19 minutes ago, Langeveldt said:

Yes granted, but IRL it's very, very rare.  I've had to do this once in my life.  

You are often hauled up to explain yourself as well, although as this was a trainee ATC person I was given a free pass as it was their error.  

Yes like once ATC told me to do right 360 with mountain on that side . I said: “unable due to terrain” they told me “then climb over it “ and amended previously assigned altitude lol

3 hours ago, Fiorentoni said:

There's been a Lufthansa aircraft which had to divert in the US because they are not allowed a visual approach at night via their SOP and the controller (KSFO I think?) wanted to make them wait for a long time in a holding for an instrument approach. So "it's a pilot decision" is a bit too simplistic here, when it's ATC which controls the pilot. Sure, you can insist on an instrument approach, but if ATC makes you wait for 30+ minutes then it's not really "a pilot decision".
As for BATC, by now it will only give you a visual in clear VFR; MVFR should always lead to an instrument approach now. Also you can by now request any approach you want (and unlike the real controllers BATC will grant it to you without any holding 😉 )

You eliminated a lot of context in this story, including the most important detail: it wasn't the requirement for an instrument approach that caused the delay.  It was the requirement for a RUNWAY change. ATC would have had no problem clearing them for, and there would have been no delay resulting from, an instrument approach to 28R.

Firstly, the ops spec requirement not to fly visual approaches at night to certain airports is industry-common, and it does not require a clearance for an instrument approach.  It simply requires that the lateral and vertical guidance of a published IAP be followed.  You can accept a visual approach clearance, you just have to fly a published procedure.

In the Lufthansa case, SFO had runway closures for construction.  They were using 28L for departures and 28R for arrivals.  The ILS to 28R was also out of service.  Lufthansa either did not have the RNAV 28R approach in their nav data, or they don't do RNAVs on the 350 fleet.  I don't remember the specific reason, but they were unable to use the RNAV to 28R for the required guidance. 

That forced them to 28L, which was stacked with departures and that's what caused the delay. 

The spacing differences between aircraft on a visual vs instrument approach are trivial for ATC.  They would have had no problem being cleared for the RNAV to 28R (or the ILS if it were up), though they wouldn't have needed such a clearance anyway. 

Stating that which type of approach an airliner flies is purely the captain's decision is not simplistic, it's simply how things work.  It's not an ATC decision.

 

I think we're losing the plot somewhat.  I'm not a pilot, controller, or even what I'd consider super knowledgeable in any of this.  

I am fairly sure though that to make a visual approach, you need to see the runway.  We can't see the runway from 20 miles away and/or in bad weather, and need a runway with an instrument approach.  

4 hours ago, kerosene31 said:

am fairly sure though that to make a visual approach, you need to see the runway.  We can't see the runway from 20 miles away and/or in bad weather, and need a runway with an instrument approach.  

You need to be able to see the field or at least in some eyes where the field is which is where you can get away with 20+nm and it happens thousands of times a day every day.

Sure, there are times when you can call the field 20+ miles out.  There are also plenty of times when you can't call the field 5 miles out, even when the reported conditions suggest you should be able to.  Sun glare, localized haze etc... That's the whole point - a visual approach cannot be dictated by a controller.  It's something the pilots must agree to accept, or it doesn't happen.  

And no, when you refuse, it doesn't mean you'll be "hauled up to explain" or anything like that.  Even when refusing a clearance that might be seen as more of a dictate from ATC, a pilot will not get in trouble for using that magic word: "unable".  This is a strong point of emphasis as we train new captains these days.  We take great pains to ensure they understand that any amount of discomfort they have with a clearance is a fully sufficient reason to decline it.  That's their responsibility, in fact.  Don't like the approach?  Go around.  Don't like a clearance?  "Unable", and tell them what you can do instead. 

I only mention this because it IS such a critical item in the industry right now.  I agree we've kind of lost the point here, which I would say is this: in a simulator, the user should be able to dictate exactly the conditions of the flight.  That's the point of a simulator - I can fly in any weather I want, at any time of day I want, in any aircraft in any mechanical condition that I want... I certainly should be able to tell an ATC client which approach I'm doing, and not the other way around. 

I'd say the fact that this is how real life works, just supports the point that you should then clearly be able to do it in a sim as well.  

1 hour ago, Stearmandriver said:

I'd say the fact that this is how real life works, just supports the point that you should then clearly be able to do it in a sim as well.  

And that is indeed the thing that irks me the most about BATC and I hope they will change the logic later. Because after a certain point it will not accept you asking for a different approach or Runway. 

Runway I get, but approach type I should be allowed to change any time before reaching the IAF.

Also it not letting me ask for Directs that are further away than 160 miles is also a limitation that should go away. 

Edited May 2May 2 by Farlis

So from what I gather it's more about getting the flexibility and context that real life has, like saying "runway not in sight, can we get an instrument approach?" which BATC can't handle yet for example. That's however also the most difficult part in creating an ATC tool. Sure, you can throw away the scripting and just hook it up onto an AI which will then react dynamically to anything you say at any time and also forget who you are, where you are and what was said before... there are other tools that tried that approach and the result is not convincing.

So that dynamicality (is that a word) and flexibility is something that needs to added via classical coding, but that takes a lot of time and effort and is probably something I'd expect only after the core features are complete (they are nearly now with VFR out for experimental) and working flawlessly (there's still a lot of work to do on vectoring and speed management and AI traffic in general).

I know we flight simmers always want to have everything right now, myself included, but let's not forget that there has never in 30+ years been any ATC tool that did what the current ATC tools are doing or trying to do (core ATC + traffic injection being controlled by core ATC + AI voice generation etc.). So we don't really have a baseline to measure those tools by. Yes, those old ATC tools like P2ATC had much better vectoring already, but they were also being developed for 10 years and they have no AI traffic or modern voices.
Considering what BeyondATC has on its plate and is offering for a mere 30 dollars I think they've come a long way in just 2 years. Hell, it took PMDG almost 2 years to do their mediocre UFT...

The Lufthansa SFO debacle is quite an interesting one and worth a watch.

I’m not familiar with Lufthansa SOP as to what they can and can’t do and don’t know what ILS facilities were available on the night ,so can’t comment on that specific case.
However on the whole there seems to be a general misunderstanding with foreign airlines going into the states as the US definition of a visual approach differs from the European version.

In Europe a visual approach is an approach using just the mark one eyeball for lateral and vertical positioning using pilot judgment and or PAPIs, no electronic localiser or glidepath guidance is used. In other words it is a purely VFR procedure 

In the US when cleared for a visual you can still use the ILS and are encouraged to do so , but the pilot then becomes responsible for maintaining visual contact with the airport and / or proceeding traffic and also become responsible for separation and wake turbulence separation from proceeding traffic. It’s an IFR procedure under visual conditions, that’s the subtle difference.

I actually went into SFO last week at night  in a real world heavy and were cleared for the visual 28R ,but for all intents and purposes was vectors for the ILS, with the final vector being, “left head 310 to join the localiser 28R maintain 3000ft until established cleared visual approach 28R” so almost identical to the ILS procedure.

The only difference being I was now responsible for separation and wake separation, which ultimately I always am anyway, and the missed approach instructions will be given by the tower if needed rather than the published ILS MAP.

I always cover this in the my briefing going into SFO as the vast majority of pilots will be shaking their heads saying we have to request the ILS, not understanding the subtle differences and that we would still actually be flying the ILS for guidance.

Being flexible and taking the visual frees up the controller and always greater capacity.

 

Edited May 2May 2 by jon b

20 minutes ago, jon b said:

In the US when cleared for a visual you can still use the ILS and are encouraged to do so , but the pilot then becomes responsible for maintaining visual contact with the airport and / or proceeding traffic and also become responsible for separation and wake turbulence separation from proceeding traffic. It’s an IFR procedure under visual conditions, that’s the subtle difference

Lufthansa and their pilots are very much aware of this difference. They still opted to not fly them in night conditions because all the lights make it virtually impossible to tell a preceeding traffic from approach or city lights. So they feel like they can't be safely take over being responsible for seperation after dark and that is why they refuse visual approaches after sunset.

Survey on their Discord site.

Good time to let them know what pleases and displeases you about the software

 

 

12 hours ago, Dave_YVR said:

You need to be able to see the field or at least in some eyes where the field is which is where you can get away with 20+nm and it happens thousands of times a day every day.

Again, NOT what I'm talking about.  I'm talking about not being able to see the field.  

27 minutes ago, kerosene31 said:

Again, NOT what I'm talking about.  I'm talking about not being able to see the field. 

Yeah I get it, but in real life thousands of times every day the field is called without seeing the actual field but knowing where it is.

17 minutes ago, Dave_YVR said:

Yeah I get it, but in real life thousands of times every day the field is called without seeing the actual field but knowing where it is.

Er?  Not... Legally, it doesn't.  😉

6 hours ago, jon b said:

 

In the US when cleared for a visual you can still use the ILS and are encouraged to do so , but the pilot then becomes responsible for maintaining visual contact with the airport and / or proceeding traffic and also become responsible for separation and wake turbulence separation from proceeding traffic. It’s an IFR procedure under visual conditions, that’s the subtle difference.

 

Just to clarify something here.  In the USA, after being cleared for a visual approach (assuming you're not following another aircraft), ATC is still providing separation from other aircraft, not the pilot. 

38 minutes ago, Stearmandriver said:

Er?  Not... Legally, it doesn't.  😉

Maybe not, but it does.