Originally Posted by
Lead Balloon
Errrm, I don’t think you get put in a ‘holding pattern’. You are just told that you are cleared to a specified point, and what you do to ensure you don’t go past that point without further clearance is up to you.
I've never flown into Williamtown so I don't know what the procedure is. Dick's original comment was
Originally Posted by
Dick Smith
It is is well known that the RAAF Willy ATCs are often forced to keep VFR aircraft holding at Anna Bay.
If you're required to hold at a position I'd expect that you would adopt a standard right turn pattern. If you're night VFR and you've got coastal lights ahead, to the right and behind you and nothing to the left, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense to adopt a non-standard left turn away from all your visual references. At 100 knots your turn diameter is going to be only about 1.1 miles so unless you are hugging the coastline you should be able to adopt a standard right turn, maintain visual references and stay over water.
The flight path just doesn't strike me as syncing up with the Anna Bay hold hypothesis.