Vatsim Operational Help - Newbie

[Guest mruane]

HiI had my very first ATC assisted flight on Saturday into NZCH. What a buzz that was. SB3 installed and worked first time and was completely trouble free for me.When I created and filed my flight plan, I just called myself QF900 without giving any thought as to what the procedures mught be for naming oneself on Vatsim - or for that matter - whether someone else was using that nickname. If so, I apologise, it was completely unintentional.Are there are "standards" in terms of what we call ourselves on-line? Can I just pick a flight number and airline to suit the livery I have on the bird or is there a set of established protocols that others follow and that I should comply with? Might sound like a dumb question but I have not found anything to guide me.To the NZ-CTR controller last Saturday - thanks for your patience!

[niektap 0]

Hi there,By using link underneath you can find a whole list of airlines andVA airlines, with there respective radio callsigns and the three letter ICAO code to be used in your flight plan.For example I am flying for Eurostar VA, so my radio callsign is "Eurostar 228" in my flightplan it will be ESA228. A lot of pilots do mistake the Iata two letter abbreviations instead of the ICAO three letter abbreviation i.e. KL123 (IATA) instead of KLM123 (ICAO)Hope this helps,Best regards,Niekhttp://www.whatreallycounts.net/vacallsigns/

[Guest mruane]

Hi NiekThanks for your response. Is the flight number you have used based on a real world flight number or one assigned by a VA? If, like me, you do not fly for a VA then is it OK to just pick any flight number that appeals to you (and preferably one not in use in the real world)?Appreciate your help.

[hopskip 253]

As a Vatsim member since day one, and Satco since about 1999. I must say, I would encourage you to PLEASE DO USE REAL LIFE CALLSIGNS.For instance I will often, if Im looking to fly a Qantas route, go to www.qantas.com.au and look up an actual callsign used on my specific route. I quite often fly the PMDG 737 as a Virgin Blue aircraft. Virgin blue run one flight between Sydney and Melbourne every hour or so. So I will look at their website ( www.virginblue.com.au ) and pick the closest flight to the one Im going to fly. Sometimes I will even wait 15 minutes and depart at the real flights scheduled time.Alternitavley some people use just a couple of callsigns, for instance a friend of mine always flys the numbers "185" so he'll be QF185 Qantas 185 or VOZ185 Virgin 185 or CPA185 Cathay 185 and so on. Me on the other hand generally try to at least find a callsign that does fly the actual route, or has in the past done so, not neccicarily at the right time (some airlines only have one flight to a particular destination a week or some such, and of course you would want to fly now, rather than in two days time at 7am lol)Basically just pick any realistic looking callsign. You said NZCH so I'll assume your in New Zealandtherefore you could pick ZK-HOP or something which would be spoken as "Hotel Oscar Papa". This would be an appropriate callsign for a small aircraft that isn't operating for an airline. say, a privatley owned Cessna, or a Corperate LearJet.Or you could pick NJS442 (spoken National Jet Four Four Two) which is one of the regonal airlines (the ones that operate the New Zealand division of Qantas). Or of course you could choose NZ95 (New Zealand Nintey Five) and fly as Air New Zealand, or maybe QF6044 (Qantas Sixty FourtyFour) one of the Qantas Domestic flights inside New Zealand from capital to capital (NZCH-NZAA or NZAA-NZQN etc) or Qantas 118 accross the Tasmain to Australia.All you need to know is what the 2 or 3 letter identifier for each airline is. ie:QF or QFA for QantasANZ or NZ for New ZealandVOZ or DJ for Virgin BluePBI for Pacific BlueJST for JetstarNJS for National Jet SystemsFJI for Air Pacific (Fiji)AAL for American AirlinesUAL for United Airlinesto name a few...any of those airlines can then be appendaged to a 2, 3 or 4 number sequence to make up a callsign... ieAAL382UAL95 (I think UAL93 is banned and AAL11 to name a few, but the server will just reject the login)VOZ863 (this is a real life Melbourne to Sydney flight that arrives at Sydney at 10:30pm local time)EAQ2241 (Eastern twenty-two fourty-one, a real life Qantaslink Dash-8 flight from Albury to Sydney)alternitavley you can use the "Rego" callsigns for the non-airline flights.use the prefix ZK- for NewZealand aircraft ieZK-TAL "Tango Alpha Lima"VH- for Australian aircraftVH-MHG "Mike Hotel Golf" (In real life this is a Cessna C172 belonging to a flightschool "Basair" that operates from YSBK)Notice all the above have 3 and only 3 letters (not numbers) after the prefix, so VH-MYPLANE would not be appropriate, or VH-123 or VH-AB3 and the like.In the USA they have the "N" prefix and you see callsigns likeN371SE and so on, generally that sequence "N" " 3 numbers" "2 letters"oh, and that's my own making that callsign, it's my Ex-Gilfriends name... anyone see what it says? (hint, the N isn't part of it ;) )

[Guest mruane]

Thanks, thats really helped to put things into context. I am following your strategy now using ZK-MAR based on my initials for non-commercial equipment and an airline for which I have livery and flight number that I simply "like" for the heavier stuff. The idea of looking for a real world flight number for the sector and airline is a good one and worth pursuing. In all cases I would check with ServInfo and make sure that the callsign is not in use before logging in.Regarding your ex's name I can really only see "Elise" there. Is that close?Many thanks for the detailed response - it really did help.

[hopskip 253]

Yeh you do need to check on servinfo that no-one else is flying it. Regardless Squawkbox will reject any login with "Callsign Already in Use" if someone else is flying it at the same time. Though if you do something like spell it diferently (QFA instead of QF for Qantas etc) then it can get a bit interesting lol. "Qantas 25 Turn 280" "oh but Im still on the ground" "ah, I meant the other Qantas 25 aww. What the?"Yep and Elise is it ;)

[Guest mruane]

So I made the right choice. Good to know I still have some marbles left in the top drawer!Thanks for all your help Hopskip.