Originally Posted by
sabenaboy
In my opinion, it DOES make sense! Look again at the VOR 27 app in LGIR. At straight in minima of 1100 ft a plane on a 3.3° descent path would still be more than 5000 m from the runway. Let's assume a visibility of 3500 m. In most companies the pilot would need to make a go around at that point if he intended to make a straight in landing, because he wouldn't be visual with the runway. At the circling minima of 1140 feet at 1.5 DME he would have the runway in sight. So, if a pilot planned to maintain 1140 ft to 1.5 DME and planned to fly a (right hand pattern over the sea) circling approach like in the drawing
posted by oggers, there would be nothing illegal about that. (Unless you keep insisting that a temporary visual obstruction from the airframe itself, would oblige the pilote to execute a missed approach.
) (And ... I do believe that a competent, well prepared crew and familiar with LGIR can do it in a perfectly safe way if planned and briefed adequately! But... remember we're not discussing the wisdom of such a manoeuvre, but only the legality of it.)
If it's not forbidden, it's not illegal!
I give You credits for the explanation but to be honest I don't think anybody would get away with it should an event occur in such circumstances. I can't prove You black on white that it is not legal, but I would not want to discover it under a safety investigation conducted by some Authority, therefore, before some readers decide to try it out and avoid an unnecessary diversion to their operator, I would really try to bring it to the attention of some regulators and come up with a clear cut explanation.