ASA has been helping pilots achieve certification for decades. The Instrument Pilot Oral Exam Guide, now in its 11th edition, is arranged by topic, and provides a question-and-answer format very similar to the way the oral portion of the checkride is presented.

• READ MORE: ASA Launches 11th Edition of Commercial Pilot Oral Exam Guide

Blair aligns the guide with the Airman Certification Standards (ACS) that went into effect on May 31, 2024. 

This edition has new and expanded content for the pilot to apply during the preflight, and discussion of the departure, en route, and arrival phases of instrument flight. There is an increase in application of scenario-based training, along with additional study material for Instrument Instructor (CFII) candidates. There’s also guidance for instrument proficiency checks (IPC) which to be effective, should be much more than shooting approaches.

The Instrument PilotOral Exam Guide can be found at pilot supply shops, online retailers, or at ASA2fly.com.

Editor’s note: This story originally appeared on flyingmag.com. 

The post New IFR Oral Exam Guide on Offer from ASA appeared first on Plane & Pilot Magazine.

It is not uncommon for air traffic control to pose this question to pilots on IFR flight plans approaching certain airports when the weather is VFR. In daylight, when the visibility is good, the winds calm, and the pilot familiar with the airport—and the approach is a straight in—the visual is no big deal.

But throw in weather, fatigue, low light, pilot unfamiliarity, and a circle to land, and it’s a different event.

Honeywell Aerospace is trying to mitigate these risks, expanding its navigation database to offer flight management system (FMS) guided visual procedures as a stand-alone option.

According to Jim Johnson, senior manager of flight technical services at Honeywell, the visual approaches are created in collaboration with Jeppesen. The instructions for the guided visuals look like Jeppesen approach plates but carry the caveat “advisory guidance only” and “visual approach only.” In addition, the symbology on the approaches differs in a handful of ways.

“The FMS-guided visual provides a lateral and vertical path from a fix fairly close to the airport all the way down to the runway,” says Johnson. “You can hand fly them or couple them to the autopilot.”

Visual into KTEB

One of the first guided visual approaches was created for the descent to Runway 1 at Teterboro Airport (KTEB) in New Jersey.

The airport sits in a very industrialized area with the runway blending into warehouses and business parks. Honeywell provides a video of the visual approach on its website that illustrates the value of having that helping hand. Having the extra vertical and lateral guidance from a mathematically created visual procedure allows pilots to better manage their approach, configuring the aircraft in an expedient manner to avoid “coming in high and hot” in an improperly configured aircraft.

• READ MORE: Garmin GFC 500 Autopilot Receives FAA STC for Beechcraft A35 and B35 Aircraft

This is quite helpful when the aircraft needs to circle to land, says Carey Miller, pilot and senior manager of technical sales at Honeywell.

“Going into Runway 1 at Teterboro on the visual, you are not aligned with the VASI,” Miller says. “There is no vertical guidance, which can lead to a dive to the runway. Add a moonless night or gusty winds, and it can be quite challenging. Not being able to see the airport is a detriment to your energy management. The visual approaches, when coupled to the autopilot, eliminate the guesswork and the overbanking tendency that can lead to stalls.”

Adds Johnson: “The aircraft will fly constant radius turns, [and] you will be on the same ground track every time because the computer knows how to manage the vertical and lateral path. It gets rid of the pilot drifting down or turning early because of the winds.”

Airspace Guidance

The guided visual procedures created thus far have come from suggestions from Honeywell customers, including a visual approach to Chicago Executive/Prospect Heights Airport in Wheeling, Illinois (KPWK). KPWK is in Class D airspace, 8 nm from Chicago O’Hare International Airport (KORD). The Class B airspace for KORD sits above KPWK. There is a V-shaped cutout with various altitudes over KPWK.

The guided visual can help the pilot avoid clipping the Class B airspace during the circle to land—and the dreaded phone call with ATC that results.

The Creative Process

Each approach is created using software tools that take into account the airspace and terrain at the airport, then test flown in simulators to check for flyability.

According to Johnson, the suggestions for where to offer the guided visual approaches come from their customers.

“There are a lot of secondary and regional airports in the U.S. that have both terrain and airspace considerations that make visual approaches very challenging,” says Johnson. “For example, Van Nuys, California (KVNY), has both airspace challenges and a ridge nearby.”

• READ MORE: How To Manage Deadstick Approaches

In some cases, the team may opt to create a visual approach as an overlay to improve safety at airports where closely spaced simultaneous approaches are in use. As this issue was going to press, Honeywell was working on an approach to Runway 28R/L at San Francisco International Airport (KSFO). The visual approach has a briefing sheet with textual guidance, and Honeywell has literally drawn a picture of it.

During development each procedure is flown in a simulator, using a specific briefing sheet that is checked and double-checked for accuracy and usability. Each approach has the ability to be coupled with the autopilot.

Miller cautions it is important to recognize that the visual procedures are not considered instrument approaches in the traditional sense.

“Do not request it as an approach, because ATC will not be aware of it,” Miller says. This information is emphasized on the procedure briefing sheet that accompanies each guided visual approach.

The guided visual approach is loaded in the FMS just like an instrument approach. The pilots can access them with a few pushes of a button, just as they do Jeppesen approaches.

“To use the visual approaches, the customer needs to have a Honeywell-equipped aircraft, and in addition to the FMS database, for an additional $2,000 per year they receive the visual approaches,” says Miller.

To request an approach, contact Honeywell at FTS@honeywell.com. It takes approximately four weeks to put one together.

Coming Full Circle

In many ways, the visual approach procedures represent a modern treatment to the first approaches created by Elrey Jeppesen—yes, that Jeppesen—who became a pilot in 1925 at the age of 18. At the time, there was no such thing as maps purpose-built for aviation. Pilots relied on road maps—which often weren’t terribly accurate, following railroad tracks from town to town or by pilotage and dead reckoning.

In 1925, Jeppesen went to work as a survey pilot and by 1930 was working for Boeing Air Transport, the precursor to United Airlines. This was decades before air traffic control and electronic navigation systems were created. Jeppesen bought a small notebook and filled it with information about the routes he flew. In it there were drawings of runways and airports and information that pilots needed to know, like the elevation of water towers, telephone numbers of farmers who would provide weather reports, and dimensions of the runway and its distance from the nearest city.

In 1934, this evolved into the Jeppesen Company and the notebook into the en route charts and terminal area procedures we know today. Much of Jeppesen’s flying was done in the Pacific Northwest. The Museum of Flight in Seattle is the keeper of the Elrey B. Jeppesen Collection, and for many years there was a replica of his first notebook on display in the Red Barn.

We think Captain Jepp would appreciate how far the approaches he inspired have come.

This column first appeared in the January-February 2024/Issue 945 of FLYING’s print edition.

The post New Honeywell Technology Means Safer Approaches appeared first on Plane & Pilot Magazine.

Like so many others, we hangar the bird and treat the airplane’s wings, fuselage, and tail feathers to an internal spray corrosion treatment regimen every couple of years. I make sure to fly the airplane no less than once a week, and each time, get the engine up to operating temperature and keep it there for at least 45 minutes.

However, I wondered how I might protect our precious radio stack from the ravages of moisture and salt. 

I have had issues before with humidity and other kinds of electronic gadgets. Over the years, I found that when we left our musical instrument amplifiers idle in a humid environment, the rheostats would corrode at their contact points, resulting in a loud crackling noise when the volume was turned up or down. Thankfully, a little contact cleaner sprayed into the works, and a vigorous rotation of the volume knob usually cleared up the situation. And come to think of it, I had the same experience with the intercom volume and squelch controls on our Cessna.  

• READ MORE: Affordable DIY: Hands-Free Flashlight

Our instrument panel contains the full spectrum of avionics history, from that 30-year-old intercom system and three light marker beacons,  to a couple of venerable King KX 155 NavComs, and more recently a digital transponder, IFR GPS, and autopilot. I noticed that each time I opened the boxes containing these new digital toys, the first thing that fell out was a little pack of silica gel commonly referred to as a desiccant. When these valuable little devices are being shipped, the manufacturers take the time to protect them from excess moisture. At this point my trusty co-owner, co-pilot, and spouse, observed that they made this kind of humidity absorbing desiccant for closets, footlockers, and even entire rooms. A trip to the hardware store was in order!

Full disclosure, what follows is not backed up by any scientific studies, rather is a product of backyard engineering and a little experience. 

Purchase number one consisted of a “closet hanging moisture absorber” designed to hang in your closet next to your clothes and catch the absorbed water. The top of the bag contains the water absorbent material, and the bottom section is a clear plastic bag to catch the water. These come in a variety of sizes and are manufactured by several companies. 

As it turned out, the plastic hook at the top of the dehumidifier was a perfect fit for the polished Cessna control yoke shaft. These come in packages of from three to eight, and usually last a couple weeks during the high humidity season. 

Purchase number two consisted of a bright red plastic bucket. Reading the instructions on the dehumidifier carton, we learned that the water catch bag would not leak, and no other precautions would be required. Having always thought that Murphy’s Law was incredibly optimistic, the $5 bucket seemed a good purchase. The rest was easy. Hang the bag on the passenger side control yoke shaft, place the bucket squarely below the bag on the floor, close the doors and let the magic happen. 

Well, not so fast.

Unless I wanted to dehumidify all of Northeast Florida, it made sense to check the door seals for a good fit, close the fresh air vents, and make sure the cabin was relatively sealed off from the elements.

The unscientific results are in. I have not had a repeat of the intercom system corrosion issues, the bag and bucket are easy to remove and replace before and after each flight, and the bag fills up on schedule as promised. Oh, and the inside of the Cardinal is much drier, and smells even better.

The cost of this unscientific dehumidifier: about $5 a bag plus the bucket. Peace of mind: priceless!  

The post Low-Cost DIY Hangar Projects: Aircraft Cabin Dehumidifier appeared first on Plane & Pilot Magazine.

Nevertheless, the common vernacular is VFR or IFR, so we’ll continue in that vein. Even so, there are degrees of operational difficulty that require modifying the terms. To define simple VFR, we generally regard a cloud ceiling of at least 3,000 feet above ground level, or flight visibility of 5 nautical miles or more, to present little concern for control or navigation. If either of those parameters has a lesser value, the weather is termed “marginal VFR,” as long as it isn’t below what’s stipulated to require adherence to instrument flight rules. Operating in MVFR is a cause for concern, as one may encounter pockets of IFR weather hiding in the murkiness. 

Going further down the scale, IFR conditions are generally regarded as a ceiling of less than 1,000 feet or visibility below 3 statute miles as reported on the ground, which is pretty challenging stuff. Even where it’s legal, visual flight in such conditions is risky at best, capable of turning deadly within minutes. Special training, extra equipment, and adherence to specific procedures are the only way to survive what is essentially “blind flying.” 

And then there’s “low IFR,” or LIFR, denoting really bad weather of less than 500 feet of ceiling or under a mile of visibility. This winter, the Central U.S. experienced a week of widespread conditions with less than a half-mile of visibility and less than 200 feet of ceiling, barely adequate for the sharpest airline crews to operate. Coastal or river valley airports often report low-IFR situations when wide-open VFR prevails a relatively few miles away.

Occasionally, “special VFR,” or SVFR, operations allow a visual-flight alternative to IFR flying, a means of dealing with a local ceiling or visibility that’s just slightly below the 1,000 feet and 3 miles required for controlled airspace. If cleared for a SVFR entry or departure, the pilot will be told to “maintain special VFR,” meaning to stay clear of clouds and keep no less than 1 mile of visibility, effectively turning the Class E or D airspace into Class G. It’s still VFR, but barely.

Unfortunately, reported weather doesn’t always match the actual conditions, making neat categorizations difficult to recognize. On one such day, when a neighboring automated weather station reported 10 miles of visibility and 1,100 feet of ceiling, I sallied forth to relieve ground-bound boredom. The local ceiling turned out to be 700 feet, making for a short flight around the pattern back to the safety of the hangar. As a wise old pilot once reminded me, “the weather is what it is, not what it’s supposed to be.”

The post Good, Bad, and the Really, Really Ugly of Flying Weather appeared first on Plane & Pilot Magazine.

Ugh. You just want to land at your destination. What do you do now?

This can be a really difficult decision for a pilot. Do you go hold somewhere? Do you try the approach again? Are there some factors you could change to improve your odds of landing at the end of the approach? Or do you just go someplace else?

All of these questions come with risk decisions.

Trying the Approach Again

It can be tempting to just try to fly the approach again. The upside is that if you break out, you get to land where you want, as originally planned. The downside is that if you had to go missed once, the odds are pretty darn good that you will have to repeat the process.

There are also temptations that come with attempting the approach again that are more related to the pilot than the weather. There is no doubt a pilot is more likely to descend below minimums, go just a little beyond the missed approach point, or try to force a landing at the end of an approach down to minimums after the second approach. These temptations can minimize or break the safeguards built into the published procedures that keep us from, well, bumping into stuff we don’t want to with our aircraft.

Trying an approach a second time takes a pilot down a rabbit hole of temptation that can lead to disaster. Does that mean you never should try an approach again? Well, no, but you should probably have a pretty good reason to do so, or you might be better off considering other options.

Trying a Different Approach

One option is to try a different approach—even at the same airport.

There have been times in my experience when I have flown an approach to a preferred runway, perhaps hoping to avoid a crosswind on the landing or even just because it was aligned with the direction from which I was approaching the airport. In cases such as this, a pilot might find themself flying a non-precision approach and have the opportunity to make a second approach attempt to a different runway that has a precision approach or even just one with lower approach minimums. In one case, where there was fog rolling in off a lake, the winds were calm, and I was able to fly an approach to a different runway that wasn’t obscured while the first runway was.

Visibility can also be variable, and an area of fog or low clouds over one runway end may not be present at another. Know the conditions. A different approach might make the difference.

Changing the Factors to Improve the Outcome

A key factor in deciding to fly the same approach or a different approach to the same airport is to critically evaluate if you can change any factors likely to improve the outcome. That might entail switching approaches, using a different navigation system, or even waiting for some weather improvement.

When you go missed on an approach, if you can’t honestly say something is changing from your first attempt, you should probably come up with a new plan. Doing the same thing again is not likely to generate a more positive outcome.

While we all like to think we are great pilots, another factor we might change is how we fly the approach. Did you end up flying a little above the glide slope? Was your CDI centered? Or were you rushing the approach to try to help ATC with faster traffic behind you?

I vividly remember going missed at Chicago’s Midway airport (KMDW) in a Cessna 172 when I was trying to help ATC by flying the approach at approximately 120 knots to not get in the way of all the jets coming in behind me. At that speed, and on an approach to absolute minimums, I had to go missed, even though I saw the runway at the last minute, because of my speed. I changed how I was flying the approach for a second attempt by slowing down to 80 knots and managed to have a little more reaction time to see the runway as the airplane approached minimums. Don’t change what you are doing at the expense of safety, but if you can honestly do something different, it might be an option.

Wait it Out

Think the conditions are going to be improving—and soon? Well, another option might be to wait it out by holding.

OK, I know most of us don’t do holds much anymore, but they are available for a reason. Holds are there to allow ATC to keep aircraft separated or for them to kill some time before progressing on to the next part of their flight. A pilot might choose to hold for a period of time if there is a reasonable expectation that conditions will improve.

Instances where a storm cell is moving through, rain showers are dissipating, fog is burning off, or even a snow squall is passing might be conditions where a pilot might reasonably decide to hold for a bit and try an approach again. Be honest with yourself if you are thinking about this. Are the conditions really improving, or are you just hoping they are going to so you don’t have to go somewhere else?

One major caution here is to make sure you don’t hold long enough that you leave yourself short of fuel reserves. Holding for an extended period can leave a pilot with less fuel than optimal, and limit their options to get somewhere else if a second attempt becomes impossible or unsuccessful. Set yourself a limited time for a hold that leaves you with plenty of options and stick to it.

Go Somewhere Else–Where the Weather Is Better

IFR pilots are required to file alternate airports in accordance with some pretty strict guidelines for a reason. The goal is that a pilot not find themself with no options and out of gas. Hopefully, you have planned for this when you set out on a flight. It is a real consideration you should be willing to take advantage of if you have to go missed at your first destination airport.

It is not required that you go to your filed alternate airport. But it is required that if you are going to try to get to another airport, you still leave yourself enough fuel reserves to reach your filed alternate. OK, I know this seems confusing.

The gist of the concept here is that you leave yourself an out. You can however take advantage of other options if available.

A good example of this might be a case where you were traveling to an airport with only non-precision approaches, went missed, and had an alternate airport filed that was 45 minutes flight away. If there happens to be an airport 15 minutes away with a precision approach that is reporting weather conditions well above minimums, a pilot might choose to divert there.

Situations like this are fine opportunities to query ATC for information to help make a good decision. If your aircraft has good onboard weather information available, use it. If you have a second crew member or even a capable passenger, engage their help to gather more information. The best decision can only be improved with more knowledge. Knowing where you are going to go missed, with weather that won’t require you to go missed again, is a critical data point in your decision process.

Going missed on an approach can be a gut punch for a pilot who was expecting to get in. It can also be a hard decision point for a pilot. Thinking about this ahead of time can help you build some personal parameters that make the decision less likely to compromise safety in the moment.

Editor’s note: This story originally appeared in the July 2023 issue of Plane & Pilot.

The post Try That Instrument Approach Again appeared first on Plane & Pilot Magazine.

Smoke lowers visibility, not only at the surface, but aloft as well. It is not unusual for smoke to lower flight and surface visibility to less than 1 statute mile, making flying VFR impossible and dangerous, especially at night and in mountainous terrain. Even under IFR, visibility may be in the low IFR flight category and below published minimums for some airports. In fact, the FAA implemented a ground stop for flights bound for New York’s LaGuardia airport because of smoke and reduced visibility on Wednesday.

So, what’s a pilot to do? If you don’t have to fly, that’s likely the best option. If you do decide to make the flight, it’s best to be on an instrument flight plan. Also, if you have oxygen on board, consider using it even below 10,000 feet. In fact, wearing an oxygen mask is always a good approach.

All smoke contains some carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, and other particulate matter. Hemoglobin bonds with carbon monoxide 200 times more readily than it bonds with oxygen, and often produces hypemic hypoxia. Depending on what is actually burning at the surface, smoke can contain a variety of different chemicals, including aldehydes, acid gasses, sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), benzene, toluene, styrene, metals, and dioxins. None of these are good to breathe, especially if you have health issues (also consider your passenger’s health).

The smoke starts as eddies in the planetary boundary layer (PBL). This is the layer of air that is directly influenced by the earth’s surface. But then some of that air gets mixed above the PBL into the free atmosphere, and encounters stronger horizontal winds. Smoke from these fires can travel thousands of miles. In fact, some of the smoke from the Canadian fires has reached as far south as the Carolinas and northern Georgia, albeit in low concentrations of particles.

In the early morning hours, the atmosphere around the regions where the fires are burning is often fairly stable near the surface. That will trap some of the smoke, keeping it close to the surface. The fires burn so hot that they often produce convective updrafts along with “clouds” called pyrocumulus, pyrocumulus congestus flammagenitus, and cumulonimbus flammagenitus (with lightning) that carry the smoke high into the flight levels. These “clouds” don’t produce any rain, but those updrafts can contain severe turbulence that manifests as strong surface winds, which can exacerbate a large conflagration.

However, later in the day as the sun starts to heat the ground, that smoky air higher up moves downwind and it gets mixed down to the surface via turbulent mixing that occurs in the prime heating of the day. And that’s how you get some of that smoke to show back up near the surface at distances hundreds of miles from the origins of the fires.

Look for FU in the terminal aerodrome forecast (TAF) or in METARs. FU is an abbreviation for smoke from the French word fumée, as you can see below from this TAF for the Syracuse Hancock International Airport (KSYR). Notice the visibility is forecast to be as low as 3/4-statute miles in the early afternoon. This is in the low IFR flight category.

In fact, Syracuse was reporting 1/2-statute mile visibility earlier in the morning, as shown below. The bad news is that obscurations, such as dust, smoke, and blowing sand are not automatically reported by ASOS or AWOS. At airports with a trained observer, they can augment the observation by adding FU to the METAR, as occurred at Syracuse.

KSYR 071354Z 29010KT 1/2SM R28/P6000FT FU BKN027 OVC150 15/04 A2969 RMK AO2 SLP048 FU OVC150 T01500044

What about using model output statistics or MOS? These forecasts are made available in some of the popular heavyweight apps. Here’s more bad news. Unfortunately, MOS doesn’t account for smoke in the visibility forecast. The TAF is much more reliable when smoke is expected in the terminal area. Those are issued by highly trained forecasters who can account for the effects of smoke. The Localized Aviation MOS Program (LAMP) does advect observational data such that in the first few forecast hours, you will see the LAMP pick up on lowered visibility reported at airports, but beyond those few hours, it will quickly tend to discount the effects of smoke since it doesn’t really have data to support this phenomenon. Certainly, this area of research will eventually integrate smoke into the MOS forecasts in some future release.

I like to use the smoke forecast from the High Resolution Rapid Refresh (HRRR) model, which you can find here. HRRR-Smoke uses infrared (IR) satellite data to start. We know that fires create heat anomalies and that will show up nicely on IR satellite data. So, it’s not just about the smoke. Using this information means that the model is determining where the source of the fires are located. Once that information is known, it relies on changes in temperature, wind, water vapor, and precipitation to predict where the smoke will eventually end up in the atmosphere. Keep in mind that this is an experimental forecast.

The HRRR-Smoke is refreshed hourly and produces a forecast out to 18 hours, but for runtime hours divisible by six (00Z, 06Z, 12Z, and 18Z), it can provide a forecast with lead times out to 48 hours. There are four different loops that can be used to include near-surface smoke, 1,000-foot agl smoke, 6,000-foot agl smoke, and vertically integrated smoke. It’s a good idea to look at all four.

For departing or approaching an airport, the biggest concern is the conditions that might occur when landing or taking off. Near-surface smoke gives you smoke concentrations at about 8 meters (26 feet) above the ground. As shown below, this is indicated on a pale-blue to deep-purple color scale at the bottom of the forecast map. As you might expect, the northeast, especially New York and Pennsylvania) is currently covered in a smoky haze—purple and red are really bad, while light blue indicates relatively low concentrations (measured in micrograms per cubic meter of air). You can see below that smoke near the surface has traveled as far south as South Carolina and Georgia with fairly high concentrations.

Instead of measuring smoke around 8 meters off the ground, vertically integrated smoke is modeling what a 25-kilometer-high column of air looks like over any given location. The best way to think of this is as the smoke you can see covering the entire sky vs. the smoke near the surface you can smell. As you can see below, smoke covers most of the country east of the Mississippi River. The scale is a bit different in the magnitude of the numbers, but warmer purple-red colors are still very bad, and the cooler pale blue colors represent much lower concentrations.

Even with these forecasts, on any given day it’s extremely difficult to get a sense of what flying conditions will be like at cruise altitude. How high do you need to climb to be on top of the smoke, assuming you can fly high enough to even get on top? There isn’t a good answer. Certainly, in regions where high concentrations exist using the vertically integrated smoke forecast, expect smoke from the surface well up into the flight levels. In other regions, smoke can often top out at 15,000 feet or so, with higher concentrations below. It just depends on the current conditions, including wind direction and atmospheric stability.

The best strategy is to look for pilot weather reports that often will point out where the top of the smoke is located. As with all pilot reports, when the smoke is really bad, pilots will often avoid flying through the area. If you do happen to fly on a smoky day, please take a few minutes to document what you experienced and submit a report.

How long will this be with us? That depends on two factors. First, can most of these fires be contained? This largely depends on Mother Nature; without ample rainfall, honestly, there’s little hope. The second factor depends on how long the stagnant air will remain in place. Given the blocking omega weather pattern that has set up across the entire U.S. and southern Canada over the last few weeks, it might be with us for a couple more weeks.

Editor’s note: This story originally appeared on flyingmag.com

The post Navigating Smoke, a Murky Topic for Aviators appeared first on Plane & Pilot Magazine.

A lucky few are doing so as part of the inaugural Spring Proficiency class, an immersive proficiency clinic for instrument rated pilots slated for April 24 through 28 at the EAA Pilot Proficiency Center. The center, located in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, opened in its new location last summer. Learning will take place through scenario-based training and the use of 12 Redbird LD advanced aviation training devices configured as Cessna 172s.

The trainees will brief the scenarios, file as they would ‘real world’ and fly them virtually.

The flight instructors for the event have been recruited from the Society of Aviation and Flight Educators and the National Association of Flight Instructors. Several have served as instructors during the Pilot Proficiency Center held during EAA AirVenture, and some helped create the scenarios that are being used for the course. For example, I had the opportunity to create the Pacific Northwest scenario based on my experience working with IFR candidates.

Class size is limited. The ratio of clients to instructors will be 2:1 to encourage focus, optimum learning, and individualized attention.

There are two classes, April 24 through 26, and April 26 through 28.

About the Missions

The flight simulation exercises and scenarios have been designed specifically for the Spring to Proficiency clinic. The missions emphasize procedures and decision-making and include dynamic weather, enhanced scenery, and live ATC and traffic through the PilotEdge network.

Spring to Proficiency was developed through the technical efforts of Billy Winburn, president of Community Aviation, and Jason Archer, curriculum developer and Gold Seal Instructor who oversaw the creation of scenarios in concert with area experts.

“There are over a dozen sim scenarios set in three areas of the country: Pacific Northwest, Greater Denver, and Southern California. We’ve worked with local experts to get a realistic reflection of the contemporary environment. Each scenario is set in late April to correlate with the time of the actual clinic,” said Winburn.

“Spring to Proficiency is a Community Aviation program clinic,” he continues. “We’ve developed the syllabus, custom flight simulation exercises and scenarios and instructors (CFI’s).  The EAA has provided its own support [along with] sponsorship from Boeing. Most of the CFIs have been recruited from the Oshkosh area while other instructors are veterans of the PPC in past years. They are familiar with the venue and the Redbird flight simulation training system.”

According to Winburn, trainees who seek a complete instrument proficiency check will have the opportunity to complete the process in a Cessna 172.

“Trainees will have completed all of the requirements for an IPC in the sims at the clinic, short of an approach with a circle to land,” Winburn said. “This maneuver will be among the flight activity in the hour-long flight in a 172 with an instructor from Pilotsmith out of Green Bay.

“Flights will be available to clinic attendees Wednesday and Friday afternoons, at the conclusion of each clinic respectively,” he added.

At the conclusion of the event, the scenarios will remain on the AATDs at the EAA facility and will be available for trainees on demand.

“We are presently refining a system where folks can purchase the syllabus on-line and then schedule time with an instructor, qualified to teach it, and meet them there to fly the program. We also plan to expand the offering to select flight training centers around the country.” says Winburn, adding that other clinics are in development at the EAA PPC addressing other aspects of aviation such as mountain flying and weather and one based on Rich Stowell’s “Nine Principles of Light Aircraft Flying.”

This article originally appeared on the FLYING website.

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At the birth of powered flight, it wasn’t at all obvious that some day airplanes would need to figure out the complications that clouds present. But before long, looking at clouds and the complexities that both sides of them presented was an issue pilots couldn’t ignore. As cross-country flights became a thing, aviators had to figure out how to get around them, which is how scud running was born. It was also how dying while trying to scud-run was born. But what were the options? What about flying in the clouds? That was the crazy idea a few visionaries, including the future air racing champion and war hero Jimmy Doolittle, came up with. It was in 1929 that Doolittle first flew a plane solely by reference to the flight instruments, which were largely invented for just this purpose. Today, we assume the planes we fly can be flown in instrument conditions, thanks to the work of Doolittle and others nearly 100 years ago now.

The post 7. Instrument Flying appeared first on Plane & Pilot Magazine.

One of my roles in life seems to be “The IFR Answer Guy.” Sometimes, I can toss off the answer as a one-liner between sips of morning coffee. Other times, I’m left scratching my head until I delve deep into the IFR minutia.

That’s what happened with what seemed like a simple question about the RNAV (GPS) Rwy 34 approach at Beverly, Massachusetts (KBVY). The query was, “Why is radar required?”

The answer requires a bit of theory. Chart design for IFR assumes the pilot will navigate the entire flight, from takeoff to touchdown, without any assistance from air traffic controllers (ATC). That means there must be some kind of connect-the-dots method of going from chart to chart by using a fix appearing on both charts. This almost never happens in practice because ATC steps in and vectors airplanes as needed, but the charts must allow some possible way for this to happen—or carry a note that it cannot.

“Radar Required” appears in the plan view of an instrument approach chart when there’s no way to navigate from the en route structure (a.k.a. airways) to any initial approach fix (IAF) without the help of a kindly controller. The most common reason for this is that the approach has no IAF. Such approaches require ATC vectors to the intermediate fix (IF) or onto the final approach course. 

That’s not true on the KBVY RNAV (GPS) Rwy 34. CROCR serves as both IAF and IF. You could cross CROCR from any direction, fly a hold-in-lieu-of-procedure-turn, if needed, and head inbound. (As an aside, I want to fly this approach just to check in with Tower at the FAF of WUSUP by saying, “Beverly Tower, Cessna One Two Thee Alpha Mike, RNAV Runway 34—Wuzzup?!”)

Sometimes radar is required because the IAF, or a fix that starts a feeder route to the IAF, isn’t depicted on the en route chart. That means there’s no connect-the-dots and ATC must step in. That restriction doesn’t apply to RNAV waypoints, however, so that’s not the reason for “Radar Required.” In fact, that’s what’s so odd about any RNAV approach requiring radar. You must have RNAV to fly this approach, so you must be capable of flying direct CROCR from any nearby airway. You could fly direct CROCR from Kalamazoo if you wanted. Why do you need ATC radar?

The answer comes in the form of another question: What altitude would you fly to CROCR? Remember that you must be able to fly it without assistance. Many charts have transition routes, which show a heading and altitude to fly from a fix in the en route structure to the IAF. The RNAV (GPS) Rwy 16 approach to KBVY has one from the Pease VOR of 3000 feet on the 213 radial. There are no transition routes to CROCR.

Some RVAV approaches have a Terminal Arrival Area, such as the KLEW RNAV (GPS) Rwy 4 approach. This system provides altitudes for entire quadrants. If you’re approaching within that quadrant, once you’re within 30 miles, you have an altitude to fly as you proceed direct to the fix. There are no such quadrants heading to CROCR.

There’s no published altitude anywhere for flying direct CROCR—and that’s the reason it says “Radar Required.” ATC must see your position on radar in order to assign the appropriate altitude until reaching CROCR.

There is a Minimum Safe Altitude (MSA) on the chart. In case you’ve forgotten, the MSA covers a radius from some fix on the approach and denotes an obstruction-free altitude. In this case, it’s a 25-NM radius from the missed approach point of Runway 34. You know that by the text curving around the MSA circle: “MSA RW34 25 NM.” 

MSAs are for emergency reference only. They’re for when everything goes to hell, you’re off course and just need to get to a safe altitude and regroup. MSAs don’t even apply to lost communication unless they’re higher than your last assigned altitude and you’re flying off-route within the MSA radius. If you were direct KBVY and told to expect this approach, and then you lost communication, you’d maintain your last assigned altitude until crossing Beverly Airport, maintain that altitude to CROCR, and only then descend in the HILPT and commence the approach. For RNAV approaches with terminal arrival areas, no MSA is published. It would be superfluous. You simply use the quadrant altitudes in lieu of an MSA.

This discussion gets more curious when you look at the KBVY RNAV (GPS) Rwy 9 approach. This approach has two IAFs, one at COLLE and another at RIKAH. COLLE shows Radar Required for the same reason CROCR did. It also shows a minimum crossing altitude of 2000 feet. That’s really odd because, if radar is required, you’d only arrive at COLLE on a vector or direct-to from ATC. Such a vector would include an altitude to maintain. The segment from COLLE to EXXRO is also 2000 feet, so you wouldn’t descend after COLLE. I asked my FAA contact about this, and according to them, it might have been an error or a request from ATC when the approach was created, though that dodges the question.

RIKAH is a different matter. There is no requirement for radar—even though this is an RNAV fix sitting in space like COLLE or CROCR. The 3000-foot crossing restriction here makes sense because without a radar requirement you might be choosing your own altitudes. The segment from RIKAH to EXXRO has an MEA of 2000 feet, but you can’t go below 3000 until after crossing RIKAH.

To see what’s special about RIKAH that it doesn’t require radar takes some more chart hopping. In this case, the reveal happens with the DREEM TWO and ZELKA TWO arrivals. RIKAH is depicted on both these charts. This provides a path from the en route structure complete with MEAs for each segment. A pilot could fly a complete route from en route through arrival to approach without any information required from ATC or radar contact. That’s presuming said pilot did all the document searching to figure out how the dots connected.

The takeaway from this is our IFR system is truly an integrated system. Individual pieces, such as an approach chart, might make no sense out of context. This chart coordination can create issues. My query about these approaches revealed to my FAA contact that RIKAH has a mandatory altitude of 6000 and speed of 210 knots on the ZELKA 2 but not on the adjoining approach. This can cause FMS systems on turbine equipment to simply disconnect. It will be fixed. (All you flying jets into Beverley can thank me just like you did the guys on “Car Talk.” Write your note on the back of a $20 bill…).

Then again, in the real world this discussion might be entirely academic. If I were expecting the DREEM TWO arrival and went lost comm, or a failure of ATC radar meant the other approaches at Beverly were not available, I could fly the RNAV (GPS) Rwy 9. However, if conditions favored another runway, I might invoke emergency authority and MSA my way over to a more favorable approach.

Or I’d simply go elsewhere. There are times the lack of official blessing on one little number breaks the whole system.

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