The closest reference to actual hard regs was in the JO 7110.65 (controller's regs):

7-4-3 CLEARANCE FOR VISUAL APPROACH ARTCCs and approach controls may clear aircraft for visual approaches using the following procedures: a Controllers may initiate, or pilots may request, a visual approach even when an aircraft is being vectored for an instrument approach and the pilot subsequently reports:1. The airport or the runway in sight at airports with operating control towers. 2. The airport in sight at airports without a control tower.

I haven't scoured the FARs, but you have to keep in mind that there are some vagueries:Contact approaches are a type of visual.You can also report the traffic in front of you in sight and be cleared for the approach. Sebastino, this has been done for quite some time. It is definitely not as unsafe as you make it out to be.

Hi guys, I've been looking through my documents for the reference and for those of us flying under the PANS-OPS have a look in doc 8168 page 3-28 Visual Manuevering (circling). It says: Decend below MDA/H should not be made until: a) visual reference has been established and can be maintained; :( The pilot has the landing threshold in sight; c) the required obstacle clearance can be maintained and the aircraft is in a position to carry out a landing, EU-OPS 1 states: “Visual approach”. An approach when either part or all of an instrument approach procedure is not completed and theapproach is executed with visual reference to the terrain. An operator shall not use an RVR of less than 800 m for a visual approach. kind regards,

FAA and ICAO are two different worlds. Over here (EPWW FIR) atc cannot suggest/offer crews to fly a visual, it's has to be their own initiative, thus ILS is more popular than visual.

Hi Matthew, Maybe that's national rules. Here in Copenhagen when traffic permits and weather good you can get a visual approach. ATC suggested and flight crew accepted. However, by far the most used in europe is vectors to an ILS. regards,

This is the problem with asking aviation trivia questions on a flight simulator forum... People come out of the woodwork (myself included) to "one-up" the previous posters. The guy who asked the question is an ATC in the US, so it's a safe bet that he's looking for an answer within that context. He asked whether a pilot MUST have the field in sight in order to accept a visual approach. The answer is NO, because as long as you have the preceding aircraft in sight, you DO NOT need to see the airport/runway. For some reason, people like Micheal feel the need to tell professionals like Jeremy that they don't know what they're talking about. It's precisely that kind of constant bickering that I limit my participation here.

Seems I was wrong. Checked Doc 4444 (PL-4444) and it states, that the pilot can request a visual, or it can be proposed by the controller and accepted by the pilot (nevertheless atc has to be sure that the crew has visual on the terrain (at least) and that they can "find their way", thus it's not used as often - when they get visual on the runway, they're already on ILS handed off to tower).