Amateur night at the field

Three miles is not on final, it is entering the traffic pattern.
I tell them to call when they are one mile, even that is big for a
pattern.

Three miles can be on final. What if you had to extend your final because
there were straight in finals ahead of you. You could easily find yourself
on a three mile final. I remember being extended at a busy class D. They
kept putting Lear jets straight in ahead of me, and extending my downwind. I
ended up about 10 miles out. I finally told the controller he should either
fit me into the pattern or turn me over to the neighboring class B
controller whose space I was entering.

"john smith" wrote in message
...
Three miles is not on final, it is entering the traffic pattern.
I tell them to call when they are one mile, even that is big for a
pattern.

Proper procedure when other traffic is already in the pattern would be
to overfly the airport at least 500 feet above pattern altitude and
enter upwind crosswind behind any traffic already in the pattern.

Three miles can be on final. What if you had to extend your final because
there were straight in finals ahead of you. You could easily find yourself
on a three mile final. I remember being extended at a busy class D. They
kept putting Lear jets straight in ahead of me, and extending my downwind. I
ended up about 10 miles out. I finally told the controller he should either
fit me into the pattern or turn me over to the neighboring class B
controller whose space I was entering.

Three miles is not on final, it is entering the traffic pattern.
I tell them to call when they are one mile, even that is big for a
pattern.

That is sort of hard to do when on a practice instrument approach.

I am confused by the upwind crosswind part of your statement. Did you mean
enter the upwind leg by flying crosswind. That would mean you just overflew
the downwind that you could have entered at 45. Or did you mean enter the
crosswind leg upwind of the runway? That would make more sense, but I think
you are supposed to fly across the upwind end of the runway right across the
numbers. That way you aren't likely to get into the way of departing
traffic. This also becomes a problem on long runways were some planes can be
at pattern altitude plus 500 by the end of the runway.

"john smith" wrote in message
...
Proper procedure when other traffic is already in the pattern would be
to overfly the airport at least 500 feet above pattern altitude and
enter upwind crosswind behind any traffic already in the pattern.

Three miles can be on final. What if you had to extend your final because
there were straight in finals ahead of you. You could easily find
yourself
on a three mile final. I remember being extended at a busy class D. They
kept putting Lear jets straight in ahead of me, and extending my
downwind. I
ended up about 10 miles out. I finally told the controller he should
either
fit me into the pattern or turn me over to the neighboring class B
controller whose space I was entering.

Three miles is not on final, it is entering the traffic pattern.
I tell them to call when they are one mile, even that is big for a
pattern.

In article ,
"soxinbox" wrote:

That is sort of hard to do when on a practice instrument approach.

If there is other traffic in the pattern, unless they are violating the
regs, you will break out into VFR conditions a mile or two from the
runway. You then follow the last airplane in the pattern.

I am confused by the upwind crosswind part of your statement. Did you mean
enter the upwind leg by flying crosswind. That would mean you just overflew
the downwind that you could have entered at 45. Or did you mean enter the
crosswind leg upwind of the runway? That would make more sense, but I think
you are supposed to fly across the upwind end of the runway right across the
numbers. That way you aren't likely to get into the way of departing
traffic. This also becomes a problem on long runways were some planes can be
at pattern altitude plus 500 by the end of the runway.

You guys are way over thinking the problem. If you overfly the runway
above pattern altitude you have a clear view of any aircraft in any
position in the pattern and follow the last airplane accordinly without
interferring. This keeps you in a postion to land on the airport from
anywhere in the pattern.

The scenario I originally described was night VMC, not a mix of IFR and VFR
aircraft. The tower was closed.

Viperdoc wrote:
The scenario I originally described was night VMC, not a mix of IFR and VFR
aircraft. The tower was closed.


You *can* practice IFR approaches at non-towered fields. The local
approach control vectors you to the localizer, you shoot the approach,
and you make all the calls that you'd make to a tower on the CTAF.

If you overfly the runway above pattern altitude you have a clear view of any aircraft in any position

That makes sense unless another acft is lost among the ground clutter.
At what point do you descent to pattern alt? That part I think is a bad
idea as the potential is always there to come down on top of another
plane in the pattern (the one you *didn't* see)

I'll stick with the AIM's recommendation on this one.

In article .com,
"Kingfish" wrote:

If you overfly the runway above pattern altitude you have a clear view of
any aircraft in any position

That makes sense unless another acft is lost among the ground clutter.
At what point do you descent to pattern alt? That part I think is a bad
idea as the potential is always there to come down on top of another
plane in the pattern (the one you *didn't* see)

I'll stick with the AIM's recommendation on this one.


The 360 overhead approach at pattern altitude works well. You come down
the runway centerline at cruise, check for traffic, break toward the
downwind over the threshold, pull power, should be at gear speed at the
180 point, drop flaps, continue the circle, ending at the threshold, and
flare to land.

Properly done, this approach is done power off after the break and
results in minimum time in the pattern. Remember, you are not in the
pattern until downwind -- likewise, those on the 45 or on straightin are
NOT on the pattern!

Be sure to check for traffic at all times.