Contact Approach

On Sun, 13 Feb 2005 08:45:22 -0700, Newps wrote:



Ron Rosenfeld wrote:


Yes he was. There are actually two maps, depending on whether the
observation is taken from the (so-called) terminal building, or from the
intersection of the taxiway and runway.

There are four maps per station. A short range(0-3 miles) and long
range (0-x). X depends on your terrain. When I worked at GFK the
horizon was at 10 miles so that's as far as the chart went. Here at BIL
the farthest mountains are 100 miles away so thats how far the chart
goes out. There are two charts for daytime and two charts for nighttime

I'll have to look more closely. I've only seen the two maps, and what I
noted was that they had two different observing points.

There are no landmarks visibile more than a few miles away from the ground,
and there's only one lighted obstruction (not counting runway lights) that
would be visible at night.

I'd guess that if there were a tower at EPM, visibility distances would be
greater, but from the ground, I don't think there's anything to be seen
more than three or four miles distant.


Ron (EPM) (N5843Q, Mooney M20E) (CP, ASEL, ASES, IA)

Some of the places I've been certified at only had 2 maps total; one
short range and the other long. Any of the visibility checkpoints that
were also qualified for nighttime were annotated that way on those charts.

JPH

Newps wrote:


Ron Rosenfeld wrote:


Yes he was. There are actually two maps, depending on whether the
observation is taken from the (so-called) terminal building, or from the
intersection of the taxiway and runway.


There are four maps per station. A short range(0-3 miles) and long
range (0-x). X depends on your terrain. When I worked at GFK the
horizon was at 10 miles so that's as far as the chart went. Here at BIL
the farthest mountains are 100 miles away so thats how far the chart
goes out. There are two charts for daytime and two charts for nighttime

CFeyeeye,
Here's the rest of the story. The C-150 departed Concord, CA about eleven
p.m. and flew to the Sacramento area only to find that all the airports in
the valley were covered with fog. This was about
15 years ago. At that time Travis also had a GCA approach but most likely
the specialists required were not on duty.

They returned to Concord and were unable to land. They were sent to Oakland
but were unable to land there, as well. They went back
to Travis.

On that same evening a Navy A-7 had attempted to shoot the ILS
there and in the process succeeded in taking out the approach light
system.

The pilot in command decided to try making a spiral down to the airport. and
lost control in the process.

The victims, according to autopsy had been recently smoking weed.

A few weeks after the accident I had occasion to call Travis, and
popped the question to the specialist as to why they had not sent
the aircraft to Angwin nearby at 1800 feet. The response was that
Angwin had no reported weather. Slince that time I have made it a
point to make night landings at Angwin as a part of my training program.
Gene Whitt

"Gene Whitt" wrote in message
k.net...

ATC cannot even send you to a known VFR airport that has no weather
reporting.


Nonsense. There's no such restriction.



Some ten or more years ago a C-150 was trapped above an
extensive 1300 foot fog layer. They tried Concord, Oakland and
Travis AFB. The aircraft crashed near Travis.

During this time there was a VFR uncontrolled airport at 1800
feet with lighting within 30 miles.. ATC was not allowed to tell
the plane of the airport because it did not have weather reporting.


How could ATC know what the conditions were at this airport if it had no
weather reporting?

"Jose" wrote in message
m...
Fred is a certified weather observer, but the station is officially
closed.

Then Fred is not certified to take weather observations at that station.

If your FBO has a certified weather observer on staff it's because he's
at a certified weather observing station.

Ok, I should have read on a bit more before posting. I take it that a
certified weather observer loses his certification every time the station
closes (say for the evening), and regains it whenever the station opens in
the morning. So if Fred goes there when the station is closed, and does
=exactly= the same thing he would have when it was open (except for the
reporting path), then the observation is not official.

Is this ultimately what it rests on?


An "official weather observation" is not only made by a "certified weather
observer", but it makes it onto "official telecommunications channels"
(which include a drop to ATC), and it is recorded in "official databases"
(whether paper or electronic). Part of all that is specifically so that the
details of record can be examined in case of an air accident.

So Fred's after-hours personal report is official only if it makes it
through all those steps.

"Steven P. McNicoll" wrote in message
ink.net...

wrote in message
...

It was reported. The pilot was the conduit.

Where is it written that this is not allowed?


In Federal Meteorological Handbook No.1. Surface aviation observations
are required to be disseminated.


....recorded, disseminated, and recorded in an archive... where, in the case
of an accident, it can be locked to ensure no-alterations, and be retrieved
for investigation.

In the pilot-as-conduit scenario, is there anything to prevent the original
"observer" from saying "I didn't say that", or "I didn't exactly mean that"?

wrote in message
...
If a weather report is shouted in a forest, and there is nobody around
to hear it, is it really a weather report?




Nope, unless it was chiselled into official bark, which was known to be
thereafter unchangeable, and which could be peeled off and shown to the
investigators months later.

In the pilot-as-conduit scenario, is there anything to prevent the original
"observer" from saying "I didn't say that", or "I didn't exactly mean that"?

ATC tapes? I won't argue with what the rules =are= (now that I know
them) but the question applies a higher standard to records of weather
that the pilot can actually see when he gets there, than it does to IFR
clearances which can be relayed to a pilot from some other airplane in
the system.

OK, ATC tapes are definately not available in my ham radio relay
scenario. However, I wonder if all ATC clearances are recorded -
specifically those that are relayed via other aircraft, perhaps on a
unicom frequency. Suppose there is an accident due to an aircraft
cleared for an ordinary approach after the airspace had been
(supposedly) vacated by the cancellation of an IFR flight plan which was
relayed from the ground via another aircraft? Only half the
conversation would be on tape (the ground half isn't received directly
by ATC, hence the need for the relay).

How is that covered in the regs?

Jose

On Mon, 14 Feb 2005 12:47:07 -0500, "Icebound"
wrote:


"Steven P. McNicoll" wrote in message
link.net...

wrote in message
...

It was reported. The pilot was the conduit.

Where is it written that this is not allowed?


In Federal Meteorological Handbook No.1. Surface aviation observations
are required to be disseminated.


...recorded, disseminated, and recorded in an archive... where, in the case
of an accident, it can be locked to ensure no-alterations, and be retrieved
for investigation.

In the pilot-as-conduit scenario, is there anything to prevent the original
"observer" from saying "I didn't say that", or "I didn't exactly mean that"?


Thanks for the lucid and logical explanation.

"Jose" wrote in message
. com...
In the pilot-as-conduit scenario, is there anything to prevent the
original "observer" from saying "I didn't say that", or "I didn't exactly
mean that"?

ATC tapes? I won't argue with what the rules =are= (now that I know them)
but the question applies a higher standard to records of weather that the
pilot can actually see when he gets there, than it does to IFR clearances
which can be relayed to a pilot from some other airplane in the system.

OK, ATC tapes are definately not available in my ham radio relay scenario.
However, I wonder if all ATC clearances are recorded - specifically those
that are relayed via other aircraft, perhaps on a unicom frequency.
Suppose there is an accident due to an aircraft cleared for an ordinary
approach after the airspace had been (supposedly) vacated by the
cancellation of an IFR flight plan which was relayed from the ground via
another aircraft? Only half the conversation would be on tape (the ground
half isn't received directly by ATC, hence the need for the relay).

How is that covered in the regs?



I am not sure of all the regs, and I defer to Steve and newps and others on
that, but I point out very good reasons why ad-hoc weather observations are
not likely to be accepted for certain scenarios requiring "official"
observations.

The "official" observation is observed according to written rules, recorded,
signed, disseminated in a very particular and predictable fashion, archived,
retrieved. An observation not following those steps may easily get lost or
altered post-fact.