Originally Posted by
Busboy
With our history? Really? So tell me, what was our history prior to the stabilized approach required criteria?
Seriously...I think you'd be hard pressed to find many line pilots that think all the money spent on Blue Threat training and all the fancy magazines, books, etc., is worth it. So far, the meaningful information could have been condensed into about 4hrs of GS.
I do play by the rules. And, my approaches meet the stabilized criteria. My point is that somebody(?) decided that 500ft was the minimum altitude to be stabilized for VMC conditions. It's an arbitrary number. Doesn't necessarily mean that less than that is unsafe. It just means that's our rule. What if the number they came up with for a stabilized altitude had been 700ft? Would not being stable at 600ft be unsafe?
Apparently someone willing to pay the bill has decided that our safety record and/or culture justified the expense of all those safety related items you listed. Somebody also decided 250 below 10K was the limit. Is that any safer than 260 or 265?
Unlike the FAR example, being stable earlier on an approach rather than later does actually make a safer approach. Maybe your airplane has an automated callout at 600' or 700', but mine doesn't. Mine only has them at 1K and every 100' interval starting at 500'. Seems that might be a great reason to pick that "arbitrary number".
I'm not sure if you're just arguing for arguements sake, or you really think pushing this approach is defensible. Hope it's the former.