Minimum Speed In The Terminal Area

EDUC8-or

Well-Known Member
It is my understanding for turbojets the minimum speed ATC can assign in the terminal area is 210 knots unless you are within 20nm of the landing runway and the speed then becomes 170. Is there some sort of loophole that I missing?

Reason I'm asking is my company operates the CRJ-200, which doesn't have slats. The controllers at our biggest base are notorious for assigning 160 and even 150, sometimes beyond 20 miles from the landing runway. This causes us to configure off schedule and sometimes many miles out. Doesn't sound like a big deal, but when you configure off schedule you can miss things (like checklists).
 
It is my understanding for turbojets the minimum speed ATC can assign in the terminal area is 210 knots unless you are within 20nm of the landing runway and the speed then becomes 170. Is there some sort of loophole that I missing?

From 7110.65, 5-7-3 MINIMA

b. When an operational advantage will be realized, speeds lower than the recommended minima may be applied.
 
when i worked at Oakland center I was taught that you cannot ASSIGN speeds lower than those listed in the .65 without FIRST getting PILOT CONCURRENCE. if a pilot requests a slower speed (for whatever reason) then it's assignable then also.

needless to say i've issued speeds lower than those listed as minimum assignable speeds before. i had somebody doing 200 knots max and needed an ERJ to either get vectored around to stay behind or decrease speed to match. I asked the ERJ if he was able to maintain 200 knots and he said he was indeed able to. so i assigned 200 knots to a jet and was perfectly legal.
 
when i worked at Oakland center I was taught that you cannot ASSIGN speeds lower than those listed in the .65 without FIRST getting PILOT CONCURRENCE. if a pilot requests a slower speed (for whatever reason) then it's assignable then also.

needless to say i've issued speeds lower than those listed as minimum assignable speeds before. i had somebody doing 200 knots max and needed an ERJ to either get vectored around to stay behind or decrease speed to match. I asked the ERJ if he was able to maintain 200 knots and he said he was indeed able to. so i assigned 200 knots to a jet and was perfectly legal.

That's my understanding, speeds lower than those listed cannot be assigned, but they do that all the time in Charlotte. I try to help out where I can, but if I'm in the CRJ-200 and we're heavy the slowest I'll accept is 170, especially when ATC asks for 150 25 miles out. The controllers here get can very unprofessional when the slowest you'll go is 170, we had a fed in the jumpseat and the final controller gave us a "Good luck, hope you don't have to go around." before handing us off to the tower, the fed was taking some notes on that one.
 
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