Originally Posted by
falcon900
Finally, is it of interest that on the second approach, they still approached from left of the extended threshold?
That track is to be expected, it is the VOR approach after all.
The VOR sits south of the runway so a radial that intersects with the runway centerline at the proper distance from the runway (at minimums) is used.
You can even see when they saw the runway and corrected toward the runway centerline the second time.
Becoming visual with the runway is the only reason to deviate from the VOR radial. Therefore the assumption they were aiming for Juhu is very reasonable. Of course they should notice the runway they see is nowhere near straight ahead, but if as mentioned the map was not monitored it makes sense.
There is a tendency to go visual early on VOR approaches even if the track is often made as to make relatively late turn onto centerline possible. But most crews want to be done with the turn before being low so they need to first turn towards the centerline and then back onto the centerline instead of doing one turn when the radial intersects the centerline.
VOR22L at JFK is a good example and has good FR24 coverage if anyone wants to watch the wildly differing maneuvers on that approach (Mixed with the RNP Z 22L sometimes which aligns you with centerline earlier than the radial/centerline intersect on the VOR). This is anecdotal and i have not pulled the recordings at the time but i've heard two 747s make their final approach to 22R because they went visual very early. One went around after being instructed to go around while the other one the tower controller even cleared to land on 22R. He still made a go around which is the thing to do if you are approaching a runway you didn't brief for.
Overall this "incident" seems to be an error which was noticed very early and i'm sure does not deserve the press cover it got.
JFK VOR 22L approaches from several aircraft with runway centerline and VOR radial in black lines for illustration purposes
