YOU'RE CLEARED TO HOLD...

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Schooner69A
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YOU'RE CLEARED TO HOLD...

Post by Schooner69A »

HOLD ENTRY.JPG
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(Best John Cleese voice) And now, for something completely different…

You are a company check pilot and are in the process of bringing a new hire – an ex-military guy – on line.

You’re doing some upper air work – instruments – and have cleared him to a hold prior to executing a VOR approach. You have him positioned in Sector 2 for an easy 30 degree offset entry into the hold (Well, you’re not a real prique…)
Now, when he hits the VOR, he turns outbound, parallels the inbound course, turns inbound at the appropriate time, flies to the VOR, turns right and continues in the hold.

Has your new hire done anything wrong?

Why?
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fish4life
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Re: YOU'RE CLEARED TO HOLD...

Post by fish4life »

No legally you can enter however you want. An FMS only knows a few entries
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AuxBatOn
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Re: YOU'RE CLEARED TO HOLD...

Post by AuxBatOn »

Is he within 5 degree of the holding radial when he hits the VOR?
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montado
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Re: YOU'RE CLEARED TO HOLD...

Post by montado »

Looks like they remain in protected airspace. No big deal, only thing wrong would be if you brief one thing and do another would be poor CRM.
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DHC2eater
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Re: YOU'RE CLEARED TO HOLD...

Post by DHC2eater »

Without the exact parameters it looks like he stayed in his protected airspace which is all any ATC'r or mature checker should care about!!



IMHO!

Eater...
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BE20 Driver
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Re: YOU'RE CLEARED TO HOLD...

Post by BE20 Driver »

I asked ATC one time what constitutes protected airspace. It's miles around your holding point. They don't care as long as you're doing something that approximates a hold and stays within 5+ miles of where you say you are going to hold.
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kevenv
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Re: YOU'RE CLEARED TO HOLD...

Post by kevenv »

BE20 Driver wrote: Thu Dec 21, 2017 7:19 pm I asked ATC one time what constitutes protected airspace. It's miles around your holding point. They don't care as long as you're doing something that approximates a hold and stays within 5+ miles of where you say you are going to hold.
The answer you got is a bit misleading. In a radar environment, protected airspace is a moot point. You are getting 3 or 5 miles radar separation from other a/c. Protected airspace in a hold or en-route is used in a non radar (procedural) environment or in a transition from non radar to radar (where the airspace is protected until the a/c is on radar).

The size of the airspace to be protected for a hold depends on the altitude. There are a number of different sized templates though for practical purposes, ATC will use only a few to encompass all the altitudes that they are working. This airspace is plotted and quite familiar to the controllers who use it daily. This is where we must ensure that the protected airspace for the hold / airway / approach procedure / etc do not overlap. Again this is in a non radar environment.

The holding template is a number 4 (smallest for FAA). It goes up to 31 which is roughly 87 nm long by 57 nm wide.
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Last edited by kevenv on Fri Dec 22, 2017 6:51 am, edited 1 time in total.
B208
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Re: YOU'RE CLEARED TO HOLD...

Post by B208 »

At the very least it requires a chat. You need to figure out what was going through his head. If he was aware that he was set up for an offset but chose to parallel the outbound heading for a semi-valid reason, (i.e. there was a strong cross wind pushing him to the outside of the turn, the aircraft was going slow enough to make the inbound turn and still stay on the protected side, etc...), then the whole issue becomes a discussion point about technique. If, on the other hand, he just had a complete loss of situational awareness or lacked the required background knowledge then the issue becomes much more serious and would constitute a definite fail if it's a checkride.
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HiFlyChick
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Re: YOU'RE CLEARED TO HOLD...

Post by HiFlyChick »

The question I would ask is if when he turned outbound (you say he "paralleled the inbound course"), was the wind blowing him onto the protected side, or was he almost on the outbound radial? My concern would be if in the course of turning inbound he went through the inbound track (i.e. basically resulting in a parallel entry on the incorrect side). The biggest concerns are situational awareness and CRM - did he have a plan that he didn't effectively communicate to you, or did he not correctly access where he was? If it's either of those as opposed to just not a great entry then a discussion is warranted

(I'm speaking from the point of a small 703 operator flying light twins - the heavy metal probably requires less "creativity")
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dpm
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Re: YOU'RE CLEARED TO HOLD...

Post by dpm »

Just out of curiosity, how many of you (who don't fly big planes into big airports like CYYZ) get holds often for real? In 14 years of private, small-plane IFR flying (about 400-500 of hours filed IFR), every hold I've flown has been either training or part of a flight test/IPC.
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Re: YOU'RE CLEARED TO HOLD...

Post by 172_Captain »

dpm wrote: Fri Dec 22, 2017 8:13 pm Just out of curiosity, how many of you (who don't fly big planes into big airports like CYYZ) get holds often for real? In 14 years of private, small-plane IFR flying (about 400-500 of hours filed IFR), every hold I've flown has been either training or part of a flight test/IPC.
At least once a week. Depends where you’re flying. I’m out of Timmins which is a non radar environment. Can’t do an approach until the guy in front lands or cancels. Between Jazz, Porter, Thunder, Ornge, Cree, Bearskin ect it can get pretty busy.
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dpm
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Re: YOU'RE CLEARED TO HOLD...

Post by dpm »

Thanks, 172_Captain. I've been IFR in and out of Timmins only twice. Both times, I was the only plane arriving, so I guess that's why there wasn't a hold involved.

Agreed about the interesting non-radar environment there. On one of the flights, I departed in IMC just ahead of a Jazz Dash-8. I was on the airway torwards YYB (no RNAV yet in my plane), and the Jazz flight was on the airway towards YSB. Because they were so close, the poor Dash-8 was restricted by my Warrior's anemic climb rate: when I hit 4,000, they were cleared to 3,000; when I hit 5,000, they were cleared to 4,000; etc. Eventually the airways diverged enough (based on my DME position reports) that Toronto Centre was able to clear the Dash-8 to an unrestricted climb.
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Schooner69A
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Re: YOU'RE CLEARED TO HOLD...

Post by Schooner69A »

I posed the question because of a bit of a misconception; the misconception being that you MUST execute an offset entry in Sector 2 (the manoeuvering side). In reality, you are ALLOWED to do so on the manoeuvering side but are PROHIBITED from doing so on the non-manoeuvering side. However, the way it is written gives the impression that you MUST execute a tear drop manoeuver. Here’s the relevant passage from AIM RAC 10.5:

Sector 2 procedures (offset entry) are:

(a) Upon reaching the fix, turn to a heading that results in a track having an angle of 30 degrees OR LESS from the inbound track reciprocal on the holding side.

This gives you the option of a 30 degree offset, a 20 degree offset, a ten degree offset, or no offset at all.

So, holding entry becomes much simpler: “Can I do direct entry? No? Then it’s ‘turn the shortest way outbound and do a parallel entry’…”
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HiFlyChick
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Re: YOU'RE CLEARED TO HOLD...

Post by HiFlyChick »

172_Captain wrote: Fri Dec 22, 2017 8:31 pm
dpm wrote: Fri Dec 22, 2017 8:13 pm Just out of curiosity, how many of you (who don't fly big planes into big airports like CYYZ) get holds often for real? In 14 years of private, small-plane IFR flying (about 400-500 of hours filed IFR), every hold I've flown has been either training or part of a flight test/IPC.
At least once a week. Depends where you’re flying. I’m out of Timmins which is a non radar environment. Can’t do an approach until the guy in front lands or cancels. Between Jazz, Porter, Thunder, Ornge, Cree, Bearskin ect it can get pretty busy.
Good point, 172_Captain - it's been so long since I did a hold that I forgot the fact that it's not because they're becoming so rare, more so that it's because I haven't been recently where they are more common. For us out on the east coast, one spot where that may happen is in Iles-de-la-Madeleine (CYGR), because like Timmins, the radar coverage doesn't go to the ground. A few times when I went in there, Moncton Center at least told me to anticipate a hold, and they did it far enough back that I just slowed down and avoided it altogether (they don't have so much traffic, it's just the wait for them to land, taxi clear and close the flight plan).

I still recall having this same conversation with a brand new F/O many years ago and telling her that we almost never ever get a hold. Of course, you guessed it - we had a hold that very flight! :)
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