"Russ MacDonald" wrote in message news:IlqQd.32477$uc.6337@trnddc04...
I requested and received a Contact Approach on about my third flight after receiving my instrument rating!
I
was being vectored "outbound" for the ILS at Temple. Clouds were scattered-to-broken at about 700 ft AGL,
and
visibity was excellent. Once I saw that I could easily get under them and get back to the field, I got the
contact approach and it saved me about 10-15 miles of vectoring. Visual approach would not have worked
because
of the cloud clearance. Well I guess you could say it would've "worked" but it wouldn't have been legal

I'm certainly no pro, and I don't "regularly" fly contact approaches, but, there you go...

Cheers,
John Clonts
Temple, Texas
N7NZ

I bet the approach controllers were surprised when you requested the contact approach. They probably don't
hear that request more than once a year, and then it's usually from pilots who normally fly in the Northeast.

I think the controllers were probably expecting you to fly an approach. In my experience of flying into TPL,
Gray Approach would have begun vectoring you 30 or 40 miles out towards the segment of the expected approach
to join just prior to the FAF. Typically, vectoring does not cause any extra delay into TPL.

I don't think I like the idea of dropping down below 700 foot clouds very far from the field. I'm right at
the speed limit in the BE350 and there are lots of towers out there, especially northeast of TPL.

Actually, they were originally expecting me to fly a visual approach. They vectored me to the field from the
south, and called "TPL 3 'oclock 1 mile" but that broken cloud layer kept me from seeing the field almost just
below me. So he vectored me in the direction of a downwind "outbound" for ILS-15. But as I got a mile or two
north of the airport I the layer suddenly ended, and I could see the field and that I could easily maintain it
visually... Thus the request for the contact, because I didn't think it was VFR conditions at the time...

Cheers!
John Clonts
Temple, Texas
N7NZ