ATC clears takeoff aircraft for midair

I'm a newly minted PP-ASEL and had a disturbing experience the other day.
I've begun renting at the field where I trained, a busy class D airport.
It's usually not possible to do pattern work there because it's so busy.
Returning from a local flight, I noticed that there was very little traffic,
so I asked to do some touch & gos; I was making left traffic using runway
16. On the 3rd or 4th go, I noticed that a craft was cleared for takeoff on
runway 11. I knew immediately that our paths would cross. I could not see
the other plane as it was behind me; the other pilot was warned by the tower
that I was in the pattern making left traffic. The other pilot finally saw
me as I was turning crosswing to downwind (heading 70 to 340) and he
indicated he was turning right from his takeoff heading 110. When I caught
sight of him, I don't think we were more than 100'-200' apart. At this
point, I said "traffic in sight" and tower replied "maintain visual
separation." If I had it to do again, I would have left the pattern and
headed outbound heading somewhere between 160 (my departure heading) and 110
(the other pilot's) until we had positive visual identification.

I'd be especially interested in comments from Gene Whitt, who said ATC has
been trying to kill him for 40 years, and anyone who might recognize the
airport from the runways described.

It is not unusual for such examples to occur.
It happens on approach to landings, also.
The CDAS towered field I fly out of is the third busiest in our state
(100k+ operations) and is the training base for a large university.
Students and experienced pilots alike have come close on multiple
occassions in the 25 years I have been flying here.
This seems to have happened more frequently since the field was dropped
as an FAA staffed facility to a contract facility.

"Joe Johnson" wrote:
I'm a newly minted PP-ASEL and had a disturbing experience the other day.
I've begun renting at the field where I trained, a busy class D airport.
It's usually not possible to do pattern work there because it's so busy.
Returning from a local flight, I noticed that there was very little traffic,
so I asked to do some touch & gos; I was making left traffic using runway
16. On the 3rd or 4th go, I noticed that a craft was cleared for takeoff on
runway 11.

I'm guessing we're talking about HPN?

I knew immediately that our paths would cross. I could not see
the other plane as it was behind me; the other pilot was warned by the tower
that I was in the pattern making left traffic. The other pilot finally saw
me as I was turning crosswing to downwind (heading 70 to 340) and he
indicated he was turning right from his takeoff heading 110. When I caught
sight of him, I don't think we were more than 100'-200' apart. At this
point, I said "traffic in sight" and tower replied "maintain visual
separation." If I had it to do again, I would have left the pattern and
headed outbound heading somewhere between 160 (my departure heading) and 110
(the other pilot's) until we had positive visual identification.

The lesson here is that it's your job to keep a good lookout for
traffic. Doesn't matter if you're IFR, VFR, talking to a controller,
etc. Always keep a good traffic watch, and do whatever you gotta do to
keep from hitting other airplanes. The tower's sole responsibility is
to sequence traffic and provide separation on the runways and taxiways.
Regardless of all the instructions and warnings they might give you,
legally if you are VFR at a class D airport, the primary responsibility
for avoiding other traffic rests with you.

One thing you should realize about the phrase "maintain visual
separation". It's more than just a suggestion, it's the controller's
way (for the benefit of the tape recording) of legally transferring
separation responsibility to you.

Yes indeed, Roy, it's HPN. I'm aware of and agree with everything you said.
I'm upset with myself for not following my first impulse, which was to
continue outbound until the other pilot and I had visual contact. This was
Sunday night, and I was unfamiliar with this particular controller.
Listening to the radio traffic, I noticed she had something of an attitude
problem. Have you had this experience?

In article ,
"Joe Johnson" wrote:

Yes indeed, Roy, it's HPN. I'm aware of and agree with everything you said.
I'm upset with myself for not following my first impulse, which was to
continue outbound until the other pilot and I had visual contact. This was
Sunday night, and I was unfamiliar with this particular controller.
Listening to the radio traffic, I noticed she had something of an attitude
problem. Have you had this experience?

The controllers at HPN are pretty good. Sure, they make mistakes on
occassion, but so do all of us. I figure if my error rate was as low as
theirs, I'd be a pretty good pilot.

HPN is a really challenging environment for both pilots and controllers.
First, the mix of traffic is unlike anything you'll see anywhere else.
Lot's of GA, lots of student training, bizjets, turboprops, more
helicopters than you can shake a stick at, and of course scheduled
airlines. Not to mention the occasional blimp. About the only thing
I've never seen at HPN is a glider or an ultralight :-) The airport
layout has two intersecting runways, with many pairs of runway ends not
visible from each other. Cram all that into a complex airspace where
the flow of things is really driven by the flow of heavy metal into LGA,
JFK, and EWR, and it's a mess. Keep your eyes open and your head on a
swivel.

As for attitude, it's really hard to infer subjective things like
emotion and attitude over the radio. I wouldn't read too much into it.

Thanks Roy. I've enjoyed your informative posts & hope to meet you one day.
(Don't look for Joe Johnson--it's a pseudonym I use to avoid spam.)

"Joe Johnson" wrote in message
news
[...] (Don't look for Joe Johnson--it's a pseudonym I use to avoid spam.)

Spammers don't care what your name is. They only look at your email
address. Pseudonyms do nothing to affect whether you get spam or not.

"Roy Smith" wrote in message
...


One thing you should realize about the phrase "maintain visual
separation". It's more than just a suggestion, it's the controller's
way (for the benefit of the tape recording) of legally transferring
separation responsibility to you.

There's no reason for a class D tower controller to ever use the phrase
"maintain visual separation" to two VFR aircraft. There was no separation
standard in the first place, thus nothing to transfer to the pilot.

Newps wrote:

There's no reason for a class D tower controller to ever use the phrase
"maintain visual separation" to two VFR aircraft. There was no separation
standard in the first place, thus nothing to transfer to the pilot.

I was wondering that too. More, in all my experiences with class D airports
(I'm based at CDW, but I've been to TEB several times, HPN once, SWF a lot,
....) I don't think I've ever heard that expression used.

BTW, my experience at TEB is limited (perhaps a dozen visits there), but my
club moved out of there just about when I joined. A lot of people have
complained about the difference in "control quality" between TEB and CDW.
In my limited experience, I have to agree: TEB always seemed much more
tightly managed than CDW.

I'd guess that one difference is the training volume. TEB has (or had, at
any rate) a fair bit of GA training, but nobody did pattern work there.
They all left for places like CDW, MGJ, for that.

- Andrew

"Roy Smith" wrote in message
...

The lesson here is that it's your job to keep a good lookout for
traffic. Doesn't matter if you're IFR, VFR, talking to a controller,
etc. Always keep a good traffic watch, and do whatever you
gotta do to keep from hitting other airplanes. The tower's sole
responsibility is to sequence traffic and provide separation on
the runways and taxiways. Regardless of all the instructions
and warnings they might give you, legally if you are VFR at a
class D airport, the primary responsibility for avoiding other
traffic rests with you.

One thing you should realize about the phrase "maintain visual
separation". It's more than just a suggestion, it's the controller's
way (for the benefit of the tape recording) of legally transferring
separation responsibility to you.


How can "maintain visual separation" transfer separation responsibility from
the tower to the pilot if, as you said earlier, the tower has no
responsibility for separation?