MEMORY-LANE-L Archives

Archiver > MEMORY-LANE > 2006-12 > 1165640009


From: "*** Lana ***" <>
Subject: Re: [ML] Here in Pahrump
Date: Fri, 8 Dec 2006 22:53:29 -0600
In-Reply-To: <4572317F.3030205@gmail.com>


Walter any grass landing fields still left in your part of the world? They
are still being used here. Always amazes me to see an old style plane
coming down in what looks like a pasture with nothing more than a wind sock
to show that it is an airfield.

When we moved back here from San Diego, I had to explain to my kids why some
of the neighbors had planes in their pastures.

Lana

*** -----Original Message-----
*** From:
*** [mailto:] On Behalf Of WJFreeman
*** Sent: Saturday, December 02, 2006 8:08 PM
*** To: grace w gathman
*** Cc:
*** Subject: Re: [ML] Here in Pahrump
***
*** grace w gathman wrote:
***
*** > I tease my husband that the pilots use our house as a
*** sighting on the
*** >glide path into O'Hare field!
*** >
***
*** Having flown a number of instrument approaches (probably into the
*** thousands) and many times that number of landings under
*** visual flight rules, I can say that pilots do not much
*** notice other things, while tracking inbound on the localizer.
***
***
*** And as you near the missed-approach point (aka MAP, roughly
*** 200 ft above ground level on the glide slope), you are even
*** more focused.
***
***
*** Generally you are looking at the REIL (runway end
*** identifier lights) and
*** the threshold lights just beyond them with the view of the
*** RCL (runway
*** center lights set into the tarmac) and the runway edge
*** lights stretching
*** off into the distance.
***
***
*** If, on an instrument approach, you do not even look up from the
*** instruments (horizontal situation indicator (HSI), glideslope and
*** localizer needles, which must be near centered on the radio
*** beams or you
*** are going to miss the runway and spoil your whole day, or
*** if equipped,
*** the flight director bars), until you are at the MAP which
*** is usually at
*** the middle marker radio beacon.
***
***
*** Then it is one quick look out the windscreen, and if you see the
*** threshold lights, the "rabbit" (strobe lights running sequentially
*** towards the runway), or the REIL, then you "transition" to visual
*** control and by this time since you are very, very close to
*** the runway,
*** you proceed with reducing power once you have the runway
*** made to flare
*** for the landing.
***
***
*** If, in that glance, you do not see any of the above, then
*** it is a missed
*** approach, and it is full power, rotate to a nose up 5° to
*** stop the sink,
*** and start cleaning up the aircraft from landing
*** configuration by raising
*** the gear, milking off the flaps, etc, while holding runway
*** heading for a
*** few moments and then a climbing turn as proscribed by the missed
*** approach procedure on your instrument approach plates
*** (actually, they
*** are called plates, but are really just paper charts
*** replaced every 56 days).
***
***
*** The ground could be on fire, and unless it is in your
*** focussed field of
*** view, you would probably not pay much attention to it.
*** Mainly because,
*** you are going real fast, and are getting ever nearer the
*** ground, so not
*** much time for rubber necking.
***
***
*** So unless your house with or without lights is within a
*** very few yards
*** of the edge of the runway pavement, pilots are not going to
*** see them as
*** they are in one of the busiest phases of flight.
***
***
*** Might work for Santa Claus, but it don't work for pilots on
*** approach.
***
***
*** Walter
***
***
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