Call Signs - Three variants

[send2gl]

On the flightaware flight details page whilst following a friend’s journey on easyJet 8225 22 April 2022 it lists the following;

EZY8225
U28225
EZY46WE
G-UZHI

I know the last number is the aircraft registration but the other three appear to all be some kind of call signs? Are they each used for different purposes?

Geoff

[tyketto]

It looks to me that there are 4 different types of flight numbers here.

The first one is the flight number in ICAO format. the ICAO code for EasyJet is EZY, hence EZY8225. This is mainly used by ATC.

The second one is the flight number in IATA format. the IATA code for EasyJet is U2, hence U28255. That is mainly used at for passengers, travel agents, etc.

The third one is also the flight number in ICAO format. This is also used by ATC. Why they use this is because for some airlines, they only use one flight number for a particular route, but could have multiple flights in the air flying that same route. So they could have 2 or more flights of flight 8225 flying. They can’t use the same callsign, however for ATC to use, so that is where this callsign comes in: EZY46WE, which would be “Easy 46 Whiskey Echo”.

The last one, as you said is the aircraft registration.

BL.

[send2gl]

Thanks tyketto for very informative reply,

Knew routes used same flight numbers but didn’t think of shorter popular routes which might fly same destinations more than once.

Have sometimes found a search for a flight number maybe shows up on flightaware but not on FR24 (or visa versa).

Thanks again,

Geoff