Originally Posted by
Dream Land
I like the guys that are proud of themselves for doing the SFO visual procedure several times a month, how bout getting a reality check. The ILS should have been working.
The glide slope was (and still is) out of service because there is extensive runway construction work underway, right at the location where the glide slope transmitter and antenna array is (was) located. You cannot undertake that kind of work and keep a functional glide slope system at the same time - it would be like trying to change the oil and spark plugs on your car's engine while at the same time, driving it on the highway.
Even after all the construction work is done, and a new glide slope antenna is installed, it will still take many days, (or even weeks) of testing, and multiple approaches by the FAA's highly-instrumented Flight Check aircraft, before the glide slope can be given a clean bill of health, and the new ILS officially commissioned.
ALL reconstruction work must be fully complete before that can happen. We just went through this very scenario last summer at my local airport, where the ILS runway was extended by 1000 feet.
They did, at least, maintain the functionality of the runway 28L localizer, (the antenna of which is located at the far end of the runway, well away from the construction work), and the PAPI, (until Asiana plowed through the light array and destroyed it.)
The only argument that could be made, I suppose, would be that only one of the two parallel 28 runways at SFO should have been rebuilt at one time, leaving the other runway with a fully functional ILS, but that may not have been feasible, financially or otherwise.