mcmanigle
Line Up and Wait
- Joined
- Mar 4, 2013
- Messages
- 522
- Display Name
Display name:
John McManigle
Hi all, just wanted to relate a quick story and try to learn a bit more about "the system" in the process.
Was flying on Saturday from College Park CGS to Eagle's Nest W13 outside Charlottesville. The first part of the trip was fantastic (got the Dulles East transition for the first time), but as we got down past Culpeper things got a little grey -- ceilings in the 3500' range with some scattered layers below. Still comfortable VFR, given the number of alternates along the route. We were cruising at 2500'.
Approaching Charlottesville, the ceiling was slowly getting a bit lower, and the intermediate layers were slowly going from "few" to "scattered". Still nothing particularly scary, but the hills to the east (between Charlottesville and W13) were looking questionable, so I decided to divert to CHO and make my friend drive a bit further to pick me up.
CHO was reporting (as I recall) scattered 1000', broken 1900', and that looked about right from 10 miles out (we were flying at about 1200' AGL at this point). I thought to myself "how great would it be to not have to worry about staying 500' below and 2000' horizontal from the scattered layer on the approach" and called up requesting SVFR clearance and straight-in for runway 21.
The tower controller came back with "Charlottesville is actually still VFR, cleared to land 21." So, I went ahead and gave the clouds a wider-than-strictly-necessary berth on the approach. (Turns out none were overly problematic.)
My questions are the obvious ones: Is there anything preventing a controller from granting an SVFR clearance if the current field observation is compatible with VFR? Is this a situation where the tower would have had to coordinate with approach (Potomac) to arrange it, and this was his gentle hint that life would be easier for all involved if I just went ahead and landed without bothering everyone in the ATC world? (The field was very quiet.) In the future, is this an "appropriate" time to ask for SVFR, or am I better off just doing my best with the fiction that VFR is VFR unless you "need" something "special"?
Or just any general comments. I'm sure we'll go off on a tangent after a reply or two anyway.
Was flying on Saturday from College Park CGS to Eagle's Nest W13 outside Charlottesville. The first part of the trip was fantastic (got the Dulles East transition for the first time), but as we got down past Culpeper things got a little grey -- ceilings in the 3500' range with some scattered layers below. Still comfortable VFR, given the number of alternates along the route. We were cruising at 2500'.
Approaching Charlottesville, the ceiling was slowly getting a bit lower, and the intermediate layers were slowly going from "few" to "scattered". Still nothing particularly scary, but the hills to the east (between Charlottesville and W13) were looking questionable, so I decided to divert to CHO and make my friend drive a bit further to pick me up.
CHO was reporting (as I recall) scattered 1000', broken 1900', and that looked about right from 10 miles out (we were flying at about 1200' AGL at this point). I thought to myself "how great would it be to not have to worry about staying 500' below and 2000' horizontal from the scattered layer on the approach" and called up requesting SVFR clearance and straight-in for runway 21.
The tower controller came back with "Charlottesville is actually still VFR, cleared to land 21." So, I went ahead and gave the clouds a wider-than-strictly-necessary berth on the approach. (Turns out none were overly problematic.)
My questions are the obvious ones: Is there anything preventing a controller from granting an SVFR clearance if the current field observation is compatible with VFR? Is this a situation where the tower would have had to coordinate with approach (Potomac) to arrange it, and this was his gentle hint that life would be easier for all involved if I just went ahead and landed without bothering everyone in the ATC world? (The field was very quiet.) In the future, is this an "appropriate" time to ask for SVFR, or am I better off just doing my best with the fiction that VFR is VFR unless you "need" something "special"?
Or just any general comments. I'm sure we'll go off on a tangent after a reply or two anyway.