airport vehicle flashing beacons

[mfuller_uk]

Hi. This may be a bit of a strange question, but still here goes.

With regards to vehicles being airside and having to have a flashing beacon. Can anyone point me in the direction of the regulations surrounding this.

I have only ever seen vehicles that have one single beacon on the top of the vehicle with 360 visibility of the beacon. Is this part of the requriment, or can it be satisfied with several lights on the sides of the vehicle (like many ambulances have now).

Also are there any regs regarding the colour, brightness and flashing sequence etc.

Im am asking this as it is the poduct of 'down the pub' a conversation regarding airside vehicles. You know how it is.

Best Wishes.

Michael Fuller
Air Transport Management Undergraduate
Loughborough University, UK.

[Spiney Norman]

You boys have fun down the pub don't you!!!! Try CAP168 Chapter 4 (The Assesment and treatment of obstacles). 12.1 Lighting of vehicles. This gives a reference to Chapter 6 Appendix A table 6A.1. Which also refers. I didn't check it I'm afraid cos I find CAP168 has strange hypnotic powers! Every time I look at it I wake up hours later with my cheek covered in drool!!!!

Spiney

[capt.sparrow]

basically needs to be on the highest point on the vehicle, with a max of 400 candels, non strobe or rotating.

[This is a crisis]

The requirements for vehicle obs lights are quite clear but how many airports actually enforce them?

At my particular airfield, the norm seems to be a standard quartz halogen rotating beacon that would do justice to any motorway service vehicle!!

How many crews have been blinded by these things flashing away on top of the GPU tug while they are trying to start? Fair enough, for vehicles that regularly operate on runways and taxiways, the brighter the better, but for apron vehicles a nice gentle flash will usually suffice.

[Spitoon]

As crisis says, the rules are clear but no-one seems to bother about applying them. There are some cracking tugs around with two strobes on the roof of the cab - like looking straight at a camera!

[mfuller_uk]

the reason why i posted this question was in refernce to the 'airside lighting' which is being incorportated into the new version of the St. John Ambulance crusader mark iv.

From looking at the pics of the vehicle and reading the applicabel parts of CAP168, I dont think that it meets the requirments for airside lighting, but as you said who actually enforces the requirements - but I have not seen airside lighting like this before.

Have a look and any comments would be appreciated. For one there does not seem to be 360degrees of visibility.


http://member.sja.org.uk/vehicles/crusader/mkIV/default.asp

Thanks

Michael

p.s. No St John Ambulance bashing please, pretty please.

[Spiney Norman]

Mike.
Having looked at the pictures of the vehicle in your link I agree that it would appear not to comply. The orange lights don't appear to be visible through 360 degrees, and, more importantly, they look like strobes. The usual way aerodrome authorities get around this problem is by escorting individual vehicles with a correctly lit airport vehicle. A good example would be when local authority fire vehicles attend an emergency and are escorted to rendezvous points airside. I presume that the St Johns vehicles wouldn't be for regular airside use so it would not be practical to equip them to a CAP168 specification. As has been stated, nobody really polices this sort of thing seriously and aerodrome authorities seem to only notice vehicle lights if they're not on! Usually after ATC prompting. Having said that however, the use of powerful strobes on a vehicle on the apron, particularly at night, would be very unadvisable for various reasons. Probably not much help but I mean well!!!

Spiney
P.S. I've seen too many people helped by the St.Johns to EVER take the p***

Oh! Forgot to put in........
As a St.Johns driver would be exceedingly unlikely to have a current airside driving licence an escort would be obligatory. (I\'m talking about attending at any \'regular\' airport).

Spiney

[Paracab]

Would think that a SJAB ever going airside without an escort is extremely unlikely.

At the BAA airport I occasionally get called to (999 ambo calls) we never go near the airside area without the police, who stay with us until we are landside again.

Also I reckon those orange lights might be halogens as that lightbar appears to be manufactured by the same people that make ours and we have blue and red halogens sited where the orange is on the SJAB vehicle.

[Spitoon]

A SJAB ambulance on an aerodrome is quite a rare thing in my experience. I would guess that the lightbars shown in the photographs have been installed with use on roads in mind - no doubt there are rules for this too but I have no idea what they are. As has been pointed out, ambulances will usually be escorted if they ever have to go airside.

[yachtpilot]

There are strange anomolies regarding rules on flashing lights and strobes...Limits on candelas of light on ramp vehicles / use of strobes while in cloud etc...yet the strobes used on ' rabbit ' centreline approach lighting on ILS's is perfectly acceptable to the authorities...
On one occasion flying into Saarbruken on a really sh*tty night with vis right on minima and a fair amount of turbulence I was totally psyched out by these hugely powerful strobes suddenly striking the fog and lighting up the cockpit in the final stages of the approach. I elected to go-around...