Local Intel...Avoiding Florida Pan Handle Colorful Airspace

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Pilot101

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Pilot101
Greetings,

I am doing some flight planning for a distant future VFR flight from AZ to KLAL airport and I wanted to reach out to the VFR pilots who live in the pan handle area to get some local knowledge intel...assuming you are in Mobile AL and you wanted to fly to Lakeland FL...what is the route/ altitude along the Florida pan handle you would take?.

Using ForeFlight profile view and the map it is pretty easy to start the route using their recommend wind based route and then use the "rubber band" feature to avoid all of the pretty colored airspace (blue/magenta/ the dreaded orange) depicted on the sectional chart to get from AZ to the Eglin / Pensacola area...then...

Yikes...there sure is a lot of colorful boxes down in that neighborhood.


Does anyone have a custom route that you can provide me that I can cut and paste into ForeFlight that keeps you away from all of the pretty colors?

Of course you could go north and then east and then south...or just grind along the north edge of the Warning areas to HEVVN and then hang a right however there has got to be some really sharp pilots who have figured out the "routine" and can share the "dot to dot" game to navigate the area.

Do you have any local knowledge "pro tips" and "gottchas" that you can share?

Also something that I have never seen before...at the HEVVN intersection there is a "box" outlined by grey parallels lines and there is depicted a 50/05 AGL...I cannot really see the complete box that is within 50/05 AGL...in ForeFlight you are supposed to press and hold and then the airspace feature is supposed to depict what airspace is within that lat/long however noting comes up.

Anyway...THANKS for any advice/ tips/ tricks/ shoulda-woulda-coudas you can share!!!
 
The FAA has a training out there for flying into KDTS. It has procedures for flying through all of NAS and Eglin airspace, while you would be travelling further, I would imagine a lot of the information would be pertinent to those transitioning the airspace as well.
 
Grab flight following and you can probably go through most of it. Or stay way north. Following I10 you miss a lot of it on the east side. In any case, flight following will help.
 
I'm not a local. I delivered a plane to Spruce Creek a few weeks ago and transited that area, however. The controllers were professional and friendly, and the traffic levels were on par with a nice Saturday in the LAX area.

If you're comfy with busy airspace, you'll have zero problems. They were even chasing someone who lost situational awareness and bombed a skyhawk into one of the airspaces while also going NORDO and nobody seemed to even have an elevated heart rate. He just bumped the jets and cirrii around the wayward cessna until the student pilot found his radio and headset again, then got vectored back home like it was a basic event.

For my bit, since I was coming from Portland, I went north of the party zone and it added about 4 minutes to my routing if you believe Garmin. The coastal route was very crowded and presumably has all of the best scenery. :D

My ADS-B receiver was worth its weight in bitcoin for that 45 minutes, as it assisted with my SA tremendously. Beg, borrow, or steal one if you're not already equipped.

$0.02
 
Its 6 of one, half dozen of the other. You can follow I-10 to stay north of the restricted areas or fly along the beach to stay south of them. Just use flight following and you can ask if the R areas are open. I would say it depends more on your fuel situation at the time, gas is going to be cheaper farther inland (north).

You can't start the turn south towards Lakeland until around Tallahassee so unless you want to see the beach I would just stick to the north and life is easy. The beach route will be longer or the same distance unless you are comfortable with a decent sized cut over the Gulf around Wakulla. Purely on landout options, I would stick to the north and away from the marshy, uninhabited stuff.

Afternoon thunderstorms will also start to be a factor soon so your choice may be made for you depending on time of transit too.
 
I’ve done it a few times. Vfr corridor right down the beach. Super simple. Fun.

Tools
 
As far away as you're coming from, there's no reason to get tangled up in the Elgin area. However, if you do decided to, it looks like you can stay just off the shore between 2600 and 8500 and you'll be in clear airspace. Around the DTS area, you have class D below you. Otherwise, there's a restricted area above you starting at 8500 up.
 
Pilot101 said:
Greetings,

I am doing some flight planning for a distant future VFR flight from AZ to KLAL airport and I wanted to reach out to the VFR pilots who live in the pan handle area to get some local knowledge intel...assuming you are in Mobile AL and you wanted to fly to Lakeland FL...what is the route/ altitude along the Florida pan handle you would take?.

Using ForeFlight profile view and the map it is pretty easy to start the route using their recommend wind based route and then use the "rubber band" feature to avoid all of the pretty colored airspace (blue/magenta/ the dreaded orange) depicted on the sectional chart to get from AZ to the Eglin / Pensacola area...then...

Yikes...there sure is a lot of colorful boxes down in that neighborhood.


Does anyone have a custom route that you can provide me that I can cut and paste into ForeFlight that keeps you away from all of the pretty colors?

Of course you could go north and then east and then south...or just grind along the north edge of the Warning areas to HEVVN and then hang a right however there has got to be some really sharp pilots who have figured out the "routine" and can share the "dot to dot" game to navigate the area.

Do you have any local knowledge "pro tips" and "gottchas" that you can share?

Also something that I have never seen before...at the HEVVN intersection there is a "box" outlined by grey parallels lines and there is depicted a 50/05 AGL...I cannot really see the complete box that is within 50/05 AGL...in ForeFlight you are supposed to press and hold and then the airspace feature is supposed to depict what airspace is within that lat/long however noting comes up.

Anyway...THANKS for any advice/ tips/ tricks/ shoulda-woulda-coudas you can share!!!
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I flew that Westbound about 10 years ago. Easy to work with Approach like already said. The Restricted Areas were hot but they didn’t say anything like they’d rather I stayed out of the MOA’s. The Grey thingy is for Special Military Operations. This one will be for activity on IR32 & 33. If you’re talking with ATC they’ll tell you what you need to know. If not, call Radio. There’s one out West that goes active every once in awhile, like every few years or so. It’s for Cruise Missile tests.

upload_2021-5-20_19-40-43.png
 
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Flying here is really not that difficult. As mentioned, get flight following and you'll be fine. If there's not a lot going on at Eglin you will have a very scenic flight. Maybe get to see the Nightstalkers practicing (two of their MH-47's flew over my house on Monday) or get a heads up on a passing F-35, F-22 or F15. Worse case is they keep you north of I-10.
 
donjohnston said:
Flying here is really not that difficult. As mentioned, get flight following and you'll be fine. If there's not a lot going on at Eglin you will have a very scenic flight. Maybe get to see the Nightstalkers practicing (two of their MH-47's flew over my house on Monday) or get a heads up on a passing F-35, F-22 or F15. Worse case is they keep you north of I-10.
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The nightstalkers are parked at Destin. They come through a couple times a year.

T-38s are also frequent as they are attached to the F-22 unit.
 
luvflyin said:
You're a jet jock aren't you? Have you flown in that territory? Whadda ya know about that IR32 & 33?
Click to expand...

Yes I've flown in that area, I thought the flightaware screenshot gave that away.

As to IR 32 and 33, according to the DOD FLIP, it's pretty much a ghost route by use restrictions, both in terms of yearly volume, and the type aircraft that the route is restricted to. For the OP, it's a non-issue.
 
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I have flown around this area for many years. Flight following is a piece of cake. Stay north of I-10 across the panhandle and you will be fine. Most MOA's are you will fly right thru. Eglin's restricted areas are off limits with exception of the north/south and east/west corridors. Out of Mobile you can hit the coast just south of Pensacola then along the beach to Panama City Beach. Visually this is the best route. See attached routes. 5500' keeps you above most of the controlled airspace. If you go the beach route request 2000'. That will keep you above the banner tows and sight seeing flights, but you get a good look at the beaches and water.

Screenshot (2).png Screenshot (3).png
 
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As others have said, your choices are bypass Eglin Restricted airspace to the north or south. North route is over the top of Crestview and requires no ATC interaction. South route just off the beach requires commo with Eglin. Instructions are printed on back of the sectional. If you have flight following they will hand you off seamlessly.
 
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