1995-03 · NASA ASRS report 300441
RPTR COMPLAINT OF APCH CTLR JUDGEMENT OF TFC SPACING.
WX CONDITIONS WERE CEILING AND VISIBILITY UNLIMITED; VISUAL APCHS IN PROGRESS WITH TFC IN E FLOW. (TKOF AND LNDG RWY 9L&R; RWY 12.) OUR ACFT; AN FAR 121 TURBOPROP; WAS TOLD BY ATC THAT WE WERE #2 FOR RWY 9L; FOLLOWING A COMPANY ACFT OF SAME TYPE. WE HAD THE OTHER ACFT IN SIGHT AND RPTED SAME TO ATC. ATC CLRED OUR ACFT FOR VISUAL APCH; #2; TO FOLLOW COMPANY. AT THAT TIME WE TOOK OVER OUR OWN NAV AND SEPARATION IN ORDER TO SAFELY FOLLOW THE COMPANY (SAME ACFT TYPE). ABOUT 8 NM FROM ARPT; RADAR CTLR ADVISED US TO REDUCE SPD TO FINAL APCH SPD AS WE WERE INDICATING 40 KTS FASTER THAN COMPANY. WE COMPLIED WITH ATC INSTRUCTIONS; DESPITE THE FACT THAT WE HAD IN THE COCKPIT A TOTAL OF 20000 HRS FLT TIME; WITH IMMENSE EXPERIENCE IN THIS TYPE OF FLT ACTIVITY. AT THIS TIME WE WERE HANDED OFF TO LCL CTL. AS WE PREDICTED; COMPANY AHEAD OF US PULLED AWAY AS WE FLEW FINAL APCH AT MINIMUM APCH SPD. ACFT CLRED THE RWY WHEN WE WERE APPROX 500 FT AGL. LCL CTL REQUESTED THAT WE KEEP UP OUR SPD AND PLAN MINIMUM TIME ON RWY AS AN MD-11 WAS CLOSE IN BEHIND US; AND GAINING AS WE HAD BEEN QUITE SLOW FOR 8 NM. WE COMPLIED WITH LCL REQUEST BY USING AGGRESSIVE REVERSING THRUST AND AGGRESSIVE BRAKING; MORE SO THAN SHOULD NORMALLY BE USED CONSIDERING PAX COMFORT AND ACFT WEAR AND TEAR. TWR INSTRUCTED MD-11 TO GAR; DESPITE OUR SPEEDY EXIT. CLOSENESS OF SPACING IS INDICATED BY THE FACT THAT THE GAR ACFT WAS ALREADY PASSED OUR POS BY THE TIME WE TURNED OFF THE RWY. THE MORAL: PLTS KNOW HOW TO FLY; THEY KNOW THEIR ARPTS AND THEY KNOW THEIR AIRPLANES. IF ATC GIVES US A VISUAL APCH TO FOLLOW TFC; LET US DO IT -- DON'T GIVE US LIMITING FACTORS SUCH AS REDUCE TO FINAL APCH SPD. IF WE HAVE THE TFC; THEN IT'S OUR RESPONSIBILITY. WE KNOW THIS WHEN WE CALL TFC IN SIGHT. WE CAN PLAN ON FLYING AN APCH WHERE NOBODY GOES AROUND. IF ATC WANTS TO DO THAT; THEN GIVE US STANDARD IFR SEPARATION. AGAIN; LET US PLTS FLY THE PLANES.
Source: NASA Aviation Safety Reporting System (public domain). Reports are voluntary submissions and are not verified by NASA.
Loading the flight search…
Pick an aircraft model — Boeing 737, Airbus A320, A380, Boeing 787 Dreamliner and more — enter your origin airport, and FlightFinder shows every route that plane flies from there with live fares.
We support Boeing 737/747/757/767/777/787, the full Airbus A220/A319/A320/A321/A330/A340/A350/A380 family, Embraer E170/E175/E190/E195, Bombardier CRJ and Dash 8, and the ATR 42/72 turboprops.
Search and schedules are free. Pro ($4.99/month, $39/year, or $99 one-time lifetime) unlocks the enriched flight card — on-time stats, CO₂ per passenger, amenities, live gate & weather — plus My Trips with push alerts.
Live schedules come from Amadeus, AeroDataBox and Travelpayouts. Observed routes (which aircraft actually flew a given city pair) are crowdsourced from adsb.lol ADS-B data under the Open Database License.