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Switching to PAPI

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Hey guys,

 

Yesterday I received a Norwegian airlines 737-800 DVD that I purchased ( it's very good! ) and I noticed that the pilots switch from their instruments to PAPI on Finals but I can't quite catch what distance from the threshold they do this. I was wondering if it is a set distance for all airports or whether or not it varies on airport/weather etc?

 

Kind Regards,

 

Dan

You should be switching to visual at your minimums at latest, earlier if possible and you feel like it.

 

Most ILS approaches are flown as CAT I (unless low visibility present), so this would be at about 200ft above runway level.

--Peter Fabian 
RTFM.jpg

Some airports have an obstacle restriction that means you can only use the PAPIs within a certain distance (eg NZRO, rwy 36 PAPIs cannot be used beyond 3 DME).

 

Mike

Mike Dryden

And many are not aligned with the glide slope...

My Liveries | FAA ZMP | PPL ASEL |
| Windows 11 | MSI Z690 Tomahawk | 12700K 4.7GHz | MSI RTX 4080 | 64GB 6000 MHz DDR5 | 500GB Samsung 860 Evo SSD | 2x 2TB Samsung 970 Evo M.2 | EVGA 850W Gold | Corsair 5000X | HP G2 (VR) / LG 27" 1440p |

 

 

And many are not aligned with the glide slope...

 

Pretty much everywhere in plain old vanilla FSX!

Steve Bell

 

"Wise men talk because they have something to say.  Fools talk because they have to say something." - Plato (latterly attributed to Saul Bellow)

 

The most useful tool on the AVSIM Fora ... 'Mark forum as read'

We switch to the PAPI once at the DH (and visual) of that approach. If you do happen to break visual before, of course you can switch to a visual approach. One issue to be wary of is that the PAPI is not always aligned with the ILS.

Cheers,
Ryan

Professional Coffee Drinker/BAe146 Driver
Aircraft Maintenance Engineer

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