With this release, planning gets even better with a more advanced Procedure Advisor and a dramatically improved navigation database that enables visual preview of SIDs, STARs, approaches, and pattern entries. Downloads are significantly faster and use less disk space. Cabin Altitude Advisor leverages integrated pressure sensors to alert you when things don’t seem quite right. Support for Apple Watch gives you at-a-glance weather, flight instruments, and timers. Our new web-based flight planning system delivers an industry first Web-to-Panel flight planning experience for supported avionics. ForeFlight Mobile version 7.0 is available now on the App Store.
More Efficient Route Planning with Departure, Arrival, and Instrument Procedure Preview
Our Procedure Advisor tool now allows you to visually preview arrivals, departures, approach procedures, VFR traffic patterns, and Search and Rescue patterns prior to adding them to your route. Procedure preview makes it easy to see how various procedures enter and exit a terminal area.
To use procedure preview, enter a departure and destination in the Route Editor, then tap the Procedure button in the upper right of the Edit view:
A preview window displays the available departures, arrivals, approaches, traffic patterns, and optionally, SAR patterns.
In this example, tap on ‘Departure (19)’ to view the graphical display of departure procedures out of the Houston area:
The preview begins with a broad overview of the selected airport and geographic guides that outline each direction served by a particular procedure. After selecting an arrival or departure, either in the list on the left or by tapping one on the Map, transitions can be previewed and selected before adding it to the route.
Procedure Advisor also allows you to preview instrument approaches, including a flag on the best wind runway based on the current METAR. Once an approach is selected you can preview different entry points on top of the plate itself. When you are done, simply tap Add to Route.
You can also preview different traffic pattern entries with Traffic Pattern Advisor. The preview flags the best wind runway based on the current METAR and the best side for different VFR pattern entries. Once you have finished adding items to your route, simply tap Close (on the upper right) or tap outside the preview window to hide the Procedure Advisor.
Procedure preview is available on the iPad to Basic and Pro subscribers.
New Map Touch Feature Enables Chart Legends on the Maps View
You can now view US VFR Sectional and IFR Enroute chart legend panels directly on the Maps view. The new Map Touch action allows you to rotate through each overlapping chart in turn based on where you tap the chart. To enable, select the gear icon in the Maps view; then, tap on Map Touch Action.
When “Bring chart to front” is selected, a single tap toggles between all available charts in the area, including switching between sectionals and terminal area charts. When “bring chart to front with legends” is selected, the chart side panel information is also displayed. You can turn off the Map Touch feature at any time by selecting “No action”.
Faster Downloads with Delta Downloads
With ForeFlight 7, we introduce faster and smaller downloads that use less disk space during cycle cross-over time. We call this Delta Downloads and the new system only delivers the ‘what changed’ data each month, resulting in a 70% to 90% reduction in download time without compromising chart quality. Delta Downloads includes terminal procedures, taxi charts, IFR and VFR charts, FAA A/FD, and Canada Flight Supplement data. As Delta Downloads rolls out, you will see the full benefit over the next couple of data cycles. As a customer, there is no action you need to take. Delta Downloads happens automatically for all subscribers.
Stay Safe at High Altitudes with Cabin Altitude Advisor
In the past year, hypoxia and depressurization have claimed pilot lives. We hope Cabin Altitude Advisor helps to prevent future accidents like these. Cabin Altitude Advisor takes advantage of the barometer sensor built-in to iPhone 6, iPhone 6 Plus, and iPad Air 2. The advisor alerts pilots when crossing through 12,000 feet MSL and 25,000 feet MSL. The audio and visual alert triggers once every 30 minutes for each altitude. Pressure Altitude is also available to display in the Instrument panel.
A New Look in the Downloads View
In the Downloads view, you will now see VFR charts (TACs and Sectionals) listed by chart name instead of by State.
You can refer to a Chart legend for VFR chart coverage or simply use Pack to ensure that the charts you need for a trip are downloaded to your device.
ForeFlight on Your Wrist with Apple Watch
ForeFlight 7 introduces Apple Watch support, including weather at-a-glance, instruments, and timers.
ForeFlight Lands on Your Desktop
We are excited to announce that ForeFlight flight planning is coming to your web browser. ForeFlight Web Beta enables a full screen desktop experience, automatically syncs to ForeFlight Mobile, and offers seamless Web-to-Panel capabilities via ForeFlight Connect. Our Web-to-Panel concept is a first in flight planning, where web planning activity syncs to your mobile device and loads into the panel of supported avionics like Dynon SkyView.
ForeFlight Web Beta will initially be available to existing ForeFlight customers. We envision this as a very collaborative product development process with our customers. Features will evolve quickly with frequent releases, driven by our vision and by customer feedback. ForeFlight customers who are interested in this Beta program are invited to sign up at www.foreflight.com/web. Invitations to the Beta will be released in phases.
