Pilot Controlled Lighting

Jaybird180

Jaybird180

Final Approach
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Jaybird180
An opportunity came up for me to do a night flight Saturday night, so I took it. I was alone in the same Skyhawk that my primary instructor solo'd me in, so I was in familiar settings.

I decided to go over to 26N just for kicks (and to get in some PIC XC hours).

Enroute, I passed over 2 airports. One of them I could see the white/green flash and knew that I was on course (since I was following the pink line:wink2:). I didn't find the 2nd airport's beacon, but no worries.

I began my descent to TPA at 8-9 miles out and expected to spot the beacon for 26N, but figured it was still lost in the sea of lights. I clicked the mic to help spot the airport and continued to head for the star on the MFD while conscious of crossing the bay, looking for the road and being sure not to venture out into the darkness of the Atlantic Ocean on this starless and moonless night.

As I intercepted the star, still no airport, so I made a climbing right turn at 400'MSL to try again. I came back on the radio with Atlantic City Approach and asked for vectors as I headed back and they confirmed that I was headed right for it. But I still didn't see it. I clicked the mic on the CTAF 7 times, then 5. No joy. When approach told me that I was directly overhead, I decided to abort and head over to KACY, oh well:dunno:.

When I arrived, I reread the A/FD for 26N to confirm they had PCL and sure enough it uses MIRL.

I didn't previously know that there are different types of lighting systems in use and they work a little different. I read an NTSB report once of a pilot who had an incident because he didn't know how to operate the lights.

A call to the FBO this moring, and I learn they had someone working on the PAPI the night prior and that the runway lights had previously been found turned on at a strange time. Were they working properly??? I dunno. I'm going to call this one user error and just be thankful that I'd read that NTSB report and had the sense to get out of the situation.

What are the differences on the types of PCL systems used and how can I familiarize myself with their operation before launching to a new airport?
 
I've arrived at airports and clicked many times with no lights.

Sometimes the PCL just isn't working, and no one called in the NOTAM or even knew they weren't working because it was still daylight when they went home...
 
The only thing I'd suggest checking: are you sure the PCL frequency is the same as the CTAF? There are quite a few airports I've seen that have separate frequencies. For example, take a look at KBHB. CTAF is 123.0, but the lights are on 122.7. I can't tell you how often I heard folks come into the pattern there, clicking away on CTAF, and become very confused/perturbed by the fact that the lights wouldn't turn on.

EDIT: Never mind, I just read the airnav page for 26N...sounds like Dan is likely correct; they may have just been out and no one knew it yet.
 
In addition to the possibility of an outage or wrong freq, one common problem is PCL systems which are more sensitive to the break between the clicks. Click the mic too fast, and the system "hears" it as only one long transmission, not 5-7 separate pulses. You may need almost a full second between releasing the PTT and hitting it again, and that requires a bit of patience.
 
On a night XC my CFI 'diverted' me to a field where I found out the PCL was on a different freq than the CTAF. I had to dig out my A/FD to find the right freq. Then my CFI asked what I'd do if I was at an airport and couldn't turn on the lights. I said I would just land on the dark spot since anything with lights was NOT the airport. That didn't turn out to be as funny as I thought it would be.

Other than that, I haven't had problems with lights - I've read NOTAMs where one rwy had lights OTS and other rws were OK, but I haven't been caught by surprise yet.
 
Ron Levy said:
You may need almost a full second between releasing the PTT and hitting it again, and that requires a bit of patience.
Click to expand...

This is good advice since it relates to the OP's flying area as well. Millville NJ (KMIV) has a very old PCL system which requires almost a second between clicks.

Caught me out when I went there for dinner once and couldn't get the lights to turn on when I was ready to taxi for the flight home.

Matt
 
I was flying back from BID to ASH with my wife and we arrived at ASH about 21:20 local time (ASH tower closes at 21:00). I had no problems spotting the ASH beacon. The low intensity pilot controlled lighting was NOTAM'd out of service but medium and high should have been fine. Winds were calm, no other traffic around. As I maneuvered to enter a left base for runway 32 I tried five clicks. Nothing. I tried seven clicks. Nothing. As I got closer I noticed that the approach lights for runway 14 were going - the only lights on the field other than the beacon - and I figured I'd give up on 32 and sidestep to enter a left downwind for 14. Except that the only thing was the approach lights so that wasn't much help. I stayed at pattern altitude and tried the lights one more time, 7 much, much slower, clearly delineated clicks. Everything came up. At this point I flew a very nice downwind, base, and final for 32. I didn't want to muck with the lights anymore so they were still on High Intensity which was kind of annoying but we were down with a fine landing.

I suspect that between my general heightened alertness about returning at night, and the old PTT switch on the rental not releasing as smoothly as I wanted, I may not have fully released the PTT between clicks making for poor triggering of the lights. But also the fact that LIRL PCL was NOTAM'd out of service made me suspicious, especially with the "rabbit" flasher going on 14 and no other lights up! My wife was unconcerned. After we landed she asked what I would have done if I hadn't managed to get the lights on. MHT is close by, and the tower is active all night, so it would have been a fine alternate.
 
I haven't had problems with getting lights on, except when I click too fast.

Had a problem in Northern Wisconsin where someone kept turning the lights off on me. I think a neighbor of the airport didn't like the approach lights in their windows. Keyed them on, someone would keep clicking until they turned off, then stop.
 
Teller1900 said:
The only thing I'd suggest checking: are you sure the PCL frequency is the same as the CTAF? There are quite a few airports I've seen that have separate frequencies. For example, take a look at KBHB. CTAF is 123.0, but the lights are on 122.7. I can't tell you how often I heard folks come into the pattern there, clicking away on CTAF, and become very confused/perturbed by the fact that the lights wouldn't turn on.

EDIT: Never mind, I just read the airnav page for 26N...sounds like Dan is likely correct; they may have just been out and no one knew it yet.
Click to expand...

Good point. Went to BHB earlier today and noticed the PCL freq was different than CTAF. Especially helpful information when its IFR. :)

spinfire said:
I was flying back from BID to ASH with my wife and we arrived at ASH about 21:20 local time (ASH tower closes at 21:00). I had no problems spotting the ASH beacon. The low intensity pilot controlled lighting was NOTAM'd out of service but medium and high should have been fine. Winds were calm, no other traffic around. As I maneuvered to enter a left base for runway 32 I tried five clicks. Nothing. I tried seven clicks. Nothing. As I got closer I noticed that the approach lights for runway 14 were going - the only lights on the field other than the beacon - and I figured I'd give up on 32 and sidestep to enter a left downwind for 14. Except that the only thing was the approach lights so that wasn't much help.
Click to expand...

I had a similar problem a few weeks ago departing ASH. Clicked 7 times for HIRL, then 5 for MIRL which seemed too dim so I clicked back to HIRL. When I got to the end of the runway the light intensity was nearly blinding so I tried to bring back down to MIRL with no luck. There may be some sort of ongoing PCL issue there.
 
With the Low Intensity NOTAM'd out it does sound like there is something wonky with the PCL lately at ASH. The lesson I learned is that it is OK and maybe even neccessary to click slower.
 
FOLLOW-UP:
A couple weeks ago, I took a good friend of 20+ years on his 1st GA flight. We went to 26N, landed at night and walked to to boardwalk, sat down and talked over some pizza.

On the flight back, I took his sleeping as a compliment.
 
Jaybird180 said:
FOLLOW-UP:
A couple weeks ago, I took a good friend of 20+ years on his 1st GA flight. We went to 26N, landed at night and walked to to boardwalk, sat down and talked over some pizza.

On the flight back, I took his sleeping as a compliment.
Click to expand...


Next time, maybe you try eating some, too! :D
 
I don't think I will make it a $100 pizza run. The pancake place I wanted to visit was closed when we arrived :-(
 
At my home field I can't get them on until I hit 5 miles. There are some hills around so not sure if the signal is being blocked?
 
Velocity173 said:
At my home field I can't get them on until I hit 5 miles. There are some hills around so not sure if the signal is being blocked?
Click to expand...

Perhaps there's some method of determining the relative signal strength so that all the lights at all the airports on the same freq don't turn on when you key the mic? I have no clue...just speculating. Maybe not even possible.
 
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