Where the hell am I?!

[Ian_Wannabe]

Hey hey,
Just a quick one.

Whilst on my navigation exercise last weekend I found that when I was being shown the 'Lost procedure' I found it REALLY difficult to find ground references by reading from the ground to chart...

I was just wondering if any of you good people have any genius ways of making spotting landmarks easier?

I realise climbing makes it easier, bigger landmarks to look out for help etc.... any more??

All I could see to the east of the welsh hills were fields and many many rivers........

Cheers

Ian

[Genghis the Engineer]

Assuming that you have at-least a vague idea of where you are, start by aiming for a good line feature - a motorway or major river for preference. Make sure that at the most "lost" you could be, you'll definitely be a known side of some point feature on that line feature.

Then turn towards it, fly till you get there, and you know exactly where you are.

For example, if you are in Kent, head North until you get to the Thames, then turn left until you hit the Dartmouth crossing. Whilst en-route, plan how you're going to get where you need to be from there.

But try and do it without infringing airspace. So, for example, if you are somewhere NW of London, you'd be better heading SW for the Thames than SE for the M25 which may cause offence, and do it above 3500 ft so you shouldn't hit any ATZ/MATZ. In that case, once you'd hit the Thames, you'd be better turning right for Oxford than Left for Reading since latter would take you into LTMA.

Better still don't get lost, but any pilot who tells you he's never done that is lying.

G

[Keygrip]

Another one that I've spotted is that pilots look too close to the aircraft.

Many students say "there's nothing to navigate by" when they cannot see any big, unmistakable, features directly below them - but don't bother with the funny shaped lake a few miles away.

Look all round the aircraft - and all the way to the horizon - when trying to find features.

Granted, this is usually easier here in Florida than it is in some parts of the world - as we often see for 50 miles or more - and the coastlines are closer than they are in the UK ('cause Florida is narrower) - but the system works.

K

[englishal]

If you are worried about infringing any airspace, yo could always pick a nearby navaid [VOR / NDB] and in conjunction with DME you can be pretty certain where you are. There is nothing wrong with using Navaids to fix your position, in fact it shows good airmanship.

Rgds
EA:D

[High Wing Drifter]

If you are worried about infringing any airspace...
Also, I guess we should not be afraid of doing a 180 just to be sure.

[BEagle]

With the proliferation of Regulated Airspace in the UK and the ready availability of the VHF Fixer service in virtually all parts of the country, the 'traditional' lost procedure is becoming a bit of an anachronism. Whilst pilots should still be aware of it, nowadays I prefer to teach use of transponder and 121.5 - because the chances of wandering uninvited into the shark-infested custard of Regulated Airspace is too great!

We have also fitted panel-mounted GPS sets to all our aircraft; before students are allowed to go outside the local area solo, they are taught how to read their position from the GPS - not to navigate by, but to advise ATC 'I think I'm at ....N .....W' if they become 'uncertain of position'. Also, the key strokes required to switch on and initialise the GPS in the after start checks are taught to them ; the default data page is set to show range and bearing from our home aerodrome.

[Kingy]

As one who regularly flies non - radio, no gps around the country. I can only agree with the others about looking up at the horizon. Often they'll be a huge range of hills or somthing that can give you a quick fix. Also, in extremis there is always the Sun...

Keeping a good flight log always helps too - some call this 'track crawling' but I generally know exactly where I was max 10 minutes ago - how lost can you get at 65kts..! (don't say a word Aerbabe;) )

Kingy

[Whirlybird]

Ian,

In the area you were in - if I'm guessing correctly - there was probably some WOODLAND. The chart is very accurate as to shapes; try and find a unique shaped piece of woodland, and look for it on the chart. The Forestry Commission does have a habit of cutting trees down, so this isn't foolproof, but it can be useful in rural areas.

The Welsh Hills...OK, any particularly high ones? This can be a clue, if you don't climb so high that you can't tell.

Use everything. The charts are extremely accurate, so even if you can find a river crossing a railway near a village of a particular shape, that might well be the only one like it in that area.

Don't despair. It IS difficult...but gets somewhat easier with practice.

[FlyingForFun]

The thing which really worked for me was genuinely getting lost with a (hung over) instructor sitting next to me, on my second ever navigation exercise. The instructor apologised the next day, and I never flew with him again (he wasn't my regular instructor anyway) - but seeing an instructor reading from ground to map, exactly like the textbooks say, really helped hammer home the technique.

In our case, it wasn't too difficult - there was a large town a little way in front of us, which we figured was probably Oxford. Having done the "reading from ground to map" bit, we then continue to positively identify it by reading from map to ground, and confirming that roads were where they were supposed to be, and so on.

Knowing at least roughly where you are is a big help. Always keep an accurate flight log. If you change heading (maybe because of a wind correction, or because you'd forgotten to align your DI with your compass and got off track) then write it down, and write down the time, too. Then, when you establish that you're lost, either continue on your current heading if you're not concerned about airspace, or else pick something on the ground and begin to circle around it (after noting down the time!) Then, if you can't spot where you are quickly, you can use your flight log to help you figure it out.

(The way we got lost was by making a relatively large adjustment to our heading because of what we thought was a bad wind forecast. It turned out that the wind forecast wasn't that bad, we'd just mis-identified a landmark and so interpreted our position incorrectly, so our heading change had actually taken us well off track. Knowing the heading corrections that we'd made, it was relatively easy to figure out the area in which we thought we might be, even though it was some way off our planned track.)

One other thing to remember - not too relevant for practicing the lost procedure, but very helpful when it comes to real navigation. If there's really nothing around that you can use to confirm you location, don't worry. As long as you flying the right heading for the right amount of time, you'll end up roughly where you want to be. If you know you should be able to see a large town in 10 minutes time, then just keep flying until you see the town - and once you see it (which you will be able to, even if you're slightly off course) you can assess whether you need to make any corrections or not.

Have fun!

FFF
---------------

[Whirlybird]

FFF,

The one time I got seriously lost was when I misidentified a ground feature and made a large heading change. It's worth bearing in mind that winds are rarely that far off what they're forecast to be. How different can they be? For instance, a wind of 30 kts at 90 degrees to your track means you need to correct by about 22 degrees; a wind at 45 degrees at 20kts means you need to correct by 10 degrees. If you're 10 degrees out, after 20 miles, you'll be about 3 miles off track, and even in 5km vis still be able to see the town or whatever that should be there. And that's a pretty extreme example to take. The only time when that doesn't apply is if you're correcting in the wrong direction, ie a wind from the right becomes a wind from the left. But even so, it would have been nearly a head/tail wind to start with, so it's unlikely to make that much difference.

So if you find yourself making huge heading corrections and thinking it's because the wind was not as forecast, maybe take another look.

[MLS-12D]

I got lost myself on Sunday. What should have been a 45-minute flight took two times that long, partially due to a headwind but mostly due to my stooging blindly around like an idiot. :O

All was well as I cruised along southward, noting various towns as I passed by (but not keeping a written record of the specific times: Mistake No.1). Then there seemed to be a prolonged period when there were no ground features below or ahead (probably due to the headwind). I began to doubt my dead reckoning (Mistake No.2), and after some minutes of indecision, I persuaded myself that I was west of track so I turned 90 degrees to the right (Mistake No.3). Although I came to several towns, I couldn't identify them on the chart. After about 15 minutes (felt like two hours) I found one that had the town name on the watertower (should be a legal requirement!); I was much farther northeast than I should have been.

Altogether a poor show! :( Several lessons learned, anyway.

quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
... you could always pick a nearby navaid [VOR / NDB] and in conjunction with DME you can be pretty certain where you are. There is nothing wrong with using Navaids to fix your position, in fact it shows good airmanship.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Ha ha! Like any plane I fly would have fancy radio thingys installed!

[FWA NATCA]

Don't forget about reading the names on Water Towers, Highway signs, names on buildings, as well as other prominent land marks.

Mike

[OBK!]

I got real lost today for the first time ever, and I mean scaringly really lost.

I planned on going to the Leicester LE NDB (this is in a Seneca btw) from Nottingham. Anyway's, there's loads of traffic around Nottingham, I decide to go straight out and call east mids for zone entry. They where kind enough to vector me in, and spit me out the other end.

Go out the zone...heading 150..seems about right. However ADF needle is doing circles..GREAT! Which direction do I go. Anyway, look around and I could just not relate a single thing to the map. This lasted for about 20minutes, and at 160kts, it's f***ing scary! There where loads of Matz's around aswell!

Anyway, VOR 1 was intermitent, GPS not working, ADF not working, NO DME and at this point didn't have a service regardless of trying Brize and Cottesmore with no answer..AND didn't know where I was....:uhoh: What do you do!? I've become so depending on Radio Nav when in a twin as I find it a more accurate method of navigation and more procedural....

Anyway, my destination was Duxford, I just flew to Barkway until I found a ground feature. Eventually found massive lake. Thank god!

Finished off with a sh*t landing....(and on the return journey).

I now hate flying the Seneca just because of all the greef it gave me today. I'll get over it I'm sure!

[drauk]

OBK, why not call D&D and request a position fix? They'd likely pinpoint you immediately from which you could locate yourself on your map.

[ChiSau]

I managed to get lost on one of my QXC legs (which was pretty good going as it was from Oxford to Gloucester!! :O )

Got very stressed that I was going to stray into Brize airspace so in the end called 121.5 and asked for a training fix!!:ok:

Nice lady found me (NW of Brize airspace but v close!) and put me back on track!

Am quite glad now that it happened as at least I now know you can always ask. There's this huge perecieved pressure on you when you learn that somehow you're botherig ATC etc etc to call them - so it was good to get over that.

[rustle]

OBK!

"This lasted for about 20minutes, and at 160kts..."

You know those two lever-type things in the middle, next to your right knee (NB, not the red ones or the blue ones) - if you move them aft a bit, you slow down :)

HTH :ok:

[FlyingForFun]

There's this huge perecieved pressure on you when you learn that somehow you're botherig ATC etc etc to call them One way of getting over that is to go and visit them. Especially the guys+gals on 121.5 - they just sit there all day bored, waiting for us to call them, so it's probably a relief when we do call! Even those controllers who have other responsibilities will always tell you that they'd rather you call, though. (Except for Brize Radar who seem to want to fob everyone off to London Information - but that's a different matter entirely!)

FFF
------------------

[OBK!]

rustle

I know! You had to spoil it! It was my way of making my experience melodramatic. Now everyone knows!

:mad: :)

[rustle]

Don't worry about it, I think this comment: Finished off with a sh*t landing.... makes it sound (melo)dramatic enough ;)

[tmmorris]

Got lost a couple of weeks ago between Wolverhampton Interstellar and Moreton-in-Marsh disused; I didn't know if Bidford glider site was a disused airfield or not (anyone know?) so when I found myself overhead a disused field I wrongly concluded I was at Bidford, going slower than planned, rather than (as was actually the case) at Honeybourne, on time but off track.

Moral of this story? You're more likely to be off on the heading (DI drift, hard to align DI to compass in turbulence, &c.) than on the timing, which relies on a fairly accurate stopwatch. Hence if you think your timing is out, check that it's not actually your heading.

Nearly got to Brize but as the nice lady there had us on radar she gently pointed out that we had CAS in our 12 o'clock; bimbled around a bit and found Rissington, and then we were fine.

Tim

[IO540-C4D5D]

Why not just get through the PPL, and then buy a GPS. A decent moving map GPS (anything lesser is not worth getting IMHO) is about £500 which is peanuts on the scale of flying costs, for anyone who flies enough to keep their license never mind staying current.

Unless you stick to your local area, and good visibility, visual nav will fail you eventually no matter how good you are.

[Evil J]

I'll re-iterate what has sort of been said already and what I think I said in a different forum.

That is if you don't know where you are tell us (ATC that is) especially if its a radar unit. At East Mids we just a bout always have a spare controller sat next to us so even if the frquencuy sounds manic, if you say your lost we'll put you to a different frquency and find you and either watch you to destination or hand you over to someone who can. Or like has been said call D&D.

The key here is that getting lost is not illegal, even if you declare a pan-infinging CAS quite definitely is!! We are here to help.

On a separate matter, I don't think a moving map GPS is essential at all. I use an aviation one that has aifields and VOR's and nothing else. I set the route I have planned on the map set it running and use it as a confindence check-it stops you convincing yourself you are not where you should be (which reading many of the honest stories above sound like a frequent cause of problems) and it is also useful if during a zone transit for example you get deviated by ATC as well as the usual diversion, estimate update type functions at which GPS' excel.

[DRJAD]

I've just, since getting PPL, started using a handheld GPS. For me it is useful that it is handheld, since that prevents me from using it as a primary navaid..

I feel confortable with radio aids + DR and ground to map - though that does not mean that I do not occasionally get lost briefly. Most recently last Tuesday near Gamston - but a combination of ground to map + radio aids, and a quick look at the GPS map display for reassurance rapidly reorientated me.

I like to feel that I wouldn't hesitate to call a radar unit or D&D if I were completely lost or disorientated: the fact that there is a human voice of whom I could ask any relevant supplemental questions seems like a major reassurance to me - and a service vital in the extreme.

DRJAD.

[steamchicken]

if you are in Kent, head North until you get to the Thames, then turn left until you hit the Dartmouth crossing

Surely better to head SW to the coast and follow it....bit of a long way though....but t'other would be longer still and take you through LTMA and indeed Heathrow control area (and roughly overhead the Houses of Parliament). Oh hold on....did you mean the Dartford crossing?