ICAO Flight Plan, Again

Tuesday, February 23, 2021 at 11:33 AM ET

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Before standardizing on the ICAO form, the FAA still used its domestic form. This led to the confusion of calling the ICAO form “International,” suggesting it was only for international flights, when today it is all we use for any flight.

Key Takeaways:

The ICAO flight plan's Item 10 (Equipment) and Item 18 (Other Information) now demand pilots accurately detail aircraft "capabilities" (e.g., integrated GPS, ADS-B), moving beyond simple installed equipment due to modern avionics complexity.
Accurate transponder/ADS-B codes (for VFR) and Performance Based Navigation (PBN) codes (for IFR) are crucial as ATC uses them to determine an aircraft's eligibility for specific airspace and procedures.
Pilots, as primary users of the flight plan, bear the responsibility to correctly identify and record their aircraft's full ICAO capabilities, leveraging the POH and digital tools, especially for varied fleet aircraft.

See a mistake? Contact us.

August 2019, marked the end of the FAA Domestic Flight Plan. The ICAO Flight Plan form is required in the U.S. for all VFR and IFR flights. Yet, there are two areas that still create confusion: Item 10. Equipment, and Item 18, Other Information.

Many pilots struggle with these codes and ask: 1.) Does ATC care about the codes? 2.) Are some codes redundant and/or superfluous? 3.) Is there “nesting” (something that is included in a bigger part)? 4.) Who are the customers of the ICAO flight plan?