You have likely seen a lot of news about the “CTAF Trial” on the network over the past few months. But what is CTAF and how does it differ from tuning into 122.800? Today we are going to take a deep dive into advisory frequencies and how they are implemented around the network!

ADVISORY FREQ

An advisory frequency is simply a radio frequency used for pilots to transmit any information that may be relevant to other traffic in the vicinity and coordinate with said traffic where necessary in the absence of air traffic services. On VATSIM even the busiest airports revert to advisory frequency when no air traffic control is available. The current “default” advisory frequency on VATSIM worldwide is 122.800 .

On the advisory frequency, pilots will make call outs to notify other traffic of their intentions. This includes taxi, takeoff, landing and approaches. Making radio calls will ensure that everyone has a smooth operation in and out of even the busiest of airports on the network!

CTAF

Now what is this CTAF trial? VATUSA began the CTAF trial earlier this year. The goal was to implement the real world traffic advisory frequency into the VATSIM network. If you have had the opportunity to fly general aviation aircraft in the real world, you will notice that not every airport uses 122.800 as their traffic advisory frequency. Now, pilots in the United States (and expanding to Canada, Mexico and the Caribbean) will use the real world CTAF frequency for the airport rather than defaulting to 122.800.

HOW TO FIND CTAF FREQ

There are multiple ways for VATSIM pilots to find the CTAF frequency for the airport they are visiting.

1: VATSIM AIP: Pilots can find the CTAF as well as other useful information right in myVatsim under the AIP tab

2: Client Commands: The command .ctaf {ICAO} will pull the CTAF frequency for the indicated airport. This code works in any VATSIM pilot client

3: Real world sectional charts: Real world charts (or digital versions) will include the CTAF frequency in the airport information

4: Online tools: Services such as the VATSIM radar include CTAF frequency information on their airport information