SoCal Practice Approaches to Military Bases

[Velocity173]

.25 to .30 mm is pretty far from the side of the runway for a PAR. Tolerance if on course should be within +- 30 ft from centerline. Hard to imagine your target was even touching the course line at that distance (safety limits wave off).

They'll keep giving you course and glidepath and trend information after DH but it's all advisory in nature. Last call should be "over landing threshold,(course)."

Generally for currency they need 10 "lives" per month but that varies by service. Some of your smaller facilities have problems staying current and getting GCAs for students. Larger bases like Miramar don't have that problem.

Good write up. The PAR is an approach every IFR student should knock out at least once if they get the chance.

 

[mscard88]

[QUOTE="Velocity173, post: 2024801, member: 12000
They'll keep giving to course and glidepath trend information after DH but it's all advisory in nature. Last call should be "over landing threshold,(course).".[/QUOTE]

Correct. Air Force controllers state "at DH" (100' agl), pilot then determines whether to continue and land, or go missed approach. If pilot continues controller gives advisories all way to the pavement. Usually our MPN-14s (see my profile for a pic of one) were on a turntable so that we could turn it around for either runway.

One AF base I was at we could actually track vehicles on a state highway a couple of miles from the runway by tilting the antenna down low.

edit: I see my MPN-14 pic on my profile didn't transfer over. Disregard.

 

[Velocity173]

[QUOTE="Velocity173, post: 2024801, member: 12000
They'll keep giving to course and glidepath trend information after DH but it's all advisory in nature. Last call should be "over landing threshold,(course).".

Correct. Air Force controllers state "at DH" (100' agl), pilot then determines whether to continue and land, or go missed approach. If pilot continues controller gives advisories all way to the pavement. Usually our MPN-14s (see my profile for a pic of one) were on a turntable so that we could turn it around for either runway.

One AF base I was at we could actually track vehicles on a state highway a couple of miles from the runway by tilting the antenna down low.

edit: I see my MPN-14 pic on my profile didn't transfer over. Disregard.[/QUOTE]


Probably looks similar to an FPN-63:
http://voletude.com/project/lorem-ipsum-dolor-sit-amet-0

Took about 60 secs to swing it to another runway.

Always heard the AF informs the pilot of the DH altitude at the beginning of approach?

 

[mscard88]

Always heard the AF informs the pilot of the DH altitude at the beginning of approach?

No it's always 100' agl and we'd just tell them "at DH", and continue giving advisories to the surface.

 

[coloradobluesky]

Are the approach plates for a PAR in the government or Jeppessen charts?

 

[mscard88]

Are the approach plates for a PAR in the government or Jeppessen charts?

There are no approach plates for PARs, at least in the Air Force, as it's a radar approach, same with a surveillance approach.

 

[Velocity173]

Are the approach plates for a PAR in the government or Jeppessen charts?

The Radar Mins section will list them at the front part of the approach plates but not like a diagram or anything.

 

[coloradobluesky]

Without any approach charts how is a pilot that doesn't know anyone find out about them, let alone fly one?

 

[Velocity173]

Without any approach charts how is a pilot that doesn't know anyone find out about them, let alone fly one?

Well the Radar Mins will just have DH and WX mins so outside of that, I suppose the basic description in the AIM. Plenty of stuff online as well. Really it comes down to just following the final controller's instructions.

I've got a Power Point presentation on GCAs. It goes through the phraseology you'd hear for both SA and PARs. I could send it to ya if you're interested. Too big of a file to attach.

 

[apr911]

.25 to .30 mm is pretty far from the side of the runway for a PAR. Tolerance if on course should be within +- 30 ft from centerline. Hard to imagine your target was even touching the course line at that distance (safety limits wave off).

Not really sure how far off I was to be honest. I know I was over some commercial buildings and based on my best guess from the satellite view on google maps, I was somewhere around Katella Ave & Holder St when I should have been Katella Ave & Valley View St which is about 0.4 statue miles to the west. I could have been closer in but definitely no further in than Katella & Hope St as it took 20-30 degrees of correction to make it visually from my location to the runway so the math works out closer to Holder St.

They'll keep giving you course and glidepath and trend information after DH but it's all advisory in nature. Last call should be "over landing threshold,(course)."

Yes; if it wasn't clear from my post, from DH on was conducted visually (and of course, since the PAR is only available in VFR conditions, it was all conducted with a saftey pilot AKA my CFII in the right seat) and I was aware it was "advisory only" as the controller did slip in an "advisory only" warning both times. While the information was advisory, I was just surprised he continued since it was briefed with him we'd go missed at DA and I assumed they'd break off the approach at that point.

Since I wasnt assigned a minimum altitude restriction (aside from lacking clearance to land) and he continued to offer guidance, I continued to follow his guidance down almost to touch down but alas, wasn't authorized to land.

His last call was "crossing over threshold lights, (course)"

Are the approach plates for a PAR in the government or Jeppessen charts?

Radar approaches are not listed with the normal airport approaches they can however be found in the procedures section of the TERPS. Some civilian airports still have ASR approaches which stands for "Approach Surveillance Radar" which would also be listed in this section. An ASR is similar to a PAR but it lacks the vertical guidance and the lateral guidance is not as precise so it is a non-precision approach.

In the case of the Southern California TERPS (SW-3), there's 4 pages (N1 through N4) of Radar Minimums and all of the Radar approach procedures are for military bases and there are no civilian airports in the section as no civilian airport in the area operates a radar approach. If you wanted to land an ASR you'd have to go outside of SoCal and for a PAR you'd have to find a military airport that is open to the public; the closest to SoCal that meets this criteria is Yuma, AZ (KNYL) which is an MCAS airport (so it has a PAR) that also serves as a civilian public-access airport.

The PAR for Los Al (KSLI) is published on page N1 of the Southern California TERPS (SW-3).

The radar minimum procedure plate is not the most intuitive of plates nor is it very well explained and having not flown it before, I was reliant on ATC to tell me frequencies and who it was I was talking to because the approach plate, while listing frequencies doesn't really tell you what they are for.

The other information on the page gives the different radar approaches available at KSLI, in my case, I did the RADAR 1 approach using the PAR with glideslope information for runway 22L. The approach has a 3.0 degree glideslope, a touchdown elevation of 40 feet and Runway Point of Intercept at 745.

For CAT ABCD, the DH/MDA-VIS is 282-3/4 which is 250 above touchdown.

In the case of Los Al, 124.75 is Ground Controlled Approach... They talk to you first getting you lined up and prepared for final (they remind you to do your landing check before handing you off) and you respond back to them like you would any other controller.

From GCA its over to 127.95 which is Final Control. Final Control does a "how do you hear" radio check and then from there they tell you not to acknowledge further tranmissions and the controller takes over. The Final Controller is required to give you feedback on where you are once every 5 seconds and a range from touchdown at least once per mile

The feedback consists of vertical and lateral position (Above/Below/On Glidepath and Left/Right/On Course) with a qualifier when off course (Well/Slightly/Drifting). When you are off course they'll also tell you how quickly you are converging or diverging from course with a "correcting/diverging slowly/rapidly"

I dont know what the tolerance is for "slowly" vs "rapidly" because all I ever got was correcting "slowly" but then I was puttering along at 90 and I imagine the tolerance is built for a much faster approach.

In my case, the controller also gave headings to fly and they expect you to fly those headings as it's how they calculate the next correction (so if they tell you fly 210 and you fly 200 your next correction may be off). You can do a "no gyro" approach in which case they wont give you headings instead telling you "turn left, stop turn, turn right, stop turn" and so on.


The PAR can get you down out of the soup with nothing more than a handheld radio. It takes some getting used to at first having to switch from interpreting "visual instruments" to interpreting "hearing sound" but its still surprisingly easy to do and I would have had no problem making the runway on either approach had I needed and been able to land...

Which brings up an important disclaimer to keep in mind... Normally you cant land at a military base so you cant file the base as an alternate (or your final landing destination) without permission to land that you are unlikely to get... That being said, in the event of an emergency or fuel exhaustion, a military field should not be passed over just because the controller said no. AOPA has a flight accident report/video in which an IFR pilot low on fuel was advised he could not land at the base and instead of declaring a fuel emergency ended up pushing the aircraft to fuel exhaustion, eventually crashing and getting himself killed. Military bases are valid fields in an emergency. You might have some explaining to do and it might be difficult to get fuel or your mechanic at the base but they are still no less valid than any other airport.


Here's a nice write-up from 2013 for the same KSLI approach.
http://www.wingsbywerntz.com/706-par-approach

Here's a video of the controller doing it in the SIM; its kind fo cool because you can see the new version of their screen and what it is they're looking at:

Here's another from ATC's point of view for a "live" approach in Iraq; kind of boring because the pilot was near perfect:

Of course, the computer imaged PAR with path tracing is new... The original machine looks like something straight out of a 1950's Sci-Fi movie.

 

[denverpilot]

The top one the instructor playing controller damn near screwed the pooch at the one mile point.

He told the pilot he was "right of course" when he went off to the left again (I'm assuming the sim was set up to have a right to left crosswind).

See the hook off to the left got steeper right before he broke out?

One misspeak, and you can be in a world of hurt down at the low end like that. And you'd never know.

He also did something weird a real controller wouldn't have done, because he could cheat and see the heading the pilot was flying.

He repeated the command to "turn right 050" a few times back to back.

In a real one, he would have kept adding a few degrees right each subsequent transmission until he saw trend movement back toward center.

Still a good example of how it works.

And you're right about the old gear looking like SciFi. That new depiction is much better.

 

[mscard88]

I worked the old SciFi I guess in the USAF. Out in the field we had the MPN-14 which had a surveillance and PAR, and old vacuum tubes. We'd have to field jackets inside the van as it had to be kept cold so they wouldn't overheat. Always funny to walk out of the van w/ jacket on and the temp was in the 90s. The target was a short vertical line that represented the plane. What was interesting was a C141, and C5, would display as two targets. The leading vertical line (target) was the plane, and slightly behind that line and a little bit higher was another smaller vertical line (target). That was that big T tail on these two planes. The fastest PARs (that I ever worked) were the T-38s which simulated an engine failure right after takeoff, so heavy w/ full fuel. Approach speed on final was around 190 knots so it didn't take long to work them down.

 

[Velocity173]

Old (FPN-40/63 MPN vs new (ATNAVICS / FPN-67). Won't know what you'll get unless you ask each facility. Digital much better than the CRTs but the old system is still pretty accurate...in the right hands.

 

[mscard88]

That first pic was about what the USAF displays looked like. Very accurate as you mentioned.

 

[Velocity173]

I worked the old SciFi I guess in the USAF. Out in the field we had the MPN-14 which had a surveillance and PAR, and old vacuum tubes. We'd have to field jackets inside the van as it had to be kept cold so they wouldn't overheat. Always funny to walk out of the van w/ jacket on and the temp was in the 90s. The target was a short vertical line that represented the plane. What was interesting was a C141, and C5, would display as two targets. The leading vertical line (target) was the plane, and slightly behind that line and a little bit higher was another smaller vertical line (target). That was that big T tail on these two planes. The fastest PARs (that I ever worked) were the T-38s which simulated an engine failure right after takeoff, so heavy w/ full fuel. Approach speed on final was around 190 knots so it didn't take long to work them down.

Students flying T-38s doing PARs = ugly. Throw a student controller into that mix and you have a waste of time.

 

[mscard88]

Students flying T-38s doing PARs = ugly. Throw a student controller into that mix and you have a waste of time.

That's what we had most of the time! Of course the trainee controller was being monitored by a rated controller. The worst was when we had Iranian Air Force student pilots (over a hundred of 'em) before the Shah was overthrown. All over the sky!

 

[Velocity173]

The top one the instructor playing controller damn near screwed the pooch at the one mile point.

He told the pilot he was "right of course" when he went off to the left again (I'm assuming the sim was set up to have a right to left crosswind).

See the hook off to the left got steeper right before he broke out?

One misspeak, and you can be in a world of hurt down at the low end like that. And you'd never know.

He also did something weird a real controller wouldn't have done, because he could cheat and see the heading the pilot was flying.

He repeated the command to "turn right 050" a few times back to back.

In a real one, he would have kept adding a few degrees right each subsequent transmission until he saw trend movement back toward center.

Still a good example of how it works.

And you're right about the old gear looking like SciFi. That new depiction is much better.

Yeah a little non standard phraseology in there as well. He wouldn't have been given a landing check on final either. One degree turns might work in a sim but in real life they're pretty useless. Especially if the aircraft doesn't have some sort of heading hold.

If he's a CFI though, he really didn't do all that bad. I'd let him talk me down...if it were VMC.

 

[denverpilot]

Yeah a little non standard phraseology in there as well. He wouldn't have been given a landing check on final either. One degree turns might work in a sim but in real life they're pretty useless. Especially if the aircraft doesn't have some sort of heading hold.

If he's a CFI though, he really didn't do all that bad. I'd let him talk me down...if it were VMC.

Heh yeah.

You sure about the landing checks call? Many military controllers do it during the "cleared to land" call.

I've gotten the "Skyhawk XXX, cleared to land Runway YY, check gear down."

"Cleared to land YY, gear down and welded, Skyhawk XXX."

 

[Velocity173]

Heh yeah.

You sure about the landing checks call? Many military controllers do it during the "cleared to land" call.

I've gotten the "Skyhawk XXX, cleared to land Runway YY, check gear down."

"Cleared to land YY, gear down and welded, Skyhawk XXX."

For a PAR at a USA / USN facility, a landing check is given on downwind in time to be completed before turning base. Usually do a combo for it since you have to give a position report as well. "Crusader11, 7 miles northeast of XYZ, perform landing check." Has to be done prior to handoff to the final controller if you have an incomplete pattern.

The wheels down check is a seperate issue from the landing check. After handoff and the transmission acknowledgment is out of the way, you knock out the wheels down. "Crusader11 Roger, wheels should be down." Usually military, mostly the fighter guys, knock out the wheels down with the transmission acknowledgement anyway so the final controller doesn't have to bother. "Crusader11 has you loud and clear with the gear / three down etc."

 

[mscard88]

Air Force bases: in the pattern (actually any aircraft) "check wheels down"
: PAR "approaching glide path, wheels should be down"

Had a UH-1 Huey pilot laugh when I told him ck wheels down, told him we were required no matter rotary or fixed wing

 

[Velocity173]

Air Force bases: in the pattern (actually any aircraft) "check wheels down"
: PAR "approaching glide path, wheels should be down"

Had a UH-1 Huey pilot laugh when I told him ck wheels down, told him we were required no matter rotary or fixed wing

We never issued the wheels down if we knew it had skids. Although I made a student do it once in a Cobra just to hear his reply. Even with wheeled helos, we didn't do it unless we knew it had retracts. We had a little ditty, "twos, threes and fifty threes." Now a days, you've got so many retract helos, it's just safer to issue to everybody.