Approach Charts

instrument approaches are the crux of instrument flying but we can't just point our airplane at the airport and start descending instead we must have a plan and we can fulfill that plan by following published instrument approach procedures which allow us to descend safely without any visual references the standards for creating an instrument approach are set forth by terminal instrument approach procedures or Terps for short these standards are used by the government military and sometimes corporate groups to establish approved instrument approach procedures the standard instrument approach chart has six elements these are the margin identification pilot briefing plan view profile view landing minimums and airport diagram these sections are arranged in a standardized format to make it easier for pilots to accurately read so they can successfully fly the approach without confusion there are two types of instrument charts produced FAA charts and Jepson both versions contain the same information but the information is presented to the user in a slightly different format for the purposes of this video we'll be focusing on FAA style charts the FAA charts are available in a 26 volume set of books or available in digital form collectively referred to as the u.s. terminal procedure publications or TPP's with each issuance valid for 28 days these publications contain instrument approach procedure charts departure procedure charts standard terminal arrival charts and airport diagrams additionally there are also takeoff radar and alternate minimum textual procedures let's discuss the main features of a typical instrument approach chart for our example approach chart we'll be using the ILS localizer for runway two one at Pocatello Regional Airport located in Idaho this approach offers a few unique qualities due to the mountainous terrain in the area the first part of the approach plate we'll review are the margins around the edge of the page this area contains vital information including the name of the procedure the airport it applies to the valid dates the city and state and the coordinates of the airport this allows the pilot to quickly identify the approach procedure applicable for the airport and whether if we look at the top and bottom right corners we can see it clearly identifies the ILS or localizer approach for only two one at Pocatello regional the city and state information can be found in the top and bottom left corners at the bottom of the plate is the latitude and longitude probably the most important part about the margins next to the name of the approach are the valid dates found on the right hand and left hand sides these dates tell the user when the approach plates are legal to use and when they expire in the case of this approach it's only valid from July 18th to August 15th of 2019 the next section is the pilot briefing this section provides the pilot with a majority of the information they will need in order to fly into the airport this includes things like nav aid frequencies the final approach course runway length and elevation information the approach lighting system used applicable notes or limitations frequencies and a textual description of the missed approach procedure looking back at Pocatello we can see that in the top of the pilot briefing that the localizer frequency is 110 point 3 the approach course is 211 degrees and the runway is nine thousand and sixty feet long both the touchdown zone elevation and airport elevation are four thousand four hundred and fifty two feet next are the notes which provide pertinent information for the approach in this case due to the nearby mountains circling isn't authorized to the southeast four runways three and two one it also contains notes instructing what to do in the event of an inoperative approach lighting system in addition there are two symbols to the left the tee and the a inside black triangles if you see the tee in an upside-down triangle that means that this airport is published in the take-off minimums and obstacle departure procedure section of the TPP that section should be referenced to become familiar with the airport's obstacle departure procedures and or non-standard takeoff minimums reference the notes at the top of the section for additional details similarly seeing an A in the triangle means that the alternate minimums for this Airport are non-standard if you are planning to this Airport as an alternate for your cross-country flight you would need to investigate what alternate minimums are for this Airport in the alternate minimum section of the TPP again reference the notes at the top of the section for additional details keep in mind that an a with the letters n a after it means that the use of this Airport as an alternate is not authorized next in the briefing is the approach lighting system when the runway has an approach light system it will be posted in three ways at the top is the name of the system and under that is an identifier and pictorial schematic of the layout the standard identifier consists of a circle with characters or another symbol inside identifier is portrayed with a dot at the top indicate that the system includes sequence flashing lights an indicator and negative colors indicate that the pilot controlled lighting is used for Pocatello a mowzer system is used it includes sequence flashing lights and is pilot controlled more details about the approach light systems can be found in the legend of the TPP or in the FAS aeronautical chart user guide the missed approach box contains a textual description of what to do in the event the pilot does not see the runway or cannot make a safe landing on the runway the directions are kept as simple as possible outlining each step in a concise manner to avoid any pilot confusion typically missed approach instructions contain a climb a course are heading to fly to a fix and a hold in the case of the ILS - one at Pocatello it's a bit more complicated but it still contains the same basic elements a climb to seven thousand four hundred feet and a course of direct to the Pocatello vor due to the mountainous terrain this approach adds an extra step continue the climb until reaching seven thousand four hundred feet before making a right turn back to the vor for the hold the last section of the pilot briefing consists of the frequency boxes these contain the most important frequencies you'll need for the approach they're organized into a logical order to help reduce workload while setting up for the approach the central section of the approach chart is dominated by a large bird's eye view of the airport and its surrounding areas this is known as the plan view the area surrounding the airport is used to outline the approach procedure by designating fixes nav aids and radials that make up the route the plan view also plots geographical and obstacle information and lists any important notes for the procedure this helps make it easy to plan the approach and assist the pilot and transitioning from the enroute phase of flight to the approach phase of flight every instrument approach begins at an initial approach fix to begin the approach look for an initial approach fix labeled as IAF sometimes an approach has more than one from this point a thick black line indicating a published segment the approach is drawn to pass through each point of the approach down to the missed approach point looking at the ILS to one there is initial approach fix at the Idaho Falls vor that will transition you to the localizer course which then goes until the missed approach point where the line becomes dashed additionally the locator outer marker is also an initial approach fix this is for aircraft approaching the airport from the opposite direction depending on which direction you arrive at an airport from it may be necessary to reverse course to get established inbound on an approach a common course reversal maneuver is called a procedure turn there are many ways to perform a procedure turn and unless there's a specific procedural track like a holding pattern the discretion is up to the pilot as to which option they want to execute there are a few stipulations however the first is that the airplane must remain within the confines of the approach which is usually 10 nautical miles secondly like a hold there is a maneuvering side and a non maneuvering side the procedure should be performed on the maneuvering sight charts will depict the 45-degree type of procedure turn and include headings of the procedure for your convenience when following the 45 degree type turn the procedure is generally as follows turn 45 degrees to the maneuvering side once on that heading start a timer for one minute when the minute is up turn 180 degrees in the direction opposite of the first turn finally fly that inbound heading until the inbound course is intercepted at which point you'll follow the inbound course looking back at the locator outer marker in our example the second option shows us that we would fly a zero three one degree heading along the localizer and then initiate a procedure turn by first turning left to a heading of three four six degrees after passing cooped up after one minute we'll turn to the right to a heading of one six six we'll fly this heading and then re intercept the localizer inbound on a course of two one one the plan view uses the same nav aids found in other FAA charts it also incorporates geographical and obstacle information prominent water features such as lakes ponds rivers and oceans are depicted in gray mountainous terrain are depicted in shades of brown approach plates depict terrain that is 4,000 feet above the airport elevation or one within six nautical miles of the airport any terrain that is above 2,000 feet above airport elevation these topographical displays show altitude that intervals as the features get taller with Peaks pinpointed with the exact height other various obstacles will be displayed in a familiar fashion followed by an altitude in MSL the highest obstacle on the plan view will be shown with extra emphasis the last important item is the minimum safe altitude ring this circle labeled MSA is a 25 nautical mile ring based on an avid or a fix and gives a safe altitude to fly to maintain obstacle clearance the MSA should only be used in emergencies when you have departed the designated approach plan since it only gives 1000 feet of obstacle clearance the ring can be continuous or split into sectors based on obstacles in the area for Pocatello the mountains to the east are why the MSA shows an area from 2 to 0 degrees to the marker beacon down to 0 for 0 degrees to the marker beacon as unsafe to fly below 10,000 700 feet MSL but to the west and north where the elevation is lower the MSA reflects this by having altitudes of six thousand eight hundred feet and seven thousand nine hundred feet respectively the profile view is a side view the approach used to help visualize the descent profile the approach it also contains a pictographic representation of the missed approach procedure for quick reference by viewing the approach path from the side we can easily see the required altitudes step-down fixes final approach points and the missed approach point distances the course and any other notes regarding the descent altitudes can be displayed in four ways when the line is below the altitude it is a minimum altitude that the aircraft cannot descend below when the line is above the altitude it is a maximum altitude the aircraft cannot climb above when the line is below and above the altitude it is a mandatory altitude that must be flown when two altitudes are listed between a set of lines this indicates a block out sued that the aircraft must remain within conversely no lines depicted indicate a recommended altitude for that section of the procedure the next two symbols always shown are the indicators for the final approach fixed location on a precision approach the altitude is listed with an arrow in the shape of a lightning bolt pointing to the approach course this tells us that the location of the final approach fix is when we intercept the glide slope at the specified altitude for non-precision approaches a maltese cross is used to show us a location of the final approach fix based on a distance from the airport one thing to remember is one approach plate may show two different approaches on one chart and therefore contain information for both a precision and a non-precision approach if we look at the ILS 2 1 again we can see it gives us information for an ILS localizer and circling approach meaning both symbols will appear on the profile view on some non-precision approaches a visual descent point is shown to assist pilots in the transition to look for the runway this point depicts where normal descent to the runway touchdown point may be commenced provided certain criteria are met this helps in maintaining a stabilized approach to the runway after the missed approach point the dark thick line changes to a dashed line this indicates the missed approach segments of the approach these are just some of the common symbols you will encounter to review the full list remember you can find these in the legend of the TPP or in the FAS aeronautical chart user guide the next part of the chart is the landing minimums table this area is broken up into rows for each approach type offered for example on an ILS approach you may see other options like localizer or circling on an our nav approach we might see options like l pv l now /v nav l nav only and circling these rows dictate the appropriate minimums to be flown based on what equipment or performance is available to use the section is also broken up into columns corresponding to what approach category the aircraft falls in to approach categories are broken up based on reference landing speed called V ref or if not specified by the manufacturer 1.3 times the aircraft stall speed in the landing configuration VSO for example the cestas vs o speed is 40 knots this speed multiplied by 1.3 is 52 knots there are 5 approach categories with a being the slowest and I being the fastest category a is for aircraft whose speeds are below 91 knots B ranges from 91 to 120 knots c4 121 to 140 knots d for 141 to 165 knots and lastly is for 166 and above and is used only for select military aircraft one thing to note however if you fly an approach at a speed of a hundred knots you must use category B minimums even if you are in a category a aircraft this is commonly done at ER au the numbers in the table dictate minimum altitudes and visibility required the visibility can either be specified as the general prevailing visibility given in statute miles or runway visual range or RvR which is a specific distance on the centreline that runway markings can be visually identified given in feet let's look at the example of the localizer in a category B aircraft the first set of numbers you'll notice is four thousand seven hundred and forty / 24 this dictates that your minimum descent altitude is four thousand seven hundred and forty feet MSL and the required visibility is 2400 feet RvR if you do not have the landing environment in sight don't have the required visibility or you are not in a position to make an approach and landing using normal maneuvers you must perform a missed approach the second number is in feet due to the slash mark being used that separates the numbers when the numbers are instead separated by a hyphen it means the following number is a visibility and statute miles this can be seen when looking at any of the circling minimums for this approach the second section of numbers within the category box starts with the minimum altitude in AGL followed by special military minimums within parentheses if any of the minimums contain asterisks or pound signs refer back to the notes section for more information in this case there's an addendum to the 2004 hundred foot visibility requirement allowing 1800 feet for RvR if the aircraft is specially equipped with any of the listed equipment the final part of the approach plate is the airport diagram it contains what is essentially a scaled-down version of the diagram that is found within the chart supplement it contains symbols for the approach lighting system displaced threshold runway distances visual approach slope indicators and other basic airport information including a textual description of the runway lighting one special item that the airport diagram section can contain is a timing chart that gives times to travel from the final approach fix to the missed approach point at various speeds these times can be used to determine the missed approach point when other guidance is not available based on your ground speed not your air speed you may have to interpolate between the listed intervals to get the appropriate time if we were flying a Cessna 172 on the localizer approach we would start the timer as the aircraft crosses the final approach fix at this point it's 3.8 nautical miles to the runway for our example the aircraft will be flown at a hundred knots in a no wind condition therefore the ground speed will also be 100 knots will then have to interpolate between the 90 and 120 not approach beat samples a hundred is one third of the way between 90 and 120 so we need one third of the time difference between the two we can see that there are 38 seconds between these two speeds meaning we'll end up subtracting one third or roughly 13 seconds from the not two minute and 32 second time this gives us 2 minutes and 19 seconds to the missed approach point if you cannot see the runway environment by the calculated time you will need to go missed it is in your best interest to pre calculate your approach times and write them on your charts before you fly so you can focus on flying the approach instrument approach charts contain a plethora of information but when you break it down into smaller sections give yourself plenty of time to brief and review the approaches prior to flying you'll find the information to be much more manageable just remember if you need additional time to prepare you can request a hold or delay vectors from ATC the worst thing you can do is to begin an approach you are not adequately prepared for

Channel: ERAU SpecialVFR

Views: 65,638

Keywords: flying, flight, instrument rating, IFR, IMC

Id: Dn9B5MH-CFA

Length: 18min 34sec (1114 seconds)

Published: Mon Apr 06 2020