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What proportion of GA IFR aircraft are equipped for LPV approaches?

In the future, the DH will be adjusted.

Yes and no. If I remember correctly, we’ve been discussing this in the past already. In order to get approval for lower minima, the airfield must install an appropriate approach light system. For 550m/200ft a CAT I ALS would be required which is prohibitively expensive for a small airfield. Without approach lights, the RVR minimum will not be less than 1400m. With 1400m you can fly VFR.

BTW: Mid of December, Schwäbisch Hall EDTY has lowered their LPV minimum to 900m/300ft which puts it 20ft below the LNAV/VNAV minimum (and 150ft below LNAV only). But they have high intensity approach lights.

Last Edited by what_next at 28 Jan 10:04
EDDS - Stuttgart

And 20ft is, ahem, nothing. Especially as the DH is a pilot-interpreted parameter, unenforceable unless you have a CAA employee as a passenger

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

And 20ft is, ahem, nothing

Yes, but it comes with an RVR of 900m instead of 1400 which as a commercial operator is what you need more urgently!

EDDS - Stuttgart

as well as every 5$ GPS receiver module

And about every 5$ module can also receive Glonass, while EASA still thinks Glonass can’t be used because it uses an ECEF coordinate system internally (every GPS receiver I know does that too…)

LSZK, Switzerland

20 Ft?? My glide path profile is + or – 50Ft so if you average it out it would work that I might nail it and be a useful change in the DH

KHTO, LHTL

With 1400m you can fly VFR.

Not enroute…

ESKC (Uppsala/Sundbro), Sweden

You need 1500m for VFR, as of April 2012, for EASA PPLs.

National PPLs may have stricter limits; e.g. I believe a UK issued non-EASA PPL is still the JAR 3000m figure (not at all sure though).

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

Not enroute…

Enroute you as pilot determine the visibiliy, so you have guaranteed 1500m We have an airfield here close by (Donaueschingen EDTD) that has a GPS approach with minima of 1500m/600ft. There is almost no point in doing the instrument procedure, at least with a piston single, because with that kind of weather you can fly there visually. And a lot of people do.

EDDS - Stuttgart

I get your drift, of course but surely that’s true only for an airport which is

  • on a coast, say Shoreham, Lydd, La Rochelle, etc, or
  • in the middle of totally flat country for many miles, with no obstacles

Otherwise, an IAP whose MDH is “VFR”, still has a big safety value, via flying enroute at the MSA, descending to the IAP platform (which ought to be at/above the MSA too ) and flying the IAP, all as per “classical IFR”. Very few people have got themselves killed following a classical IFR procedure.

A rather harder example is Shoreham’s 20 GPS/LNAV (on which you can get killed if you screw up – an 850ft hill very near the FAT) is 800ft which is practically the same as a low level circle to land from the sea (on which you “cannot” get killed) but if you had an autopilot-coupled glideslope on the IAP, it might still be safer than the low level circle to land to 20 because some pilots will crash on a CTL. It’s a philosophical point whether a fully guided descent through IMC is ever safer than a VMC maneuver of arbitrary difficulty

In addition to the above, you have the additional (ahem, theoretical) protection from VFR circuit traffic if ATC cleared you for the approach…

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

You need 1500m for VFR, as of April 2012, for EASA PPLs.

The limit is not license related, but is in SERA. It’s 5000 m unless a national authority authorizes lower in that country’s airspace. Sweden has 3000 m with max IAS 140 kt. 1500 m is permitted in the traffic circuit. I am assuming class G, of course.

ESKC (Uppsala/Sundbro), Sweden
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