Fuel planning, EFB integration added to AOPA Flight Planner
The latest release of the AOPA Flight Planner, powered by Jeppesen, adds four new features to ease flight planning and improve safety, including a unique fuel-warning system and the ability to send the flight plan to ForeFlight Mobile and WingX Pro7.
“The AOPA Flight Planner’s new features offer more and better tools that work seamlessly with major EFBs so pilots can fly safer and get more out of flying,” said AOPA President Mark Baker. “We will continue listening to members and working with the industry to improve the Flight Planner as well as all of the other services AOPA provides members to make general aviation safer and more accessible.”
Predictive fuel-warning system
In version 2.3, the predictive fuel-warning system will display color-coded sections of your cross-country route to show you caution and warning ranges that consider forecast winds aloft and fuel usage for climb and descent based on the performance data saved in the aircraft’s profile.
“Combined with the Fuel Along Route overlay we introduced in version 2.2 of the Flight Planner, it has never been easier to plan a fuel stop along your route,” Eric Rush of AOPA’s Flight Planning Products Team explains in a video tutorial of the new release.
The magenta route line will turn yellow to represent the caution zone segment in which you have 60 to 90 minutes of fuel remaining. The course segment will turn red if less than 60 minutes of fuel remains—the reserve recommended by the AOPA Air Safety Institute.
If your departure date and time are within a current winds aloft forecast period, then the fuel warning zones will consider the winds aloft forecast at your planned altitude and planned time of departure. If your departure time is too far in the future and outside of a valid winds aloft forecast period, then the zones will be calculated without wind information. Special warnings will be presented when winds aloft are not being considered in the calculations.
The AOPA Flight Planner, powered by Jeppesen, will always include climb and descent fuel calculations based on the values entered in the aircraft profile that is selected. By default, the fuel warning zones are enabled and based on the maximum useable fuel for the selected aircraft, but you also can change the starting fuel quantity.
Send your navlog via email, open in ForeFlight, WingX Pro7
Based on popular demand from AOPA members, two of the new features allow users to share flight plan information. First, send the navlog via email to yourself or anyone else you want to have the details of your flight. Then, if you open the navlog from your email on a device that has ForeFlight Mobile or WingX Pro7, you can send it to the EFB app with one touch. Seattle Avionics announced Feb. 19 that it also can accept flight plans emailed from the AOPA Flight Planner for its subscribers using the latest version (2.2) of the FlyQ EFB app. Those who use Naviator can simply download AOPA Flight Planner saved routes from within the Naviator app.
AOPA is working to integrate with other EFB providers as well, Rush said.
For pilots who have an email address associated with their membership, that email address will automatically appear in the pop-up window to send the navlog, according to Rush. The email address also can be manually entered.
User-friendly Edit Route sidebar
Also in this release, AOPA redesigned the Edit Route window into a sidebar to make it more user friendly for changing your aircraft, departure time, fuel, and other flight parameters. The sidebar can be collapsed to maximize the amount of screen available for reviewing your charted route of flight.
For a detailed overview of the new release, watch the tutorial on YouTube.
