Hi,as far as I know, comercial pilots plan a trip from the departure rwy up to the rwy they intend to use at the destination airport. Yes, there is a chance that there are changes until arriving the destination but if I haven't filed a flight plan in FS9 I allways don't know the active until I can contact the tower at the destination airport. Is there a way to determine the active rwy(s) at a particular airport at the time of planning a flight?Thanks, Tom.

Just my two cents here...If you look the METAR at destination, you can guess the active RW reading the wind direction.

The active runway is generally dictated by the wind direction. Since the wind direction can and often does change at any time, establishing the destination active can be a guessing game. As far as I know (and it's been YEARS since I've flown real world), you can check the prevailing winds at the destination airport before leaving. That should give you a good idea as to which runway you'll be landing on. I might add that when I WAS flying, I never filed a flight plan from runway to runway..... rather just from airport to airport. I listened to ATIS when I got within range of my destination to learn which runway was active. That way I had a chance to set up for approach even before being advised by the tower. Over the years, I suppose this procedure could have been altered for some (if not all) airports. Then again, I only flew general aviation .... possibly the whole routine is different for commercial jets. -Lindy :-wave :-rotor

I'm not a real world pilot so maybe I'm haven't understood everything correctly. I'm with you that the active should be determined by wind direction first. Until now I read the METAR at the destination and choosed a rwy according to that. But there are many cases where I guessed wrong. Yesterday, for instance, I approached PAFA, wind was calm. I took a look at the approach charts and determined 1L as the main rwy because it's the only with ILS/GS/DME available and it's CAT III capable. But as I was in tower range I heard that rwy 19R was the active. If I knew that before, I would fly a complete different approach.If you fly a GA aicraft to small airports it's no problem to listen to ATIS and determine all landing actions according to that, but if you fly a STAR to a major airport you have to make the descision where to go before you have ATIS informations available. So I'm looking for a tool that simulates somehow a phone call to the destination airport asking the operator which rwy is currently in use :-)Regards from Germany,Tom.

I tend to set my aircraft up at the destination airport BEFORE I program the FMC (Boeing 737NG) to check the active runway THEN change my location back to the departure airport. Bit of a bind but the only way to do it really - the MS ATIS is pretty useless as you can't receive it until you're about 10 miles from your destination (in real-world flight I can get ATIS from 50-80 miles away depending on my flight level).Obviously if the wind changes direction at your arrival location during the flight you're bu**ered!RegardsAdam

I have used ActiveSky WXRE and now the just released AS2004. With both you can get the current destination METAR to give you some idea but as another reply said there is no guarantee that a runway will be specified according to it. Think of runway restrictions imposed by AFCADed airports as well as calm wind situations.I also fly under Radar Contact 3.1 which does have a protocol for selecting runways or you can select an appropriate one. The trick is to seamlessly merge with AI.The FSUIPC 3.135 just released now offers developers a recommendation for destination runways via its API based on recent AI landing history. If there is no active AI at the destination when you aircraft is eighty nm out or closer, then this data is not available. I hope developers such as RC will eventually implement it as it can be most embrassing landing on the same runway in the opposite direction of AI. When they do their own ATIS then the same criteria should be effective as used by AI.For a look at the available data, use the Traffic Look utility included with FSUIPC.

>as far as I know, comercial pilots plan a trip from the>departure rwy up to the rwy they intend to use at the>destination airport. Tom,Actually this is not so. Most (if not all) flightplans are filed without taking a particular destination runway in account. As you approach your destination, ATIS or the Approach Controller will advise you of the active runway and then you can set up your FMC for the actual approach in use.Stamatis