in ForeFlight; editing fuel quantities on the Flights tab; and the ability to pull up airport information by tapping on an airport tag in the synthetic vision view.
Two business plans are available, Business Pro and Business Performance. The Pro plan costs €180 per year and includes ForeFlight features such as Jeppesen VFR and IFR navigation data and global airspace information, Eurocontrol AIP charts and documents, data-driven Aeronautical Maps, mobile and web flight planning and filing, graphical preflight briefing, aviation weather, FBO directory, avionics connectivity, documents catalog, geo-referenced approach and taxi charts, profile view with airspace, terrain, and obstacles, and synthetic vision.
The Performance plan includes the above and adds performance profiles, a flight-planning engine “that generates optimized routes between any two airports in the world, fuel and payload planning, automatic fuel and weight safety checks, integrated contract jet fuel pricing, and more.”