Question re. landing briefing

[Nicholas49]

Hello,

I wondered if a professional could answer this question for me:

If you have a very short flight (for example Bristol to Dublin), is there still time to brief the landing in-flight? Are there any routes where you would brief both the take-off and landing before departure? If so, how short would the sector need to be? Also, what would be the typical cruising altitude for such a flight? I don't imagine there is sufficient flying time to reach + FL30?

Thanks,
Nick

[PAPI-74]

Bristol to Dublin is about a 30 min flight and you might go at FL FL160 ish I guess but no lower that FL080. It all depends where the base of controlled airspace is and what service you want off of ATC.
There would be time for the brief as it only takes 60-90 secs if you are familiar (twice that if the arrival is complicated with multiple holds). The FMS is all done on the ground once you have a good idea of the arrival runway, if not add 10 sec.
The shortest I have done is 6min40sec airborne. This is definately a departure and approach brief on the ground.

[Capt Claret]

YAYE-YBAS (Ayers Rock to Alice Springs), 179 nm, 25 mins, up to F330 if light enough. Arrival at YBAS not too complicated, usually, approach & landing briefing carried out en-route.

[Lafyar Cokov]

Even if one skips the main briefing - ALWAYS brief the important numbers!!
(ILS Freq, App Course, Minima, VRef, Ldg Alt, MSA + Go-Around Alt)

[Denti]

Shortest trip and only one where we briefed the approach on the ground was Berlin Schönefeld to Berlin Tegel or vice versa.

We often fly pretty short sectors like Palma de Mallorca to Ibiza and even on those there is enough time to brief in the air.

[Nicholas49]

Thanks for the replies.

Denti, would a flight such as Tegel to Schonefeld be a positioning flight without passengers? I assume a short flight such as London Luton to Stansted or Gatwick would be the same?

[Denti]

Yup, pure ferry usually after either maintenance stay (in the past) or if if the airplane ended up in SXF instead of TXL because of the night curfew in TXL the night before.

[bfisk]

Depends on exactly how short and how complex/unfamiliar it is. The shortest hop we routinely do is about 8 minutes airborne time. Has been 6 once, and also up to 12-13 minutes if we have to do a full procedure departure and approach incl. course reversal.

I'll usually brief the approach before departure, especially if we're expecting the circling approach which essentially commences overhead our departure field. If there's a full procedure starting overhead the arrival airfield, or we can carry out a visual approach, it is normally ok do do the briefing airborne if both of us are happy with and and we are familiar.

[411A]

I'll usually brief the approach before departure, especially if we're expecting the circling approach which essentially commences overhead our departure field. If there's a full procedure starting overhead the arrival airfield, or we can carry out a visual approach, it is normally ok do do the briefing airborne if both of us are happy with and and we are familiar.

Well said.
In addition, some pilots go into an extremely long song and dance with briefings, whereas...ours is usually...'standard calls and procedures' plus minimal approach details.
If it can't be done in less than thirty seconds, it's toooo long.

[Nicholas49]

The shortest hop we routinely do is about 8 minutes airborne time.

Wow, that is short. You can only have just finished the After Take-Off checks before starting the Pre-Landing checks?!

Presumably you are not talking about flights in commercial aircraft such as the A320 or B737? Or are you?

[Bealzebub]

Innsbruck.

I will often run through a landing brief for this airport prior to departure.

The reasons for this are as follows:

The destination has complex and terrain critical procedures that for many transport category aircraft may require the use of none standard flap settings, bank angles and speeds.

Most flights into Innsbruck are fairly short range, often leaving little time in the cruise phase to complete other routine tasks together with time for an adequate approach brief.

The airspace over Southern Germany is very busy and involves a rapid number of frequency changes. ATC co-ordination within this airspace normaly results in early and frequent step down procedures. All of this tends to cause frequent interruptions to a brief, and doesn't provide the necessary environment for attention to the briefing.

Going through the briefing on the ground enables any later changes to be quickly discussed as an addendum to something that has already been discussed.

Ideally a landing briefing should be given at a point in the cruise once the necesssary weather and data has been obtained, that provides (where possible) uninterrupted time to provide a succinct description of the standard items, as well as the intentions of the briefer. This should include a description of their intentions should the opportunity for a visual approach arise. Ideally the briefing should also be interactive rather than a monologue.

I would absolutely agree with the poster above in essence that the "brief" should wherever possible be just that, however nobody should feel constrained by "30 seconds" or any other arbitary time period to fulfil what is an important, although often poorly delivered part of the flights standard operating procedures.

Everybody will have their own methodology that best works for them, but this is one airport where I feel a deviation from the SOP, to the degree that the briefing is split to provide better time management, works effectively.

[de facto]

Vienna - Innsbruck

Briefing on the ground.

In cruise: MCP,Minima,A/B,Speeds,Navaids,(review of landing distance if conditions changed)and Refresher of missed approach(es) and their sequence.

[bfisk]

Wow, that is short. You can only have just finished the After Take-Off checks before starting the Pre-Landing checks?!

Presumably you are not talking about flights in commercial aircraft such as the A320 or B737? Or are you?

Not quite, but the B200 (King Air) operated multi-crew. Still plenty of work, and definately one of those legs where it pays off to pull the power back! Climb, descent and approach checklists please...

[Kerling-Approsh KG]

I'm not sure if anything similar still goes on, but Air UK used to operate AMS-EDI-GLA-AMS at times of day when there was insufficient demand for individual services to and from EDI and GLA. Fokker 100, picking up and dropping off at both. I recall we did it at about FL80. Halcyon days...

[Tmbstory]

Below is an extract from times gone by:

Standard Briefing:

At the Commander's discretion, having regard for certain conditions, the full take-off briefing may be dispensed with.

"Standard Briefing" assumes that the First Officer has been fully briefed on a previous flight in the series of flights by the Captain on the normal, abnormal and emergency procedures releative to the take-off in the particular aircraft.

When "Standard Briefing" is used it may be necessary for the Captain to draw attention of the First Officer to points of detail relative to that particular take-off. The use of "Standard Briefing" is intended to avoid repetition during a series of flights but it should be used with discretion bearing in mind that airport conditions during a series of flights are constantly changing.

[Eff Oh]

Regularly used to operate GLA-EDI or EDI-GLA in both B757 and B737NGs. I think the record was 11mins t/o to landing. Usually flown at 4000ft. :ok:

[Northbeach]

Aircraft is a Boeing 737 departure, enroute and arrival all in IMC conditions total time of flight can be less than 15 minutes. Cities served are on different islands and the region is populated by large mountains. It’s all briefed on the ground if it is done in hard IFR. Once airborne better concentrate on flying the jet, set the airspeed bugs, verify the weather and run the checklists – it all happens very quickly.

On flights around 30 minutes into Cat III weather, if possible I try to brief the whole thing on the ground. The more you can get done with the parking brake set rather than the beast doing 7 NM (4 NM below 10,000) a minute the better. It all works very well because of the high quality of the people I get to fly with, standardized training and a great ATC system.

Great fun – most of the time.

Northbeach

[dixi188]

My shortest flight:- Macon to Robbins AFB, Georgia USA.
3 mins. leave gear down.

Briefed before T.O.

Interesting thing was the log book was in decimals of an hour and 0-3 mins was .0 so 1 landing but no flight time. There was a memo saying to put .1 in log book.

Also used to do Jersey to Guernsey in about 6 or 7 mins. Again, landing briefed before T.O.

These days we sometimes do Luton to Heathrow and again brief done before T.O. About 10 mins airborne.

[firefish]

Flew a 5 min flight with a C680 a couple of days back and that was the shortest flight I've had so far. We discussed the probable approach before t/o but the actual briefing as per company standards was done in flight. This was between two small Swedish airports and hence nothing complicated. IMO, the approach briefing should to the furthest extent possible be conducted in flight after t/o and not before t/o (and then being an extension of the departure briefing) as a way to ensure that you don't mix up the departure and the approach.