Aviation > Pilot/Controller Forum
IFR Departure and Return Question
mikenftsmith:
Instead of worring if what the tower did was legal,I would be more worried that my pre flight prepartion did not catch the approaching convective activity near my time of departure.
madHATR:
A contact approach is actually not a "radar approach," and a tower controller could clear you for it... but you'd have to initiate it. Also, they'd have to keep you 1000' below IFR traffic but above the MSA without assigning a fixed altitude. (Clearance of clouds requirements and all that.) The big thing there is that the controller can't even suggest it.
As for SVFR, in your situation the tower controller would most likely approve it if they didn't have any conflicting IFR traffic. SVFR frightens a lot of controllers as it hovers in that "no man's land" you mentioned between a VFR operation and an IFR operation... but essentially it's VFR at less than VFR mins. They'd give you another "maintain at or below ..." instruction to ensure you were 500' away from any overflying IFR traffic and bring you back.
But yeah... they should have opted for one of these or done the completely inefficient thing and shipped you off to the radar facility to be vectored around for an instrument approach. However I completely agree with you about "sometimes the best decision won't always leave all the t's crossed and i's dotted." The point at the end of the day is that you got down and safe before the weather hit, even if they could have covered everyone's butt a little better.
My two cents! Love to hear any other ATC perspectives on the whole SVFR thing.
Contact Approaches: JO 7110.65S: 7-4-6, AIM: 5-4-24, 5-5-3
Special VFR: JO 7110.65S: 7-5-all, 14 CFR 91.157
KSYR-pjr:
Ah, okay, so it was IFR conditions, which I see now you stated in your original post. Confusion has been put to bed. Personally I don't have the answer to your question regarding legality, but as a fellow IFR GA pilot I have a couple of points to offer:
1) Unless the convective activity was within five miles of the airport (and as mike pointed out, your preflight planning would have shown this and most likely prevented you from departing in the first place) and conditions were deteriorating too fast, what would the harm have been of continuing the flight to departure and then requesting vectors to an approach back to the airport? As IFR pilots we are always seeking out real instrument approaches to keep us proficient and it seemed there was one opportunity for an approach in real conditions. I don't really see the same urgency in returning to the runway under your scenario while still with tower controller, unless of course there was some type of other emergency, which trumps other regulations and makes this subject moot.
2) A question for controllers - I recall a Usenet exchange a few years back about the tower controller being authorized to clear an aircraft for an approach. However I don't remember the outcome whether the tower controller has this authority. Anyone?
In my opinion, marineman, you are always wise to file a NASA report anytime you might question the legality of a situation. Nice move, there.
sykocus:
--- Quote from: marineman on March 07, 2009, 06:23:49 PM ---Thanks for your reply. I was very close to the airport (in sight) when I told the tower controller that I would like to return and land. Very quickly I received a landing clearance followed by my asking if I should squawk VFR or remain on my present code. I never canceled IFR. Was told to remain on the present code and landed uneventfully. Just filed a NASA report, though. I thought of canceling and asking for a Special VFR, but doing that would put me in "no man's land", i.e. operating VFR at a tower controlled airport that is IFR and hoping that the controller will issue me a Special VFR clearance. Other than declaring an emergency I don't know of any other way to immediately return to the departure airport without wondering about the legalities. It happened so quickly and sometimes the best decision won't always leave all the t's crossed and i's dotted.
--- End quote ---
IMO you were in no man's land: IFR but landing w/o an IFR approach or canceling IFR. You couldn't do the latter because the reported wx was IFR. You didn't want the former because you wanted to land quickly. SVFR would have been a compromise between the two. Don't get me wrong, I understand why you did what you did, but your closeness to the airport or amount of time you had been in the air doesn't have any bearing on the legality of what happened.
--- Quote from: KSYR-pjr on March 07, 2009, 09:31:33 PM ---
2) A question for controllers - I recall a Usenet exchange a few years back about the tower controller being authorized to clear an aircraft for an approach. However I don't remember the outcome whether the tower controller has this authority. Anyone?
--- End quote ---
In the LOA's we have with all our towers it specifically states they must ask before clearing a/c for visual approaches, but they can always ask. I don't know about instrument approaches. There might be a tower out there somewhere that has that ability (without asking permission first), but it would seem strange to me.
mkop:
I'm confused. Even if you're flying IFR, you can still be cleared for a visual approach, which is essentially what you did, no? What was illegal?
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