Hello all,
Flying into JFK quite regularly, but not on a weekly basis, I am often shocked at the way things go while approaching this airport...
Oftentimes, we find ourselves with last minute changes to runways and procedures, and not standard ILS - VOR approaches that require a minimum of prep for descend path control...
The worst - I think - is the nonchalence with which everyone seems to accept the famed "visual" approach to 31 R, at night, with no G/S, no papi (or any visual descend path helper), no runway center lights, no touchdown zone lights and a displaced threshold ! A lot of runways in AFRICA are well better equipped ! And after a 7 hour flight in the dead of night, hardly a good setting for safe landings...
I guess with modern airplanes, all this seems superfluous, but for those of us flying older aircraft with "conventional" instruments, I don't think it's the safest !
happy landings