circle to land VMC only
 

can someone please give me the definition in laymen terms about his type limitation on the crj?

you can fly an instrument approach to a circle, but you have to be in visual conditions to shoot that approach and commence the circle. this means 1500/3 I believe, unless the approach minimums dictate something even higher than that for your category.


almost every airline i know of has this restriction

At pinnacle (not sure if this goes for everyone) you can circle to land in VMC conditions only with no additional training required. At pinnacle VMC is 1000ft ceiling and 3 miles visibility or higher if the circiling mins are higher for that runway.

so say for example the reported ceiling is 900 ft. the chart says you can circle at 700 ft. we would not be allowed to circle because we would need 1000ft to be legal for our op specs, even though the chart says we can go lower.

We are 1000/3 at AWAC i think....lol isnt a circle done in VMC conditions anyway??? Kind of hard to circle to land in the clouds. ;)

ahhh yes 1000 man i need to get into the books haha. sorry i meant you need those conditions to start the approach. like you cant start the approach with less than that hoping that youll break out at 1000, can you?

yeah, you cant circle to land in the clouds, but cloud clearance requirements don't apply to circling approaches. As long as you can "see" the runway you are good.

i know what you mean about busting those books open. i am studying up for upgrade and there are a "few" things i have forgotten.

if they are announcing circle to land approaches then you have to have ceiling and visibility requirements to even start the approach. pretty much at NO time can you go below 1000ft or have visibility less than 3 miles while circiling.

If i had to guess...it would be like an approach that went below mins...you cant even attempt it.

One of the cool things about the Q200 at Horizon is that we are allowed to circle at published minimums. Q400 and CRJ-700 are restricted to 1,000/3.

Big Sky is the same. We circle at published mins, hence no limitations on the certificate.

VMC means 1000' ceiling & 3 miles visibility.

I wouldn't particularly care to try most circling approaches with less than 1000/3 in the CRJ....the Q200 is perfect for that sort of thing.

Remember folks the visibility is controlling!

Yeah, unless your OPSPEC says ceiling is also controlling (mine does in a few cases) you can start the approach based on vis only. Would it be a good idea if the reported ceiling is WAY below circling mins? No.

How often do you actually circle to land?

thats a big negative in the crj at pinnacle. if you do not have 1000ft ceiling you CAN NOT CIRCLE TO LAND IN THE CRJ. even with 10 miles visibility. i know it sounds crazy but vis and ceiling are controlling for circle to land approaches for us.

like i said that is in OUR opspecs. maybe some other carriers allow different. but as far as i know that is an faa limitation on circle to land approaches in the crj. you must have Visibility and you must have Ceiling to even begin an approach if the are announcing circle to land approaches. and like rickair said, i am not sure i would want to take the rj to 700 ft and circle around to another runway while trying to maintain within 3 miles of the airport to keep it in sight,, things could get pretty hairy, pretty quick.

more often than you would think. especially at smaller airports that have 1 ils to a runway, but the winds really favor another. so you would shoot the ils till you had the field and then just circle around to the other side.

I have shot many and circled to land at ragged mins ...but that was in the Herky bird..... she was sorta made for that kind of thing. :)

We had to maintain at least 150 indicated until landing was assured.

If it's a cross wind, I'd rather land from an ILS with a HUGE XWind rather than circle if there's terrain. If it's a tailwind exceeding limits...then you gotta circle.

you can always level off at Cat E mins if you have it. that gives you 4.5 miles of terrain clearance

VMC is not a specific weather minimum. It is Visual Meteorological Conditions....clear of clouds.
VFR has specific weather restrictions based on the type of airspace you are in. It is Visual Flight Rules.

When you are doing a circling approach, you are flying IFR....thus don't particularly need the 3 miles of vis that VFR requires as a general ROT.

You might need it.....if the minimums for that particular approach require it. And, as has been mentioned, you company can be, and often is, more restrictive than the basic approach would require.

So, I fly my approach down to minimums, break out and see the runway. If I think I can remain clear of clouds and land, I will. If there is a low cloud bank between me and my landing runway, then I will go MAP. And as always, the MAP procedure is for the approach I just shot.....not my intended landing runway. If I lose sight during the circle, then I am going to turn towards the rwy and go MAP (heading generally towards mid-field will aid in obstacle clearance)

If I break out above minimums, then I am going to stay as high as I can while still remaining clear of clouds. It is a heck of a lot easier to fly a visual pattern from your normal perspective versus being in the weeds. Typical error down low is to be too close, and overshoot....or worse, really rack up the bank trying to hack the corner.

we do it all the time up here in Alaska. A lot of airports don't have approaches into both runways (usually only one runway). Or it's just faster than going an extra 20 miles to go straight in...

but not in a CRJ

I've only been cleared for a circle 1 time. Many years ago at MIA...shooting approach for 9 and cleared to circle to 12. I don't think it's used that much for 121 flying. Maybe more so in the GA world?