-
Please take a moment and update your account profile. If you have an updated account profile with basic information on why you are on Air Warriors it will help other people respond to your posts. How do you update your profile you ask?
Go here:
Edit Account Details and Profile
Clint Eastwood and joys of being an unrestricted aviator
- Thread starter Dawgfan
- Start date
When requesting the break, on occasion I had tower respond with "Call the numbers" due to traffic situation.
phrogpilot73
Well-Known Member
Umm, is that because you're NOT a helo guy?!? Not saying it happens all the time - but if you're gyro's caged to look for fixed wing, we get overlooked sometimes.
mtsupilot09
"We lookin fo you. We gon find you!"
Didn't know he was a pilot. FWIW, Tim McGraw has been taking lessons in an SR22 out of BNA. He came into the FBO I work at the other day. I started to marshal him in, and he didn't even park close to where I wanted him to. I was thinking, "Who is this idiot? Can't even follow my hand signals." Then he hopped out and walked over to a BBJ sitting about 100 yards away. In regards to helos, Alan Jackson has a Bell 206 that he uses to get from his farm to his hangar in Nashville (about 20 miles distance) to access his King Air or Falcon.
phrogpilot73
Well-Known Member
So is taking off from a parallel taxiway unheard of by you. But it still happens.
Did anyone who's nitpicking actually listen?!? Tower said "I still don't have you in sight." There could be a myriad of reasons for it.
Towers don't always have scopes, and if that airport doesn't have its own approach they wouldn't have gotten a handoff, esp since he was VFR.
Tower isn't going to ask you to IDENT; they are looking for you visually, not by correlating your voice to a radar contact. Approach is using your (IFF) squawk to ID and control traffic.
I was on short final to Felker AAF the other day before they had me in sight. Helos can be hard to see, especially little GA helos, especially when they're below the horizon and you can lose them in the terrain.
You can always get the following:
Helo: Tower, PT B for the active
Tower: Not in sight from tower. Landing is at your own risk. Report safe on deck.
Helo: Taking the risk.....Tower, XX safe on deck, taxi to my line.
You can always get the following:
Helo: Tower, PT B for the active
Tower: Not in sight from tower. Landing is at your own risk. Report safe on deck.
Helo: Taking the risk.....Tower, XX safe on deck, taxi to my line.
Happens quite a bit for us rotorheads. Like phrogpilot73 said, if your gyro is not caged to look for helicopters, we're sometimes hard to see. Remember: We're covered under paragraph (d) of FAR 91.119 (Reader's Digest: We're not restricted to staying above 1000' AGL over populated areas/500' AGL over non-populated areas), so we're often much lower than most people are used to looking. Additionally, we can (and do) enter airports from any which way (unless otherwise directed, we're required to avoid the flow of fixed-wing traffic).
The tower controller was not looking at a radar, nor was he looking at the approach corridor - he was looking out over the airport for a low, dark (black?) helicopter which was most likely hidden by the dark terrain behind it. Not the easiest thing to see. As you saw, though, a simple talk-on is all it takes most of the time.
(BTW, some places require you to stop squawk - NFG is a perfect example. You maintain your squawk until you ENTER their Delta, then you strangle your parrot.)
Testify, brother! We regularly operate to/from non-standard areas on airports: Taxiways, intersections, ramps, etc. In fact, it's pretty much the norm for towered airports. It gets us in/out of their airspace quickly, and keeps the runway open for airplanes.
One of my Top 10 favorite aviation phrases: "(Callsign), from present position, you are cleared for takeoff..."
Yeah I guess I just meant that it seemed strange that he could just "sneak" up on the tower controller......but yeah, I suppose tower getting visual contact would be a seperate issue from sqwak. Definitely saw one helo type and student bring a T-34 into tower airspace without them ever seeing them (or hearing from them 
)
)
D_Rob
Lead LTJG
It might not even be a towered airport, he might have just been talking to another a/c in the pattern or taxing.
"Aircraft on downwind, state callsign ... aircraft on crosswind, state callsign ... aircraft on short finial, state callsign ... aircraft on landing roll out, state callsign ... aircraft on alpha taxiway, state callsign ... Hey tony, can you go tell that plane to call me..."
Definitely saw one helo type and student bring a T-34 into tower airspace without them ever seeing them (or hearing from them
"Aircraft on downwind, state callsign ... aircraft on crosswind, state callsign ... aircraft on short finial, state callsign ... aircraft on landing roll out, state callsign ... aircraft on alpha taxiway, state callsign ... Hey tony, can you go tell that plane to call me..."
My favorite call to tower is "610 Request takeoff from present position for departure to (direction away from runway) will remain 150 feet and below."
I have never had a tower shoot that one down. It's always "Roger, clear for takeoff at own discretion, remain clear of active, squak 1200..good day."
Giving the guy in the tower (especially a busy one) an opportunity to simplify his problem is an easy choice. It's also easier to fly a mile or two out of the way than it is to taxi around an unfamiliar airport and wait 15 minutes to take off.
I have never had a tower shoot that one down. It's always "Roger, clear for takeoff at own discretion, remain clear of active, squak 1200..good day."
Giving the guy in the tower (especially a busy one) an opportunity to simplify his problem is an easy choice. It's also easier to fly a mile or two out of the way than it is to taxi around an unfamiliar airport and wait 15 minutes to take off.
It's always great when tower treats you like a helo as opposed to an aircraft. I've spent 11mo of my life flying out of Bahrain Int'l, and of those 11mo, I'm pretty sure 2mo were spent at the hold short waiting for traffic on 10mi final. Despite our VTOL capability, they never cleared us to depart present position, the parallel or any other sensible option. we always had to taxi to the active and play with the airliners. It didn't help that the Bahraini controllers had a very small comfort zone. FCFing, by the way, was a joy unto itself.