A tower-induced go-round
Recently, Jay Honeck posted:
The controller told ME to go around, remember? I would have landed
behind the student pilot ahead of me -- or over him, if need be --
if the controller hadn't given the order to go around.
So... let's see. If under option #1 you landed behind the student,
you had enough room to guarantee a full stop before running him
down? Since your option #2 would have been to scare the bejeezus out
of the student by landing "over him", I presume the student wasn't
near the far end of the runway, so some numbers just don't seem
right, here. If you needed to be told to "go around" in that
scenario, perhaps the controller knows you personally? ;-)
What I thought I could or could not do is irrelevant. The controller
told me to go around, so I did -- end of story.
My point was that had I been on that approach, and saw the plane ahead of
me stop dead on the runway, I would have _told the controller_ that I was
going around, not figure out how to land with the other plane still on the
runway.
At an uncontrolled field, if the student had cut in front of me (as he
did when he was ordered to do so by the tower controller) I would have
executed a 360 degree turn for spacing, or landed short behind him. I
also would have got on the radio and asked him to land long and keep
it rolling.
Which the student may or may not have done while you've committed to
landing. I also would not want to be in the pattern with someone suddenly
pulling a 360 on final, either. IMO, the scenrios you're presenting do not
reflect the most courteous or safe options.
Neil
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