Landed at Newark

Justin M

Line Up and Wait
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Oct 23, 2016
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JM
I did something I never thought I would do.

I landed at Newark Liberty Airport (KEWR).

During the approach, the controller says "Fly heading 360 at or above 2000 feet." A little later he asked if I was flying 360? I said yes, he said, “oh, must be the wind, fly 330”. The winds were probably 320 at 11 gusting to 19.

He's probably used to aircraft with a GPS that fly a bearing, which adjusts the heading when the wind pushes it away from its intended destination. I fly a plane built in the 1970s which is equivalent to a VW Beetle with wings. (Even has a way back for a dog.)

I landed on runway 22 Right with a tailwind cause big airports don't care about no stinkin tailwinds.

A jet was landing at the same time on 22 Left. A standard pattern would have meant I had to fly 3 miles, she was on a 6 mile final. Considering that my approach speed is around 70 and many jets approach at around 135. I considered asking for a 360 to avoid wake turbulence. Instead I used a short approach and forward slip to fly the hypotenuse and reduce the distance.

I exited right on Taxiway Gulf, turned right on Taxiway Bravo, turned straight onto Taxiway Romeo, turned right on Taxiway Whisky for an intersection departure from Runway 22 Right. "Fly runway heading, maintain 1 thousand 500 feet," the controller instructed prior to take off.

One or two jets took off in the 10 minutes while I was still talking to tower. It was really, really quiet at one of the country's busiest airports

Here's a link to the runway diagram: http://aeronav.faa.gov/d-tpp/2005/00285AD.PDF Here's a link to the airnav for Newark. http://airnav.com/airport/kewr
 
Cool. I was actually thinking about making this run today. Was going to do that then fly the Hudson River tour then come home.
So did you blast off at home with flight plan or get flight following or just cold call on the way there???
Probably going to get a bill in the mail but if it’s under 50 worth the log book entry.
 
We fly headings into EWR wind just doesnt have as big an influence at 210 -250 knots. EWR is beyond dead right now. UALs down to 15 departures a day and UAL is 75% of ewr.

I used to call up gate hold and we'd be 35 for departure or land and sit for an hour cause there was no room for anybody to move. Or you couldnt check in with app or dep and you just waited for them to call you cause the frequency was so busy.
 
Not to start a food fight, but here's a dissenting opinion from a controller on r/ATC. Just something to consider.
https://www.reddit.com/r/ATC/comments/gck2uo/have_to_vent_about_covid19_pilots/
Yeah I feel like it would get annoying sometimes dealing with GA. The 121 and 135 guys know the drill, I cringe sometimes when I see some of the "plans" for guys flying into ORD or something. Plus even with it as slow as it is controllers are doing more. I flew a TYS IAH TYS turn yesterday same controller was doing approach, tower, ground, and CD at TYS and tower at iah was doing everything even ground. (usually theres a tower freq per runway and theres 2 grounds and metering and 3 ramp freqs)
 
Not to start a food fight, but here's a dissenting opinion from a controller on r/ATC. Just something to consider.
https://www.reddit.com/r/ATC/comments/gck2uo/have_to_vent_about_covid19_pilots/
I don’t see the big deal. ATC should just say unable if they don’t want to accommodate the request. It’s really not a big deal. They’ll break the little guy off of the approach if they’re in the way. I have every right to request an approach or touch and go into JFK. They also have every right to deny the request.
 
So is there any truth that controllers like pilots need to log different approaches like IFR pilots to stay current. A buddy of mine always tells me that
 
He's probably used to aircraft with a GPS that fly a bearing, which adjusts the heading when the wind pushes it away from its intended destination. I fly a plane built in the 1970s which is equivalent to a VW Beetle with wings.
"Fly heading..." means fly heading, not track. The controller will adjust the vectors for wind, not the pilots.

If you fly a track when told to fly a heading you may encroach on anything airplane that the controller has on the same heading on a parallel course.

Winds aloft, even just 1,000', or so, above the ground, can be significantly different than the surface winds. I once had a 45kt tailwind at 700' with surface winds reported calm.

I landed on runway 22 Right with a tailwind cause big airports don't care about no stinkin tailwinds.
They usually don't change runways until the tailwind is approaching 10kts.

Considering that my approach speed is around 70 and many jets approach at around 135.
That would be pretty slow for the B737s I fly. We're usually in the mid-140s, or above. My record was 165kts on the Stadium Visual Rwy 29 at EWR on a gusty day.
 
I had the opportunity once to land at EWR in a NORDO 1941 Taylorcraft. I forget the details, some kind of antique airplane event. They were going to block out a one hour time for the NORDO aircraft to arrive and again so they could leave. Would have been mid 1980s. Unfortunately something came up, I forget what and I wasn't able to go, which was a bummer.
 
I’ve flown my RV into EWR to drop off a passenger. It’s nice know you can do it when you need to do it.

Try not to abuse it. If it’s a destination or a point of origin, it’s a public airport and you should be able to use it.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk Pro
 
Cool. I was actually thinking about making this run today. Was going to do that then fly the Hudson River tour then come home.
So did you blast off at home with flight plan or get flight following or just cold call on the way there???
Probably going to get a bill in the mail but if it’s under 50 worth the log book entry.

Cold call on the way there. No flight plan or flight following.

No answer on the first call. Derision on the second call, but he gave me a code and a heading.

I looked up the fee. Between 10:00 am and 5:00pm the fee for the 172 is $25. 2 hours before and 5 hours after that time block, add $100.

Go for it while you can!
 
"Fly heading..." means fly heading, not track. The controller will adjust the vectors for wind, not the pilots.

Shrug. I was just trying to guess why he was freaked out about my heading not conforming to his expectations.
 
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