Question For Pilots
 

The last few times I've traveled to Vegas from L.A I've flown rather than driven (it seems that with enough advance notice you could get a pretty good deal). There's a thing that I've been wondering about the flight path to Vegas, why does the plane travel toward the west of Vegas turns east passes parallel to the airport, nears lake Mead, then doubles back, and lands facing west? You would think if it flew to the east of the airport then turn west and then lands, it would save about 10 to 15 minutes and some fuel. I'm sure there's a logical explanation I'm just wondering.

Landing pattern & TMA considerations

Looks like most of the time traffic is landing west they send you out to the east for sequencing, hopefully a controller will chime in. It will change depending on weather and several other factors.

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1355414479.jpg

"Too Much Altitude"?
In SE Michigan at least , the prevailing winds seem to be from the NW unless a storms a'blowin.

Optimally, runways for both takeoff and landing should be faced directly upwind.
-This gives additional lift and makes it easier for pilots.
-In WW2, they actually flew B-25s off a small aircraft carrier weighted down with bombs and fuel by turning into the wind and going full speed ahead.

Most likely everytime you've gone in there the prevailing winds were out of the west and they were landing on runways 25L and 25R.

This ^^^. It all depends on which way the wind is blowing from and which direction they are landing. No wind or light winds and they almost always land to the West. That means traffic coming from the West has to circle around to get in line to land...

We gave up on Vegas and go to Henderson these days. Cost is 10% of what Vegas airport charges and we save a good 12 minutes flying time by doing so.

Well, since I'm fairly versed in this....haha...

There are two main traffic flows coming in and out of Vegas. The arrivals coming from LA fly north of the departures from LAS going to SoCal. If you vectored to the east, you'd be going right through all of the departures coming out of Vegas. We vector you to the north, so as not to have conflict with Vegas departures.

FYI...if you fly on Jetblue, you will cruise at 24,000 feet from Vegas to LA. Any other airline, you can count on 28K'. Traffic flow is determined by LAX's arrival rate. If the weather is crap, or construction is going on, they will drop the arrival rate (meaning, no shortcuts for you). Generally, you can count on flying out of Vegas, talking to me out of 18,000'. I send you direct GRAMM intersection on the RIIVR2 arrival, or I'll just keep you over HEC vortac. I'll descend you down to SoCal Tracon, and hand off for final vectors. The tricky thing is that R2501 (Twenty Nine Palms) is right in the middle of your arrival into LAX. If the airspace is hot, plan on flying on course over HEC. If it's released 27K' and above, I can shortcut you right over the top.

Mike,

Are you working the new RNAV departures? Love them and my partner in the cockpit is on the Airspace Group working to get these into the system.

We are usually coming from IGN heading into HND and its A LOT easier than flying into LAS like we used to...

Joe

I think your fingers might have been on the wrong keys of the keyboard. Or spellcheck had an aneurism :D

Todd,

Unfortunately no. What he is saying may sound like gibberish but its what we live with every day. You get used to it but for the new pilots it can be a lot to handle, especially in the weather and descending fast into the airport...

Joe

-In WW2, they actually flew B-25s off a small aircraft carrier weighted down with bombs and fuel by turning into the wind and going full speed ahead.[/QUOTE]

A freind of my Dad's was on a battleship during Korea, and said the whole convoy (aircraft carrier and escort ships) would turn into the wind to launch planes. He knew his battleship could turn about 38 knots, and he claimed that while launching the carriers would blow by them doing about 45-50 knots and then slow down so they could catch up.

I was joking. I did some ground school some decades back and had VOR location memorized just for grins. The only reason I've ever liked flying United was because channel 11 on audio (iirc) had live flight deck comms :D

Ckelley,

They still do that to this day. Every knot of wind under the wings of the planes helps, especially if you get a "cold cat shot" or lose an engine on takeoff. Its a real safety factor...

Todd,

Figured so but lots of people have never heard it. You should come flying with me sometime... lots of fun...

Joe

A freind of my Dad's was on a battleship during Korea, and said the whole convoy (aircraft carrier and escort ships) would turn into the wind to launch planes. He knew his battleship could turn about 38 knots, and he claimed that while launching the carriers would blow by them doing about 45-50 knots and then slow down so they could catch up.[/QUOTE]


I thought Doolittle Raiders were the first to fly B25's off an aircraft carrier April 18, 1942 in a bombing attack on Japan.

First and only time that I know of that its been done.

The Navy did some prelim testing of flying a Herc off of a carrier in 1963 and while it could be done, it was never done on a regular basis that I know of.

C-130 Hercules Lands on U.S.S. Forrestal

TMA-is that terminology not used in the US ? Terminal Maneouvering Area

Not a great movie, but a great story.

B-25 carrier launch from the movie Pearl Harbor - YouTube

Re created with B25 launches as seen in the link, a friend of mine in Chino CA participated with the company's B25 "Pacific Princess". They have also coordinated two other launch events with B25's, one was a CNO change of command, one was I think the 50th anniversary of the raid.

No landings...

Great read, "Calculated Risk" by Joanna Doolittle Hoppes. It has all the facts on the Doolittle Raid.

My first years of flying were at an uncontrolled field where all I did was aviate and navigate. When I went back to flying it was at a bigger commercial field and the radio chatter was so confusing I got a radio and spent hours sitting in my truck in the parking lot just listening and trying to figure out what was going on. It helped immensely. Now they say, "Aviate, navigate, communicate" and you don't need to be in a plane to learn to communicate.

TMA is Traffic Management Authority, I think. The 'A' is open to opinion.

They set flow rates thru 'gates'. My westbound flights into LAX start getting 'sequenced' (speed or route) mid-Colorado. Sometimes my east coast departure will be held on the ground awaiting a 'window' in the arrival pattern at LAX 5 hours from now.

Like I said, the 'A' is open to opinion.

I bought property on Nevada Highway 161 west of Jean. A large table-top mountain that has a view of the lights of Vegas. 7 years ago, the VNAV procedures were implemented into McCarren. If you could see them in 3D, it is an interlaced speed and altitude set of 'ribbons', flight paths that include altitude changes at fixed points, that allows an increased rate of arrivals and departures without intervention from the approach/departure controllers. They clear planes onto the ribbon, and then the planes have approval to fly the 3D path in and out. As long as the plane does what it is supposed to, the controllers only have to monitor. It actually does work well. There were some 'tweaks' because of aircraft performance issues, but I have not seen a revision lately. The new routes go right overhead my property inbound to LAS from LAX.