Hi ladies and gents,

 

Just a quick question I wanted to ask. The NGX fmc allows you to set arrival procedures into most airports and runways. In the real world, are these used alot? I was under the assumption that ATC would direct the pilot with speed, altitude and direction to line up with runway, in essence, removing the need for these pre assigned arrival procedures. Any comments on this will be most appreciated. Just curious is all. :)

When I fly on VATSIM I follow the SID/STAR assigned by ATC. Normally the altitude and speed restrictions in the SID/STAR are automaticly entered in your FMC when the certain procedure is selected. Depending on a range of things (weather, traffic, aircraft type) ATC may change your course or speed of what is shown on the charts. If there is little traffic and there are restrictions ATC may lift those restrictions to get you where you need to go more quicker.

Ok. Many thanks for that. So ATC will assign an arrival procedure but they can change speed and altitude if need be? I dont use vatsim and never use fsx atc because they send me way off the approach I want to use.

And if ATC change your approach from what is entered in the FMC, do you change the programmed path to match ATC instructions continously?

 

 

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ATC uses arrivals to reduce the amount of calls they have to make on the radios, and also to simplify their job of sequencing planes when it starts to get busy. All of the above comments are pretty spot on...ATC is not required to keep the airplanes on these routes, and often will clear the aircraft direct to points farther down the arrival if this won't cause a conflict. As far as them changing the approach you have been assigned, yes, normally you would update your FMC to reflect those changes. This will become easier for you as you do it more often.

Hope this helped,

Mark

It really depends on country and airport regulations. So sometimes and at some places, ATC will just vector you, sometimes you will get your STAR to follow.

 

Same is for departure, ATC can assign you a SID to follow, or just give you something like "after take off, right turn direct XYZ VOR...."

 

If you fly via FMC, always update it with instructions given by ATC. if you feel you cannot do that, just say "unable to comply"...

When you get your Flight Plan, normally the last Weypoint is the start of the STAR. The STAR can be determined by ATC or yourself.

 

Here's an example from JFK to London Heathrow Airport.

 

BETTE ACK ALLEX N107B DOTTY NATY LIMRI NATY XETBO EVRIN UL607 NUMPO UP2 OKESI Y3 BEDEK

 

Now we're using an FMC (Flight Management Computer) so go to DEPP/ARR Page, select your Runway then take a look at your Flight Plan. You see "BETTE" is the first point so on the SID you should see the SID BETTE3. If you're using VATSIM and ATC is available they should confirm it, I always put my requested SID/STAR on my Flight Plan. That way ATC 95% of the time give it too you. Nine times out of ten the first Weypoint's name will be in the SID's name so finding the SID can be much easier than finding out the STAR without help from ATC.

 

Now for the Arrival you'll see our last point is "BEDEK". I'm already extremely familiar with the Airport so I already know it's going to be the OCK2F Arrival. But, not everyone is! So what do you do when there's no clue in the STAR's name? Charts, this is where they come in to play. For the UK these can be found on NATS Website, so on the list of Arrivals on the NATS Website they have the directions. You should know you'll be Arriving from the South-West, then you'll see "STAR's via Ockham". Once you've got your Chart you then should be looking for the point "BEDEK". Once you find it, in the description it will tell you what Arrival STAR it is for the FMC. Once again, if on VATSIM or something and online then they will normally give you a "STAR Clearance" and confirm it.

 

Sometimes routes you find already have SID/STAR's on them so use the ones you see as they're normally correct.

 

Now, once you get to a certain point on the STAR if ATC is available they will tell you if you can expect Vectors, or you can just ask. Let's use the OCK2F for LHR, for LHR nine times out of ten you'll get vectors. So the normal procedure would be to leave "OCK" on a Heading and Speed. From there ATC will guide you in with Speeds, Altitudes etc. However if no ATC is available then you can just follow the whole STAR and STAR Transition or even Vector yourself. Just follow the Altitudes on the STAR or personal experience, same with Speeds.

 

If ATC ever ask you for a different SID or STAR you should comply with them, however if you know another SID or STAR will be better you can Request. Exactly what happened with me on Approach last night, ATC asked me for the BNN1B but I knew I was too East for it and knew the correct STAR for the fix I was heading to was the BNN4A STAR so they approved.

 

Hope this example helped some what!

When I fly online on VATSIM, the ATC always asign SID and STARS to me. But almost every time, you do NOT fly the complete SID or STAR. ATC will give you vectors to a waypoint after your SID, and when on a STAR the ATC will give you vectors to the ILS approach.

 

But you will always fly some of the SID and some of the STAR.

Some SID/STARs are for all intents vectors with some initial restrictons. For instance, SY3 departure at YSSY is "Climb straight ahead to 800ft with at least a 3.5% gradient then follow Vectors from ATC". ATC will often assign a heading before you takeoff and you should stay on runway heading to 800ft before turning to that heading.

 

Most (all?) of the EGLL STAR's finish in a hold over a VOR or Waypoint. After (and in some cases before) you reach this VOR you will be Vectored to the runway.

 

Other STAR's feed straight into a runway, YMML's LIZZI4A for Runway 16 does this. The final turn puts you right on the ILS, usually rolling wings level a second or less before the Glideslope intercept. This STAR is speed and altitude controlled (ie you pass waypoints at specified speeds and altitudes or below certain altitudes and above others etc).

 

Some airports (I'm from Australia so an example here is YMLT) only have Approaches to select from (not STARs) These often involve either leaving an airway and following a DME arc, or perhaps flying overhead the VOR and then reversing course in some way to intercept final approach.

 

I usually expect a certain approach/STAR based on the flightplan (IE on a Melbourne to Sydney flight YMML - YSSY the flightplan is ML H129 DOSEL Y59 SY DCT the SID would be the DOSEL series of SIDS, which have varying numbers/letters depending on AIRAC cycle and/or runway they use, and the Y59 airway includes the waypoint RIVET which is the name of another series of STAR's such as RIVET9A.)

 

ATC has final say on Altitude however, you cannot, MUST not change your altitude above/below the cleared altitude as given by ATC unless they specifically issue the instruction. In USA "Cleared via the (STAR) arrival" can be this authorization, but I beleive it should include "Cross (place) at (altitude)". If you see "Cross BEROW at 8000ft or below" on your STAR chart, ATC has to have cleared you through that altitude for you to decend to it. Otherwise you may decend through a holding stack with aircraft at 9000ft, 10,000ft, FL110, FL120 FL130 and FL140... which is bad.

 

 

Trent Hopkinson

Close into the airport, if you receive heading or altitude commands from ATC that deviate from what's on the STAR, you'd likely do those using HDG SEL and LVL CHG / FL CH - you don't want to be messing around with reprogramming the FMC in a busy terminal area. Those modes exist for a reason - not all situations are best served by LNAV and VNAV PTH.

Well everyone here answered the STARs question, but does anyone know about the runway thing the OP was talking about?

 

When I fly offline, I always use the DEPP/ARR page to preselect a runway to land on.

As soon you have the runway from ATC you program that in your fmc.