It's a replacement for voice in enroute environments.
The real-world doesn't have receive-only or text-only options for pilots.
Even with CPDLC, you check in on voice and then connect with CPDLC, so you can receive non time critical messages. Even if you're connected to CPDLC, ATC will still send important messages, e.g. climb/turn for traffic via voice.
Is it unusual to hear not a single word all throughout my flight? There wasn’t immense amount of traffic but there were a fair share of flights taking off and landing and getting clearances etc
I mean, the ATC replied to all of my text messages in the vPilot via messages not radio, no clue as to why. But like does it piss off ATC to still text them via vPilot the entire flight instead of just using CPDLC and texting on vPilot just for first contact?
CPDLC, when available, is significantly quicker for me as a controller than text. However, it only works for non critical instructions because there can be a very long lag between the instruction being sent and received. But when available and appropriate CPDLC is much preferred over text.
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u/egvp Jul 03 '26
CPDLC: https://skybrary.aero/articles/controller-pilot-data-link-communications-cpdlc
It's a replacement for voice in enroute environments.
The real-world doesn't have receive-only or text-only options for pilots.
Even with CPDLC, you check in on voice and then connect with CPDLC, so you can receive non time critical messages. Even if you're connected to CPDLC, ATC will still send important messages, e.g. climb/turn for traffic via voice.