How do you account for the headwind or tailwind considerations that affect your Flight Planning?

We had a good question come in recently (thanks John!) about doing some IFR (or VFR) flight planning. Whether you’re taking your Private Pilot Ground School or your Commercial Pilot Ground School… this is a great reminder ALL of us!

Pilot Tip – Headwind / Tailwind considerations that affect Flight Planning

[00:00:00] We got a question here from our good friend, John… John says, I have a question about IFR flight planning. The FDs, upper winds, have an important influence on time, and consequently, fuel burn. True. The flight computer using track information and the FDs compute this. Yes, it does. However, is it more prudent to use the total wind speed component as though it were a direct headwind as well as not take credit for a tailwind?

[00:00:28] When IFR flight planning, the reasoning would be that the wind could change. Yes, it could. It might become a direct headwind. Yup. The tailwind could disappear. It usually does. I say IFR, but I suppose this would apply to VFR cross country flight as well. 

[00:00:44] All of those things can happen. And you’ve asked for our comments on this and here are my comments… 

[00:00:51] What you should do, I think, and this is my opinion, is simply… make your best estimate as to what your time [00:01:00] on route and fuel burn is going to be.

[00:01:02] And then instead of playing around with, you know, is it all headwind or all tailwind, cause it’s really not… just plug in a contingency. And that should take care of your tailwind disappearing or your headwind suddenly becoming stronger. And that’s why we have the contingency part in our flight planning.

[00:01:22] It’s going to be better from the standpoint of you filing an IFR flight plan if your ETAs are as accurate as you can get them. If you’re going to start playing around and saying, okay, all of my wind is headwind and none of my wind is tailwind, you’re going to be off enough that it’s going to matter.

[00:01:41] So take your best shot. Do the work as accurately as you can, put in a buffer for IFR flight planning or VFR flight planning, that’s what most operators in the commercial world and the corporate world do. That’s how I operate. 

[00:01:59] So [00:02:00] hopefully that helps. It’s an opinion more than anything else, but you’re quite right to be wary of the fact that it’s just a forecast.

[00:02:08] The FDs are just the forecast. So they could be off. So good question.