What does 'Heavy' mean in ATC

A 'Heavy' is an aircraft capable of takeoff of more than 255,000 lbs 😉

To change it, which is unrealistic 🙄

Go to select aircraft, select your 777 and at the bottom below the list it should say, Change Tail Number, or something along those lines. Click it, and uncheck the box that says "append heavy to call sign". That's it.

Flyboy92

Flyboy92 wrote:

To change it, which is unrealistic 🙄

Go to select aircraft, select your 777 and at the bottom below the list it should say, Change Tail Number, or something along those lines. Click it, and uncheck the box that says "append heavy to call sign". That's it.

Flyboy92

Yes it is unrealistic, you might wanna leave it there, the only time I change it is when I have a payload over 255,000lbs because it depends on some aircraft 😉

You do not want to remove it.

747 757 767 777 A330 A340 A380 are all heavies.

belgeode wrote:

You do not want to remove it.

747 757 767 777 A330 A340 A380 are all heavies.

757 an exception 😉 Different possibilities

Any aircraft large enough to create a vortex that could pose a danger to another aircraft close behind it is referred to as a 'Heavy'. Or in Wikipedia talk:

When talking to air traffic controllers, pilots will add the term Heavy to the end of the flight call sign on flights involving very large aircraft. For example you might hear this : "United 341, heavy, ready for departure". This term alerts air-traffic controllers that they need to provide extra spacing between aircraft as these aircraft generate significant wake turbulence which can disrupt the flight path of the aircraft right behind. The term is typically used around airports as that is where the cause for concern of wake-turbulence is highest. Some typical aircraft that use this call sign are the DC-10, B-747 and B-777. Of special note here is the B-757 which even though might not strictly qualify as a 'heavy' from the weight point of view, is still treated as a 'heavy' by air-traffic controllers as it is notorious for its wake-turbulence generating properties due to the specific nature of its wing design.

Tailhook wrote:

Any aircraft large enough to create a vortex that could pose a danger to another aircraft close behind it is referred to as a 'Heavy'. Or in Wikipedia talk:

When talking to air traffic controllers, pilots will add the term Heavy to the end of the flight call sign on flights involving very large aircraft. For example you might hear this : "United 341, heavy, ready for departure". This term alerts air-traffic controllers that they need to provide extra spacing between aircraft as these aircraft generate significant wake turbulence which can disrupt the flight path of the aircraft right behind. The term is typically used around airports as that is where the cause for concern of wake-turbulence is highest. Some typical aircraft that use this call sign are the DC-10, B-747 and B-777. Of special note here is the B-757 which even though might not strictly qualify as a 'heavy' from the weight point of view, is still treated as a 'heavy' by air-traffic controllers as it is notorious for its wake-turbulence generating properties due to the specific nature of its wing design.

Also if you run ai type aircraft you can have this line in the aircraft.cfg
atc_heavy=1
then the atc will automatically add it to the call.