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"Straight in" landings


wlfpckrs

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Strait in approaches are done routinely at KMMH by most pilots. There is high terrain in the pattern. It has always been the norm here.

 

When I travel and traffic is light and I am approaching on the runway heading I often announce a "5-10 mile final, traffic permitting." Out west I bet traffic is generally lighter than back east.

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I will do straight in landings when the airport is not busy with people in the pattern or I'm approaching right off the end of that runway. If there is a plane in the pattern I give them the right of way and work around them. I'm usually very conscientious about announcing at non towered airports.

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I'll second Roger's view with one caveat: don't do straight in approaches at airports that have signficant NORDO traffic. I used to fly out of an airport that had a lot of vintage planes that didn't have radios. On a nice weekend day you might not hear a single word on the radio but have several planes in the pattern. Given the odds, I always flew the pattern.

 

 

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If the pattern is clear, or if I can use a runway that doesn't conflict with trafic I like the straight in. The object of the game is to select my spot, set up the glide and see if I can hit it without adjusting power seting. I could do it pretty consistently with the 152 but so far with the CT I'm lucky to make 10%. Never the less it's a lot of fun and good practice in energy management.

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Straight in landings are good to practice. They are very common at busier tower control airports therefore its important to know how to execute them. First off a good straight in approach requires good planning and staying ahead of the airplane. Planning starts many miles out from the airport, think about where we are on final during a normal traffic pattern. For me its roughly 400-600' agl and about 1/2 mile from the threshold. By this point the aircraft should be configured in the landing configuration and at the appropriate approach speed. Descent planning should be based from that point. For descent planning refer to your ground speed and desired rate of descent. For example if your ground speed is 120kts and you want 500fpm descent rate, you are going to travel about 4nm for every 1000' you need to lose to get to your final reference point. The Garmin Vnav profile is a great tool to use for descents, it does the math for you, and you can adjust it for different ranges from the airport, descent rates, and final altitudes.

 

Our LSA's have slow approach speeds which can clog up the pattern so being confortable changing configurations from high speed descent to an approach configuration while maintaining a glideslope is really handy. Find the power settings in your airplane that will get you to the various flap deployment speeds while descending. In my CT, an RPM of 4500 will get me below 100kts to get 0 flaps on, so 4500 is what I use for straight in descents while 5nm out. 2600RPM will get me below 80kts to get 15 flaps on, so I adjust to that about 1-2 miles out on final. If I keep 2600 I will eventually drop to 60 kts and have the option on short final to deploy 30-40 flap if desired.

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Not that I have an actual list, but if I did have a list of pet peeves... Straight In Final would be on my Top 10. It may be legal, but it really is not right. I think everyone above mentioned good points for not doing it. A high speed jet or a large turbo prop... maybe, but not in a low speed high gas mileage LSA on a clear VFR day.

 

Just last weekend I was flying a CAP C172 on a check ride, and a student pilot in an LSA (yes, it was a CT...) started his radio calls "###CT 20 miles west, straight in final". He proceded to call out same every 1 mile for the next 10 minutes. The problem was there were four other airplanes in the pattern at this non-towered airport trying to figure out what type of airplane he was, when he would get here, and where to look for him.

 

The only time I do a straight in final is when a control tower tells me to do so. For flight planning, I teach my students to substitute 3 miles, 2 miles, 1 mile for downwind, base, final speed, power and flap settings.

 

As to the issue of airplanes with no radio. For Pete's sake... at least go buy a cheap Sporty's hand held and plug into your headset for a minimum amount of situational awareness and your contribution to the safety pie we all fly in. In this day and age there is no excuse for not having one and communicating with others. Pilots 50 years ago were taught to fly in the NORDO environment, today's new pilots "fly their computers" and don't look outside as much (unfortunately).

 

Scott Johnson

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... a student pilot in an LSA (yes, it was a CT...) started his radio calls "###CT 20 miles west, straight in final". He proceded to call out same every 1 mile for the next 10 minutes. The problem was there were four other airplanes in the pattern at this non-towered airport trying to figure out what type of airplane he was, when he would get here, and where to look for him....

 

Scott,

 

If I was in the pattern (and confused by the ct's type) I would have begun with "Tombstone traffic, Flight Design 102CT left downwind runway 01, NUMBER 3 for landing."

 

If that didn't get a call from the strait in traffic I would have then called "Aircraft on final for runway 01 at Tombestone, be advised there are currently 4 aircraft in the pattern."

 

You gotta step up and talk ;)

 

When such a conflict exists I will not remain in the pattern if the strait in guy will not yield. I have exited the pattern a couple of times in the last year, for both an air ambulance and a Q400 carrying 70+ passengers. The Q400 actually flies a pattern but the pattern is so big and the approach so fast that I like to get out of the way.

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