"Orval Fairbairn" wrote in message
news
The overhead is a *HELL* of a lot better than the straight in!

If so, you probably ought to include information in post supporting that
position, rather than the statements you did make.

It gives
you a view of traffic in the pattern

In VFR conditions, you can see the whole traffic pattern from final.
Secondly, if you're flying a straight-in, most of the traffic pattern is
moot, especially the upwind and the crosswind.

keeps you in close

Closer than a straight-in? Given that the overhead break necessarily
includes flight over the same ground that the straight-in requires, plus
some more, in what way is this increased time spent aloft better than a
straight-in? And what could be more "in close" than being ON the runway,
rather than flying overhead making your turn to downwind?

gets you to the downwind

Flying straight-in, there's no need to even get to the downwind.

and gets a whole flight on the ground in the time it takes
to get one plane on the ground.

Firstly, the situations I'm talking about are solo planes, not formations.

Secondly, if a particular approach is faster solo, it's faster with a
formation. A formation that can fly all the way to landing (the only way to
actually "get a whole flight on the ground in the time it takes to get one
plane on the ground") can do so using any type of approach, and if the
formation has to split up during the overhead break and enter the pattern as
individual airplanes, then they are occupying just as much of the pattern as
they would had they split up somewhere else (and you certainly are not
getting the whole flight on the ground in the time it takes to get one plane
on the ground).

There may indeed be certain types of operations and airplanes for which an
overhead break may be a superior choice but a) you can't generalize those
specific situations to the maneuver overall, and b) pilots need to recognize
that their own operational preferences cannot take priority over general
airport traffic safety.

Pete