Airport Identifiers

EdFred said:
Which is what's nice on the Garmin, is when you go to dial in a destination/waypoint it defaults at K for the first letter/number.
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On the BK 89B, I believe it is a selectable option. On the Garmin 496, it depends on whether you select airport or navaid.
 
I'm glad Tony brought it up...

Right or wrong, when I'm talking to ATC I always put a "K" in front of an "all letter" airport just to make sure they know I referring to an airport and not a VOR located at or near the airport. In some cases this could make a difference of 10 or more miles in your flight path. It's never good when ATC thinks you're going to point 1 when you're actually navigating to point 2 ten miles away especially when your on an IFR plan.

For example, I used to be based at KSGF & the SGF VOR is over 7 miles north.
 
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bullwinkle said:
Same reason they leave off an airplane's N from the identifier? If you're in the USA it's just assumed.
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Unless you get a smartass FSS briefer, like I did in 2005 or so. When I called for a Std Wx briefing, and gave the call sign 380MF, he said "Do you mean NOVEMBER 380MF?"
 
timwinters said:
I'm glad Tony brought it up...

Right or wrong, when I'm talking to ATC I always put a "K" in front of an "all letter" airport just to make sure they know I referring to an airport and not a VOR located at or near the airport. In some cases this could make a difference of 10 or more miles in your flight path. It's never good when ATC thinks you're going to point 1 when you're actually navigating to point 2 ten miles away especially when your on an IFR plan.

For example, I used to be based at KSGF & the SGF VOR is over 7 miles north.
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Using KSGF is fine, but when the route data ends with SGF it's taken to be the airport, not the VOR.
 
When speaking with controllers or briefers, be sure they know whether you're talking about an airport or a VOR. For example, KLYH is about five miles from LYH. The FAA is working slowly to change this so no airport and VOR share the same name and ID letters, but it's taking time.
 
Ron Levy said:
When speaking with controllers or briefers, be sure they know whether you're talking about an airport or a VOR. For example, KLYH is about five miles from LYH. The FAA is working slowly to change this so no airport and VOR share the same name and ID letters, but it's taking time.
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Do you mean no airport/VOR combo that's not colocated, or no airport/VOR combo whatsoever? I think that would be MORE confusing! Maybe make the ones that aren't colocated (like GRB and KGRB) different, but make the ones that ARE colocated (like LJT and KMWC) the same. And for the colocated ones that are already the same (like MSN and KMSN), leave 'em the heck alone!
 
flyingcheesehead said:
Do you mean no airport/VOR combo that's not colocated, or no airport/VOR combo whatsoever?
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It's my understanding that they are concerned only about the cases where the airport and VOR are not collocated. Otherwise, the difference isn't particularly significant from a controlling and separation perspective.
 
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