A few – I remember LDZA (ILS), LYBE (localizer – when GP died), LQSA (ILS) and LDSB (NDB).
I was surprised to learn that getting an LVP added to a type rating might only be one hour in the SIM
One hour? Five minutes. Or as long as it takes to taxi from your parking stand to the runway and take off. But it is not added to the type rating, it’s just a box ticked in your training record and must be renewed every year.
For CAT II/III which we have, (all automatic approaches) one live approach in the last 6 months, plus two with malfunctions in the sim.
In practice, I have done 13 for real in the last 2 months.
Probably a lot less than 5% – with most being into LIML, Milano Linate, where there is a reasonable chance of getting CAT 1 minima as evening sets in in the autumn and winter. Have back seated on a Citation II on a CAT II into LIML – these freezing, or close to freezing, fog days can be quite tenacious in the winter.
I was surprised to learn that getting an LVP added to a type rating might only be one hour in the SIM, presumably on the line there is quite strict currency criteria to actually fly to CAT II?
I’ve flown a few pretty much down to minimums:
Mobile (Alabama) ILS, saw the runway lights somewhere between 200 and 250ft AGL (mimimums 200 AGL) and lashing rain in an old S35 Bonanza
Austin (Texas) ILS, similar thing to above in the same aircraft
My old home airport of Houston Gulf in a C172, weather had dropped much quicker than forecast, had to divert to Galveston Scholes, broke out on the ILS at about 350 feet. It was Christmas Eve, too. Houston Gulf only had a VOR approach, minimums were 560’. I always used the GPS too since the VOR it used was the Scholes one some 16 miles away and it was pretty inaccurate
Same airport in a Grumman Tiger, broke out at 600ft. The only approach was to 31 and we were using 13 so a circle to land. Circle to land seems easy in training but you’re supposed to stay visual with the airfield and in the real world with great blobs of cloud hanging out of the prevailing ceiling it can be very easy to lose the airport.
NDB approach to somewhere in rural Texas I forget, in the Bonanza, never broke out, diverted.
The two ones in the Bonanza were the most memorable. The one in Mobile because it was my first ever ILS to minimums and I had my IR for about 1 month at that stage. I was also on my own. There was about an inch of surface water on the apron, and when departing I just quickly popped the cowling open to check the oil and one of the dzus fasteners pinged off and flew away somewhere. I spent the next 10 minutes getting drenched looking for that damned thing, but I found it, put it in, and flew off. The whole excitement of the approach really will stick with me – going through 300 feet and thinking “I hope I break out soon, I really do”, glancing up and seeing nothing but grey and rain sheeting up the windscreen, then the next glance up, I could start to make out the rabbit, then the runway fading up into view just as lights only and then finally ground features starting to resolve themselves as I passed 200 feet or so. It was an amazing feeling just breaking out and seeing the runway right there, right in front of me — this stuff really DID work!
The other one at Austin was memorable because I ended up filing an ASRS report about it. Austin has two parallel runways, they tend to land GA on one and the airlines on the other. I was vectored for the approach for the GA runway (I forget which one – 35R perhaps let’s call it) and the glideslope never unflagged. I passed the outer marker with the flag stubbornly there. Localiser was fine though. I knew from the ATIS there was no point in even trying a localiser only approach so I told tower I was getting no glideslope and I’d like to try the other runway. Tower asked the proceeding bizjet if the glideslope had worked and he said rather enigmatically “we had a deviation but it seemed to work”. (I also had another jet following me so I was keeping my speed up and hadn’t really reduced speed, the S35 Bonanza has quite a high gear extension speed so in these situations you can fly the approach quite happily at 120 knots and slow down right at the end). Tower handed me back to Austin approach, but somewhere the message had gone missing that I wanted the other runway, so approach cleared me for 35R again, but I had tuned all the radios for 35L and I didn’t sanity check what approach had cleared me for because I was a bit preoccupied with why the GS wouldn’t work (and thinking what should my plan be – filed alternate, or just go back home to Houston where I know the weather is VFR?). I honestly can’t recall if I just dumbly read back the instruction or read back what I was expecting, but the upshot was the controller thought I was going to 35R, but I was going for 35L both in my mind and set up on the radios. As I blasted through the localiser for 35R, approach called to inform me that I’d gone through the localiser and I said “I thought I was cleared for 35L…” The controller then cleared me for 35L but this meant I would intercept the localiser really close to the outer marker. And with all the stuff I had been thinking of, and all the knobs I had been twisting (this Bonanza had no automation at all, not even a crappy wing leveller type autopilot) and now I was turning very close to the outer marker to intercept, as I went over the outer marker, I put my hand on the gear knob and then looked at my airspeed… I was doing about 150 knots!
I made in hindsight probably the wrong decision to fly the approach while milking off speed to something that would not be too unkind to the gear. At about 400 feet(!) I was going at a speed I could put the gear down, so I did. Saw the runway lights at around 250 feet. Huge sigh of relief. Probably not my finest hour, I should really have missed the approach and gone again. But I was younger and dumber then.
I’d really love to be flying a Bonanza again, I loved that aircraft, but the economics of doing so right now would not be sane! The Auster offers me a completely different kind of flying, but occasionally, I do miss some of the IFR trips I used to do.
It seems that inviting a safety pilot might be a good thing. Or simply someone to watch out for other traffic when one is practicing going down to minimums in CAVOK weather.
Another good idea might be to go into a simulator every few months to practice it when one cannot regularly fly to airports with the equipment. that might be cheaper than burning AVGAS and can also be an opportunity to practice things you don’t want to find yourself in.
hmmm I’d probably guess around 5% as well.
Good morning!
ILS approaches I would estimate maybe 5 out of 100 are down to minimum, some of them even to “mee ….. neeeeee …. mum”. Non precision (we fly to a lot of smaller airfields with GPS/RNAV approaches) are down to minimum up to 50 percent.
Airways I agree with you. But to be honest since Ive been in Europe its hard to stay current and sharp. There are thousands of airfields. The trouble is they are just that, fields. Very few instrumented airports as a ratioto the total. Divide that number by 2 for the ones that a person flying a SEL or MEL piston can afford. So you see the practical use of the plane declines and so less chance of staying on top of ones game. Kinda like the guys who fly scarebus. They might have 10000 hrs of which 9500 are flown with the autopilot.
Nothing at all wrong with that as you are aware of your currency and adjust for it – apologies if it came across as a personal criticism. I worry about the pilots who aren’t self-aware and go out 11 months after a renewal in bad weather and can’t fly an approach. Actually I don’t worry for them, just their passengers and people on the ground.
It isn’t even really just an IR thing. The same thing happens with VFR pilots.
I think flying is one of those activities where we have a tremendous obligation to be honest with ourselves before and after a flight. We have a lot of freedom, usually we are the only ones in the aircraft who notice if we make a mistake.
