Bob Moore wrote:
rote

Marc CYBW wrote:
The pilots of Southwest Airlines Flight 1248 were permitted to
attempt a landing in extremely bad weather at Midway Airport
because the low-cost carrier holds a special FAA waiver to
operate below regular minimum-visibility safety regulations,
federal officials said Wednesday.

This is not a waiver, it is standard operating procedure for most
Part 121 aircarriers. OPSPECS for Part 121 carriers specify standard
CAT I minimums as 3/4 mile visibility. Any carrier may operate to
the lower minimum of 1/2 mile visibility by simulator training (and
checking) their pilots to hand fly ILSs to 100' DA. This was standard
at the aircarriers for which I both prepared the OPSPECS and flew.
The 1/2 mile OPSPEC authorization was not airport specific.

SWA briefly services ORD:

"December 29, 2005 - A Southwest Airlines jet was forced to make an
emergency landing at O'Hare Airport after colliding with a bird during
takeoff from Midway.

Flight 111 was on its way to Philadelphia when a bird was apparently
sucked into one of the 737's engines, causing it to shut down.
Southwest officials say they decided to send the plane to O'Hare
because it was a full flight and needed a longer runway.
The plane landed without incident. No one was hurt. A second Southwest
Airlines jet was sent to O'Hare to take the stranded passengers on to
Philadelphia."

JG