Atc pet Peeve

[Guest]

One of my pet peevs about atc is if the weather is above mins at the destination airport and on final approach, the tower gives instructions to make traffic for another runway.If the original runway was not the acive runway then why does atc clear you for that approach in the first place? This does not happen in real life!!

[Guest]

While FS does not model this entirely accurately, ATC (In real life) will change landing runways on an arriving aircraft, though the pilot would generally be advised well before contacting the tower that they could expect such a clearance. In real life there are what are known as circling approaches and sidestep approaches. A circling approach allows pilots to fly an approach to one runway and circle to land on another once they have the airport in sight. This is useful at say an airport with one runway and one ILS approach. (I.E. the wind is out of the east, but the only ILS approach is to runway 27-- you could either land with a tailwind--inadvisable and dangerous-- or you could circle to land on rwy 9) Generally this is something you only run into at small fields, however there are some larger fields where this is standard practice (KHFD, when the wind out of the south uses the LDA approach to runway 2, but lands aircraft on rwy 20) and generally you will be advised of such a condition by approach control rather than the tower as seems to be standard practice in FS. The clearance one would recieve from the controller would be "Cleared for the ILS 36 approach, circle to land 18"There are numerous reasons why this could happen in real life: wx conditions, runway closures, traffic conditions, direction of arrival, etc. When flying you just have to be on your toes and be prepared to change your plans as sometimes the instructions will come 4 miles from the runway and be issued by the tower.-Rob

[Guest]

Rob I agree with everything you said.In this instance the original approach runway and the one the tower assigned were both Ils runways.Atc should have assigned the Ils approach to the "active" runway. In real life I have flown many IFR flights under VFR conditions. If the "active" runway had an ILS approach they would assign that one to you.

[Guest ssurjap]

Actually, the reason why this is happening is simple. It'll be a lengthy explanation, but it'll explain why it's happening.Let's say that you are flying into Sea-Tac. ILS runways there are 16 (L/R) and 34 (L/R). If you are using a real world weather program, like FSMETEO or ActiveSky and not loading World Weather from FS2K2, Flight Sim doesn't know the destination weather, even though you (and FSMETEO and ActiveSky) do. Both of these programs have a default update of 6 minutes. That means that every 6 minutes, it will update the weather at the CLOSEST REPORTING STATION. It will also lock to the destination airport at 20 miles (default).Now let's say that the closest reporting station to KSEA (for argument's sake) is KTCM (McChord). They are reporting winds 140 at 7. KSEA, however, is reporting winds 320 at 8. FS2K2 normally contacts you to give you vectors for the ILS about 65 miles out (it varies). However, since FS2K2 doesn't have your destination wind, but McChord's winds, it'll vector you for vector 16R. Now 20 miles from the airport, the winds are updated to 320 at 8. At this point, FS2K2 will not re-vector you, because it assumes the wind will not change. However, at 6 miles out (or the OM), when you are handed off to the tower, tower already has the updated winds (320 at 8). Therefore, it'll vector you to 34L.If you are using ActiveSky or FSMETEO, then you should change the locking distance to 70 miles. This way, when you get vectored in, 99% of the time, you'll be vectored to the right runway.Steve

[Guest]

Steve Thanks for the info. I am using fsmeteo.

[ILYUSHIN_IL62 0]

What ticks me off with FS ATC regarding runways is at Sea-Tac in Real life 16L/34R are for take-off usualy and 16R/34L for landing, but not in FS they just say landing/departing runway 16L! #####? they all have ILS but still, same in Vancouver 26R/08L are used only for landings (well some take offs at like 2am) and it's furthest from terminal (Domestic) yet ATC only uses that runway! when in reality 26L/08R are used more often, I installed that AFCAD thing for it, now it only uses 26L/08R LOL :-lol BTW, is there a way for them to use both runways at once? like landing 26R and Departing 26L ?Best Regards Derek Beal :-wavePROUD RUSSIAN/CANADIAN! :D

[Guest]

AFCAD is indeed the answer. I recomend looking through the library to see if you can find a facilities file that will allow duel runways. If such a download doesn't exist for the airports you need, take a look at the instruction manual for AFCAD, it explains how to make paralell runways active. (I'd walk you through it, but the computer I'm on doesn't have fs or AFCAD on it-- the process to change runways really isn't that difficult though, i promise ;))-Rob

[Flyer Ken 0]

The solution to this problem with ActiveSky (and possibly FSMeteo, I don't know) is to lock to the destination airport at some distance out. eg, lock to the destination at 60 nm, and ATC will vector you to the correct runway.