Author Topic: DCA: late takeoff & go-around due to radio interference  (Read 4530 times)

Offline eboelter

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DCA: late takeoff & go-around due to radio interference
« on: January 09, 2019, 03:47:54 PM »
KDCA tower at 1950 UTC on 9 January 2019
« Last Edit: January 09, 2019, 04:42:49 PM by Fryy »



Offline VASAviation

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Re: DCA: late takeoff & go-around due to radio interference
« Reply #1 on: January 10, 2019, 03:46:15 PM »
Thank you for sharing, eboelter.

Is it known the cause of the interference? It sounds like a hot mic at some point but I'm not really sure.

Offline flyflyfly

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Re: DCA: late takeoff & go-around due to radio interference
« Reply #2 on: January 11, 2019, 11:57:28 AM »
Certainly sounded like a hot mike. You can hear the usual humming sound of two transmitters interfering. Also, there's some background noise suggesting it's a hot mike.

The hot mike could have been in 5512, the aircraft sitting on the runway waiting for its takeoff clearance: after the event they said "5512, we never heard *any* transmission...". Well, when there's a hot mike, there's usually only exactly one aircraft which did not hearing anything... :-) Everyone else would at least have heard some humming and garbled comms...
« Last Edit: January 11, 2019, 12:00:15 PM by flyflyfly »

Offline eboelter

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Re: DCA: late takeoff & go-around due to radio interference
« Reply #3 on: January 11, 2019, 01:46:55 PM »
I wasn't clear what the tower meant by his reference to working a helicopter and it being an issue at "local control".  I wonder if light guns were used at any point? 

Also, unrelated, it seems to me KDCA is using runway 4 more frequently.  I'd be curious to find out how its use is determined if anyone knows.