Strange approach vectoring

[Guest juraj]

Hi all,I am a bit puzzled about my last night flight from WSSS to FMEE. ILS approach, I was using ATC for vectoring me. I was passing the airport heading north, and the ATC left me flying north for about 60 miles. Then it turned me around, instructing "Maintain 15 thousand until established on the localizer".I duly complied, seeing a issue ahead. As requested, I maintained 15k until established, which happened some 20 miles from the runway. This resulted in some really unhealthy descent rate and one missed approach when I figured out there is no way getting out of that alive.My two questions are: Should is this considered as bug or was Radar Contact perfectly operational? And if the RC was working ok, what would be the correct action to take? (I presume not the missed approach). thanks in advance for feedback!

[jd 57]

i'm going to take a wild stab here.what was your altimeter set to, when you were told to descend to 15 thousand? was it local pressure? or standard pressure?FMEE has a transition altitude of 12000. so i'm guessing you were told to descend to FL150, and you changed your altimeter to local pressure.you never reached FL150. you may have reached 15,000. not the same at FMEEjd

[Guest juraj]

jd, thanks for the feedback! I believe I was still on the standard pressure at that time, although I wouldn't bet my hand on it. But the question I guess still remains, as I was told "maintain fl150 until established", unless of course I would have been told that as a consequence of me not complying to the "descend to fl150" before? Would RC's internal logic be having me approaching the localizer at that altitude?

[jd 57]

airport altitude is 10,000+ ft, so FL150 is only 5000 above the groundthat would seem reasonable.if you want, you can create a .log, instructions pinned at the top of the forum. duplicate the problem, and send me the .logjd

[Guest juraj]

Not quite, FMEE has an altitude of 66 feet. It's practically at sea level, so FL150 is indeed about 15000 feet above the ground.ok, next week I am heading back, so I'll try to reproduce it and have a .log for you.

[ronzie 21]

FMEE is basically in a hole :)I have some old charts and they show an E-W north hemisphere MSA of either 9,000 or 11,000 depending on your MSA reference and a southern hemisphere boundary of about 12,000. Since RC only knows the MSA averages around the airport it will not descend you below. Even within a ten mile radius of the VOR you would descend to fly over it at 10,000 or 8,000 at the VOR. At the VOR you would descend in a racetrack pattern to 5700 feet, fly outbound on a course of 315 descending to 4000 at 19 DME SDG(112.9) turning inbound and then flying inbound on the localizer/GS.This is the type of airport where an IAP approach is a must with steep descents and descents through a valley in the high surrounding terrain.The airport elevation is 66 feet. A standard airport rectangular pattern would not work here but that is what this version of RC is limited to.You can get the current charts here:http://www.sia.aviation-civile.gouv.fr/htm...eset_aip_uk.htmentering the ICAO or clicking on ST DENNIS for detailed airport charts.

[jd 57]

my bad. i was looking at a4.csv, and the longest runway is 10000+ not it's elevationyeah, FL150 would be a little high for an approachsend me a .log, let's see what's happeningjd

[jd 57]

should have looked at the msa's.thanks ronwhat was the mas on the airport screen? i'm not going to clear you lower than about 3000 above the msachange the msa, and add arrival notams. you'll be goodjd

[ronzie 21]

FMEE is on the northern coast adjacent to the water. Look at it on Google Earth. I can not figure out where the northern MSA of 8,400 or 11,000 is from variation being by MSA CAT A-B or CAT C-D. All CATs have 12,000 on the southern side.From the NW a straight in to RWY joining the GS at 4,000 should be sufficient. A right downwind (from SE) to 14 would initially be over high terrain but a descent to base over water down to 4,000 should clear.There is a ridge in close proximity to the threshold but it is displaced to allow a three degree GS.There is also a small circular restricted area just to the right of the localizer path to 14 a couple of miles out.