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TAKEOFF AND DEPARTURE

A few minutes after take-off, you may hear one of the pilots state "Good afternoon, on behalf of the flight crew we welcome you aboard Delta flight 542, with nonstop service from Atlanta to Los Angeles; we hope you enjoy your flight". While you are relaxing and preparing for the in-flight movie, air traffic control is busy passing Delta 542's flight profile information to the next controller, who is working in the TRACON airspace. This transition is called a "handoff". In other words, the flight crew is finished communicating with the tower and is leaving their airspace. They are then handed off to the departure controller working in the TRACON. The departure controller communicates to Delta 542 that they have received their flight progress strip information from the tower and are now monitoring this aircraft. For example, departure control might state "Delta 542 radar contact 6 miles South West of Atlanta; climb and maintain 14,000 feet, turn to a course heading of 285 degrees, direct WETWO then Vulcan (VUZ) when able."  WETWO is a departure fix or intersection.  Some controllers refer to departure intersections as "departure gates". Intersections are defined by exact GPS coordinates.  Many modern aircraft allow pilots to fly "direct" to a specific intersection or navigation fix.



ENROUTE FLIGHT

Once your aircraft reaches about 50 miles away from the Atlanta airport, you are outside of the TRACON airspace and entering en route airspace.  Now your aircraft is at an en route altitude and will be handed off to the nearest Air Route Traffic Control Center (such as Atlanta ARTCC) located in Hampton, Georgia. 

Atlanta center, along with many other ARTCCs, use long-range ASRL radar (including feeds from remote radar stations) and controls en route air traffic over most of Georgia and Alabama, extending north through North Carolina and Tennessee into Kentucky, West Virginia, and Virginia. 

As your aircraft flies at en route altitude, it will pass through several ARTCC airspace controllers until you reach about 150 miles away from LAX (your final destination).  ARTCC facilities and TRACONs use ARTS or STARS to monitor your flights progress throughout the en route portion of your flight.


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