Briefing an approach plate, especially while flying

My approach plate briefing, especially while flying, could use some
improvement. I received my instrument rating last March and have about 75
hours of actual IMC time since then, but I honestly feel my briefing of the
chart is not as thorough as it must be for optimum situational awareness.

I am not just referring to frequencies and approach minimums, but rather
the plethora of other information, such as highest nearby obstacle, minimum
safe altitude, maximum safe distance ring, etc. Although I try to brief an
approach during the lower workload of cruise flight, I discovered that I am
still missing some pertinent information.

Perhaps I should consider designing a checklist of sorts, but in the mean
time I am curious what tips the more seasoned instrument pilots have to
offer.

Oh, worth mentioning is that I use Jeppesen's approach plates and I do fly
in an aircraft equipped with a dual axis AP.

--
Peter












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You are cluttering your mind with unnecessary data. If you fly at an
assigned altitude or the altitude shown on the plate for a black line, you
can forget about the MSA (which is not an operational altitude), the highest
obstacle, and maximum safe distance...whatever that is. Frequencies,
courses, altitudes, and the miss procedure are enough.

Bob Gardner

"Peter R." wrote in message
...
My approach plate briefing, especially while flying, could use some
improvement. I received my instrument rating last March and have about 75
hours of actual IMC time since then, but I honestly feel my briefing of
the
chart is not as thorough as it must be for optimum situational awareness.

I am not just referring to frequencies and approach minimums, but rather
the plethora of other information, such as highest nearby obstacle,
minimum
safe altitude, maximum safe distance ring, etc. Although I try to brief
an
approach during the lower workload of cruise flight, I discovered that I
am
still missing some pertinent information.

Perhaps I should consider designing a checklist of sorts, but in the mean
time I am curious what tips the more seasoned instrument pilots have to
offer.

Oh, worth mentioning is that I use Jeppesen's approach plates and I do fly
in an aircraft equipped with a dual axis AP.

--
Peter












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Doesn't hurt to look real quick at the MSA rings just to get a real rough idea
of the underlying terrain. KIPT, for instance has a mountain just to the left
of the localizer, and I think you'd want to know that is there if you can't see
it. No need to memorize the heights, jsut a rough mental sketch of the minimum
safe altitudes is enough. Why? well if something goes wrong at least you know
which way not to turn...

Bob Gardner wrote:

You are cluttering your mind with unnecessary data. If you fly at an
assigned altitude or the altitude shown on the plate for a black line, you
can forget about the MSA (which is not an operational altitude), the highest
obstacle, and maximum safe distance...whatever that is. Frequencies,
courses, altitudes, and the miss procedure are enough.

Bob Gardner

"Peter R." wrote in message
...
My approach plate briefing, especially while flying, could use some
improvement. I received my instrument rating last March and have about 75
hours of actual IMC time since then, but I honestly feel my briefing of
the
chart is not as thorough as it must be for optimum situational awareness.

I am not just referring to frequencies and approach minimums, but rather
the plethora of other information, such as highest nearby obstacle,
minimum
safe altitude, maximum safe distance ring, etc. Although I try to brief
an
approach during the lower workload of cruise flight, I discovered that I
am
still missing some pertinent information.

Perhaps I should consider designing a checklist of sorts, but in the mean
time I am curious what tips the more seasoned instrument pilots have to
offer.

Oh, worth mentioning is that I use Jeppesen's approach plates and I do fly
in an aircraft equipped with a dual axis AP.

--
Peter












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--
--Ray Andraka, P.E.
President, the Andraka Consulting Group, Inc.
401/884-7930 Fax 401/884-7950
email
http://www.andraka.com

"They that give up essential liberty to obtain a little
temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
-Benjamin Franklin, 1759

This is not a matter of regulation, of course, and it is not covered in the
AIM...more of a personal preference thing, unless there is a company SOP
requiring it. I won't pretend that I have thousands of hours flying jets,
but I do have hundreds, and I was never taught to brief those items nor were
they included in company SOPs...and we were moving fast enough to make
mistakes very costly.

Bob Gardner

"Ray Andraka" wrote in message
...
Doesn't hurt to look real quick at the MSA rings just to get a real rough
idea
of the underlying terrain. KIPT, for instance has a mountain just to the
left
of the localizer, and I think you'd want to know that is there if you
can't see
it. No need to memorize the heights, jsut a rough mental sketch of the
minimum
safe altitudes is enough. Why? well if something goes wrong at least you
know
which way not to turn...

Bob Gardner wrote:

You are cluttering your mind with unnecessary data. If you fly at an
assigned altitude or the altitude shown on the plate for a black line,
you
can forget about the MSA (which is not an operational altitude), the
highest
obstacle, and maximum safe distance...whatever that is. Frequencies,
courses, altitudes, and the miss procedure are enough.

Bob Gardner

"Peter R." wrote in message
...
My approach plate briefing, especially while flying, could use some
improvement. I received my instrument rating last March and have
about 75
hours of actual IMC time since then, but I honestly feel my briefing
of
the
chart is not as thorough as it must be for optimum situational
awareness.

I am not just referring to frequencies and approach minimums, but
rather
the plethora of other information, such as highest nearby obstacle,
minimum
safe altitude, maximum safe distance ring, etc. Although I try to
brief
an
approach during the lower workload of cruise flight, I discovered that
I
am
still missing some pertinent information.

Perhaps I should consider designing a checklist of sorts, but in the
mean
time I am curious what tips the more seasoned instrument pilots have
to
offer.

Oh, worth mentioning is that I use Jeppesen's approach plates and I do
fly
in an aircraft equipped with a dual axis AP.

--
Peter












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100,000
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--
--Ray Andraka, P.E.
President, the Andraka Consulting Group, Inc.
401/884-7930 Fax 401/884-7950
email
http://www.andraka.com

"They that give up essential liberty to obtain a little
temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
-Benjamin Franklin, 1759

Many charts say ADF required or DME required. This is sometimes
overlooked until the last minute.

This may sound obvious, but make sure that you are briefing the
correct chart. Around here we have many ILS Rwy 24, and I have had
students confuse one with another.




Ray Andraka wrote in message ...
Doesn't hurt to look real quick at the MSA rings just to get a real rough idea
of the underlying terrain. KIPT, for instance has a mountain just to the left
of the localizer, and I think you'd want to know that is there if you can't see
it. No need to memorize the heights, jsut a rough mental sketch of the minimum
safe altitudes is enough. Why? well if something goes wrong at least you know
which way not to turn...

Bob Gardner wrote:

You are cluttering your mind with unnecessary data. If you fly at an
assigned altitude or the altitude shown on the plate for a black line, you
can forget about the MSA (which is not an operational altitude), the highest
obstacle, and maximum safe distance...whatever that is. Frequencies,
courses, altitudes, and the miss procedure are enough.

Bob Gardner

"Peter R." wrote in message
...
My approach plate briefing, especially while flying, could use some
improvement. I received my instrument rating last March and have about 75
hours of actual IMC time since then, but I honestly feel my briefing of
the
chart is not as thorough as it must be for optimum situational awareness.

I am not just referring to frequencies and approach minimums, but rather
the plethora of other information, such as highest nearby obstacle,
minimum
safe altitude, maximum safe distance ring, etc. Although I try to brief
an
approach during the lower workload of cruise flight, I discovered that I
am
still missing some pertinent information.

Perhaps I should consider designing a checklist of sorts, but in the mean
time I am curious what tips the more seasoned instrument pilots have to
offer.

Oh, worth mentioning is that I use Jeppesen's approach plates and I do fly
in an aircraft equipped with a dual axis AP.

--
Peter












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--
--Ray Andraka, P.E.
President, the Andraka Consulting Group, Inc.
401/884-7930 Fax 401/884-7950
email
http://www.andraka.com

"They that give up essential liberty to obtain a little
temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
-Benjamin Franklin, 1759

(Andrew Sarangan) wrote:
Many charts say ADF required or DME required. This is sometimes
overlooked until the last minute.

You should have noticed that in your pre-flight planning. Mistakes like
that are common in training, where you're doing approach after approach,
but on a real flight, you really should look at the aproaches into your
destination (and alternate) before you even get in the airplane. It's
really embarrassing to get where you're going only to discover you can't
land because you can't fly any of the approaches.

This may sound obvious, but make sure that you are briefing the
correct chart. Around here we have many ILS Rwy 24, and I have had
students confuse one with another.

Yup. I watched a student do that last week (Hi, Evan!). POU has a
VOR-DME 6 and a VOR-DME 24. We were near the IAF for the 24 approach
when he called up NY Approach and asked for the "vectors to the VOR-DME
approach". He had the 6 plate out, and didn't realize there was also a
24 approach.

The controller gave us vectors to final (for 24), and while my student
did pick up on the fact that the vector we got didn't seem to make
sense, he didn't figure out what was going on. I think the controller
added to the confusion by saying something like "cleared VOR-DME
approach" without mentioning *which* VOR-DME approach it was.

I think the take-home lesson is that if something doesn't make sense
while flying an approach, don't just keep going hoping it'll fall into
place later. If you get a vector that seems wrong, ask the controller
what's going on.

On Tue, 09 Mar 2004 18:39:52 GMT, "Bob Gardner"
wrote:

Frequencies,
courses, altitudes, and the miss procedure are enough.

Yes, but FCAM doesn't make for a good mnemonic. ;]

Hmm... come to think of it, it's better than most.

Is that 75 hours of actual or 75 hours of IFR flying? 75 hours of actual is
a lot in a year.
Just curious.


"Peter R." wrote in message
...
My approach plate briefing, especially while flying, could use some
improvement. I received my instrument rating last March and have about 75
hours of actual IMC time since then, but I honestly feel my briefing of
the
chart is not as thorough as it must be for optimum situational awareness.

I am not just referring to frequencies and approach minimums, but rather
the plethora of other information, such as highest nearby obstacle,
minimum
safe altitude, maximum safe distance ring, etc. Although I try to brief
an
approach during the lower workload of cruise flight, I discovered that I
am
still missing some pertinent information.

Perhaps I should consider designing a checklist of sorts, but in the mean
time I am curious what tips the more seasoned instrument pilots have to
offer.

Oh, worth mentioning is that I use Jeppesen's approach plates and I do fly
in an aircraft equipped with a dual axis AP.

--
Peter












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Peter MacPherson ) wrote:

Is that 75 hours of actual or 75 hours of IFR flying? 75 hours of actual is
a lot in a year.
Just curious.

75 actual. About 20 of those I received during instrument training last
winter. I fly mainly in the Northeast US and am based at an airport
downwind of Lake Ontario. LO throws off a lot of moisture. In the summer
we have many days of low clouds and rain and in the winter we have many
days of low clouds and lake effect snow events.

Most of the remaining IMC hours I accumulated by flying missions for Angel
Flight Northeast. IMO, flying for AF is an excellent way to develop and
retain proficiency, as it offers mission-oriented flying that must be given
a lot of thought before canceling flights, unlike a typical $100 hamburger
run.

--
Peter












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Peter, out of curiosity, what percentage of your total time since you got your rating
are in actual IMC? I'm based in the Northeast as well (KPVD), also fly for Angel
Flight when I can get away from work. Without looking at my logbook, I'd guess that
about 10% of my time is in actual. More often than not I only in get a couple of
tenths of actual in a flight. If the weather is low, the tops are usually also low
and at 6000' you often wind up on top or between layers. If you are flying 750 hours
a year or so, I am truely envious. Could be a difference in what you log as actual.
I only log actual for the time when I am in IMC, not on top or between layers with
good visibility.

"Peter R." wrote:

Peter MacPherson ) wrote:

Is that 75 hours of actual or 75 hours of IFR flying? 75 hours of actual is
a lot in a year.
Just curious.

75 actual. About 20 of those I received during instrument training last
winter. I fly mainly in the Northeast US and am based at an airport
downwind of Lake Ontario. LO throws off a lot of moisture. In the summer
we have many days of low clouds and rain and in the winter we have many
days of low clouds and lake effect snow events.

Most of the remaining IMC hours I accumulated by flying missions for Angel
Flight Northeast. IMO, flying for AF is an excellent way to develop and
retain proficiency, as it offers mission-oriented flying that must be given
a lot of thought before canceling flights, unlike a typical $100 hamburger
run.

--
Peter

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--
--Ray Andraka, P.E.
President, the Andraka Consulting Group, Inc.
401/884-7930 Fax 401/884-7950
email
http://www.andraka.com

"They that give up essential liberty to obtain a little
temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
-Benjamin Franklin, 1759