Invovled in major incident.....need advice regarading NASA ASRS

I don't agree with you John. Landing without a clearance and without declaring or attempting(7600/7700) to declare an emergency is unacceptable. I'd count myself lucky that nobody filed a HATR on me and do like he did with that ASRS report. It sounds like Alchemy knew in hindsight he should have gone out away from the pattern, troubleshot, and then looked for the signals. I'm assuming he was in VMC the entire time with a good engine, so there wasn't a need to rush. Rushing tends to lead to leaving the gear up or other bad things...especially with what we consider to be an emergency. We had an instructor who crossed an active runway without clearance because the he couldn't hear any transmissions. He decided he could visually clear the runway himself since he couldn't see any lightguns. Turns out the volume on that radio was turned down.
 
I was given some great advice on my Stage III check for my private (with a guy named Ralph Butcher; he wrote a few aviation books and also does articles for Flight Training magazine; great fun flying with him!).

Anyways he said that if the FAA ever came barking up my tree; tell them that I did what I determined to be the 'safest course of action'.

In your case, Alchemy, regardless of clearances, it's always better to be on the ground safely than in the air with a problem; assuming a landing is safe.

It is sad that us pilots can work most any problem safely and walk away; only to have the FAA screaming down our shirts after the fact... Not to condone landing without a clearance in a non-emergency...
 
Lost Comm in IMC today

Funny we had this thread recently... I had a bunch of 'firsts' today: first solo flight in IMC, first approach to an IFR airport... oh yeah and first lost comm in IMC... my radios quit on climbout into a 900' overcast
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Everything was fine in the runup and taxi (and I always check BOTH radios prior to departure).

Takeoff is normal... seemed like just after I left the ground I heard a nice big buzzzzzZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ in my ears.... and nothing more.

Way to much static to make anything out.... nor could I transmit anything. I was supposed to get radar vectors to my initial fix.... didn't happen obviously so I flew to my altitude (timer running for my expected altitude in 10min). I always figure the course to my first fix without vectors, so I already had it in NAV2... turned toward it, made out a 'climb to 3000' from all the noise and acknowledged....

Broke out on top of the clouds and had time to get the transciever connected to my headset (I always keep it ready... but I didn't want to take my eyes and hands off the controls / instruments with the problem combined with just having gone IMC after departure...)

The rest of the flight was pretty much uneventful; I couldn't ID any VORs; everything appeared as it should have though. I did get some crappy vectors onto the ILS... had to chop and drop to get down and intercept the GS; also a nice and late turn onto the LOC.

Broke out at 600 above mins; saw the airport at 400 above minimums, landed an had a nice sigh of relief after taxiing to transient
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I take back everything bad I've ever said about transcievers... That flight was tough enough having to fiddle with the xciever and figure everything out; It'd be even harder to not have anyone to talk to; and the good old ICOM actually worked for once (contrary to Murphy).

In hindsight I think I did a good job... my only major mistake was forgetting to squawk 7600; especially when I had to turn direct to my initial fix instead of getting vectored; however I could defend myself: aviate, navigate, communicate... and #1 and 2 were the only thing on my mind at that point. I can definately see how easy it'd be to forget somthing after coping with the stress of one problem, and end up with problems on top of problems.

Another thing that helped was the fact that I had practically memorized the flight; I didn't need to look at my chart to figure everything out after going lost comm and suddenly NOT having the luxiury of radar vectors; plus I had my 'direct to' bearing already set in NAV2.

Alchemy... transcievers are great; I am a newfound believer in them
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From what I read it seems your judgement was sound, and you acted with caution, it was just not the way the controller wanted it to work out, and wanted to talk to you for the sole purpose of venting. The one danger of light gun signals are you can easily miss them, especially towards the later stages of the flight.
Filling out a NASA report is always a good idea when things do not go as planned like this, but most of all use it as a learning experience. We have all made mistake that make us feel crap after landing, but at the same time these are the flights we learn so much from.
Do not be scared of controllers, by no means are they an authority over you. He can not take away your license, but only report you, much you like can he if you feel he lacks judgement. I have heard pilots ask for the phone number of a tower before, it is not always the other way around.
Just put this into your experience pile, we have all had flights like this. Learning from it is the main thing.
Not too long ago I had a similar flight, busy class Charlie, took off and my radios were so unclear it was unreal. Well we basically flew the pattern understanding very little of what was said, heck I am not sure if I was cleared to land. I did my best and used ectreme caution and that is about all you can do.
 
A very good point was brought up in this thread - light gun signals can be very hard to see especially at a tower in a populated/city area. You have to be looking directly at the tower as you keep control of the aircraft, the controller must realize that you're lost comm, keep the signals going directly at you, and do all of his other work at the same time. When I was instructing I ALWAYS made sure that I did practice light gun signals at a tower at night with all of my students so they can see themselves that if it ever happens it's not going to be as easy as the books say it will be. I would recommend everyone ask the controller to shoot some light gun signals at ya' next time you fly at night - as long as they're not busy they'll prbably accomdate you - it's not a big deal for them to do it.

Jason
 
I'm suprised I missed this thread but it was created during my annual recurrent so's that's why I did!

We had a pretty NASTY runway incursion years ago (and don't ask me details because I'm not going to tell you!)

But the controller was initially pissed, didn't file paperwork, the other pilot blew it off and my other pilot on my crew blew it off.

Me? I filed an ASRS report just in case. It's free, de-identified and goes to improving the aviation system. If someone decided to reneg on their "Hey man, mistakes happen, don't worry about it", even though I wasn't in control of the aircraft, violations are always issued in pairs and I wanted to be covered.

It's free insurance, and if you don't need it, it's more or less "refundable" by getting the situation/scenario into the ASRS system to help us all.
 
I don't agree with you John. Landing without a clearance and without declaring or attempting(7600/7700) to declare an emergency is unacceptable. I'd count myself lucky that nobody filed a HATR on me and do like he did with that ASRS report. It sounds like Alchemy knew in hindsight he should have gone out away from the pattern, troubleshot, and then looked for the signals. I'm assuming he was in VMC the entire time with a good engine, so there wasn't a need to rush. Rushing tends to lead to leaving the gear up or other bad things...

I was actually thinking "I know I haven't been cleared to land, but he told me to make close pattern and he knows I was going to land". This line of thought was just plain STUPID. The rules are you don't land at a towered field without a clearance and I disregarded them because I was in DENIAL about what was happening. I wanted to believe that I didn't really have a comm failure and put off doing radio checks as long as possible. I thought I was just being paranoid because it was night time!!!! Denial. I don't remember if it's in the FAA's "hazardous attitudes" list, but it will definitely make my personal list! I should've "gone with my gut" and taken immediate action instead of second guessing my insticts about the comm failure, especially in a situation like pattern work where you don't have much time to think about things if something goes wrong.

It was night and MVFR conditions (2000 broken or thereabouts), good enough for pattern work though. I should've gone missed on final once I realized I was not going to get a clearance, squawked 7600 right then, then headed away from the airport to troubleshoolt unless I saw a green light first.

Ed, sounds like you coped pretty well with your lost comm adventure. Man, I really wish I would've brough a pilot-friend up with me on that night flight. That extra headset in the right seat would've been an incredible help. I still want to know how my headset cord got knocked loose in the first place.
 
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Ed, sounds like you coped pretty well with your lost comm adventure. Man, I really wish I would've brough a pilot-friend up with me on that night flight. That extra headset in the right seat would've been an incredible help.

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It was a good thing Ed's most frequent passenger did not go flying with him, he ended up being the ride home!
 
Regarding light gun signals. While at Delta Connection Academy, I got the opportunity to tour the tower at Orlando/Sanford and I think I know the reason you guys may not be seeing the lights clearly. Number one reason, old lights! They tower had two set's of lights and demonstrated the difference in brightness by shining them on the floor. The old lights looked almost like a dull, dyng flashlight, yet they had full power (plugged in) the new light was amaingly bright! They said at night they sometimes could even flash the light toward Orlando Executive and their tower could actually see the new light! This could very well be the reason.

My suggestion, next time up for training, as tower, time permitting, to give you some light-gun signals. They usually don't mind as they need the practice and it let's you know what exactly it looks like from the air. I did that and was shocked that they look nothing like you expect them to look like.
 
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You did good to file the ASRS with Nasa. Don't worry about it. You were subject to ATC intimidation after you landed. Some controllers like to do this. You would have been perfectly within your rights to hang up on him.

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Some ATC controllers are about as worthless as some pilots. Reminds me a little of an incident I had with ATC.

Was flying a C-182 about 2 years ago. Landed at a small towered airport in AZ, and was given the clearance "Skylane XXX, turn left onto Bravo, contact ground." by the tower as I was rolling out after landing. Since there were only 2 other aircraft around at all, 1 entering the pattern and 1 in the run-up area, I figured that (time: @ 1730) the tower controller was just "shotgunning" both tower and ground freqs; hence the clearance to exit the runway, enter the taxi, then contact ground. So I exit the runway at one of the intersections, turn left onto the Bravo taxiway, and then switch to ground to give them a courtesy call. At the end of my courtesy call to ground: "Ground, Skylane XXX, eastbound on Bravo for east parking;" I get from the female on ground: "Skylane XXX, be advised, you MUST contact ground and get clearance before entering an active taxiway, blah blah blah, give the tower a call after shutdown," in a very bitchy tone.

So I shutdown and call tower, to where she proceeds to bitch me out again and asks for my "numbers" for some paperwork. I explain that the clearance I was given told me to turn left onto Bravo, then contact ground. Had I been given the clearance with the taxiway name and intersection, then I would've held short of the taxiway, ie: "Skylane XXX, turn left/exit Bravo-6, contact ground." So the onus was on them to read me a more specific clearance if that's what they wanted me to do. So far as safety being an issue, the only other plane was in the runup area, and I wouldn't just enter a taxiway without checking left/right first.

Anyhow, she still wanted my "numbers". I told her I didn't know what she was talking about. She asked for my FAA certificate number. I told her "Certificate? I don't have an FAA certificate, I'm a military pilot and don't have anything from the FAA...." To which she replied incredously:

"WHAT! Sir, you're required to have an FAA issued pilot's certificate in order to operate civil aircraft in the United States, blaah, blah, blah."

"Ma'am, the military didn't say anything about an FAA certificate, they told us that if we could fly a fighter, we could fly anything"

"What is your name, sir?"

"I'm sorry, I can't give that out"

"What base are you from?"

"I'm sorry, I'd love to help with your paperwork, but if you have any issues, you'll really need to contact the Department of Defense, they can help with any questions you may have. Have a nice day, nice talking to you." And hung up.

Haven't heard a thing since.

It's incredible, the FAA can even take action against one's civilian pilot certificates if they have a violation while flying a military aircraft; an operation where the civilian certificate privileges aren't even being exercised under. What a crock. That's why in the military, our military flight plans we file (that go to the FSS), we just put "on file" for the entry that asks for name, rank, and SSN.

FAA can be bastards at times.
 
Another thing pilots can do to protect themselves is to ask for the controller's initials. Lots of pilots don't know that and controllers take advantage of this. In fact, I've seen controllers make mistakes, then scream on the frequency and blame the pilot. Well the tower tapes can be requested and are kept for ten days, so you can always ask them to play back the tape. And the controllers have to answer to the FSDO if their initials are reported.
 
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