"bobmrg" wrote in message
...
On Oct 19, 8:19 am, "Dennis Johnson" wrote:
I was flying in Northern California the other day, VFR without a cloud
in
the sky, and asked Oakland Center for a practice ILS approach to Chico,
a
nearby towered airport. I said I would terminate the approach with a
missed
approach and then depart the area without flight following.

The controller agreed and gave me vectors to final, but said I would
have to
fly my own altitudes. I'd never heard that before, but it wasn't a
problem
for me. After getting established on the localizer, he told me to squawk
VFR and to go to the tower frequency. I did, and reported my position to
the tower, who acted surprised that I was there and didn't seem to know
anything about me or my intentions.

I thought that when I get a practice approach from Center or Approach,
they
coordinate the handoff to the control tower. But that didn't seem to be
the
case this time. What do you think was going on? What's normal?

Best,
Dennis

What is "normal" is for the controller to coordinate with the tower.
Can't explain why this didn't happen in this case, but IMHO the
controller dropped the ball. The ATCH specifically directs any
controller who is providing radar services to coordinate with any
facility into whose airspace s/he is directing traffic.

Bob Gardner
SAY AGAIN, PLEASE

My guess is if the center told him to squawk 1200 he was also told radar
service was terminated. It's not necessarily contrary to the ATC handbook,
but not really good form either to dump him off on the tower without
coordinating. There may have been a perfectly valid reason like the
landline was down, but if something like that happened to me I would
probably make a call to the center's QA manager and inquire about it.