My last landing into SFO in June involved a right turn on to south for 28R pointing directly at another aircraft being positioned for 28L. We were kept at 6000' for noise abatement reasons on the north side of the bay. When we called visual with the opposing aircraft we were turned on to a heading of 260 deg where we called visual the field. The controller then cleared us for a visual approach and gave us speed control 180kts to 5nm. We were so far above the glide path the only option was to dirty up, full flap and gear, ignore the speed restriction, close the throttles to idle and turn the flight director off.. All done at 5000 ft no ILS G/P no PAPIs available. We stabilised at company minimum and only after my colleagues on the Flight Deck gave their assent to continue did I make the decision to land. It was certainly challenging, made that bit trickier by the absence of PAPIs.
I do hope the whole SFO ATC environment thing is reviewed as a result of this crash. Both published visual approach procedures are designed around noise abatement and often result in high feed ins. The requirement to have two aircraft closely spaced, (the runways are 750 ft apart) is driven by the need to launch aircraft off 01R/01L, oftentimes after you have already been cleared to land. So at short finals you are watching traffic beside you and watching traffic on the other two runways crossing directly ahead, all the time keeping on top of your own instrument scan. The use of RNAV is moot.
Maybe it is time to have a little think again...
Last edited by nigegilb; 10th Jul 2013 at 21:34.