Phalconphixer
7th Jun 2014, 23:00
Last night, Friday 6th June between 2030 and 2200 UTC...
Our house is located to the right of the approach to RW 09 at GRX and is at the southern edge of an occasionally used holding point for inbound traffic routing via the Loja NDB.
Commercial traffic into / out of GRX these days is limited to just a handful of flights per day and the hold is very rarely used. Last night however at the times referred to above, it was occupied by two Vueling A320's inbound from BCN. The first of these, VLG2018, made what appears to be a normal approach via Loja but seemingly abandoned the approach passing Lachar. Whether it did so from choice or because it was instructed to is anyones guess. In a standard missed approach manouvre it climbed rapidly back to 7000ft and headed back towards Loja and entered the hold, orbiting 7 times before being recleared back to GRX. Pic below shows radar track via flightradar24.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v13/foxbat/Captura1VLG2018_zpsedd82e2e.jpg
Fifteen or so minutes later, it was joined in the hold at 10000ft by VLG2016... again the pic is via flightradar24... (for some reason the illustrated track flown by VLG2016 is offset geographically southward by about 5kms but I guess thats just a quirk of the ADS-B reporting and its translation by flightradar24...)
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v13/foxbat/Captura2VLG2016_zps7c1be9c4.jpg
Both aircraft were in the holding pattern for around 45 minutes, clearly visible from my house to the south of Moraleda de Zafayona. There was nothing reported on the AENA website explaining the delay and to the best of my knowledge, an inbound MAD-GRX Iberia / Air Nostrum CRJ-100 appeared to have landed normally at GRX without holding during the period that the two A320's were circulating. (flightradar24's MLAT trace of the CRJ disappears before it starts it approach...)
All of which kind of begs the cynical question, why did the CRJ get a straight in (if indeed it did!) at the expense of the two A320's?
V.V.I.P. perhaps? Wouldn't be the first time some public figure has used his / her influence or his / her money to get preferential treatment and a rapid transit through the airport... Like I said... just curious...
Our house is located to the right of the approach to RW 09 at GRX and is at the southern edge of an occasionally used holding point for inbound traffic routing via the Loja NDB.
Commercial traffic into / out of GRX these days is limited to just a handful of flights per day and the hold is very rarely used. Last night however at the times referred to above, it was occupied by two Vueling A320's inbound from BCN. The first of these, VLG2018, made what appears to be a normal approach via Loja but seemingly abandoned the approach passing Lachar. Whether it did so from choice or because it was instructed to is anyones guess. In a standard missed approach manouvre it climbed rapidly back to 7000ft and headed back towards Loja and entered the hold, orbiting 7 times before being recleared back to GRX. Pic below shows radar track via flightradar24.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v13/foxbat/Captura1VLG2018_zpsedd82e2e.jpg
Fifteen or so minutes later, it was joined in the hold at 10000ft by VLG2016... again the pic is via flightradar24... (for some reason the illustrated track flown by VLG2016 is offset geographically southward by about 5kms but I guess thats just a quirk of the ADS-B reporting and its translation by flightradar24...)
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v13/foxbat/Captura2VLG2016_zps7c1be9c4.jpg
Both aircraft were in the holding pattern for around 45 minutes, clearly visible from my house to the south of Moraleda de Zafayona. There was nothing reported on the AENA website explaining the delay and to the best of my knowledge, an inbound MAD-GRX Iberia / Air Nostrum CRJ-100 appeared to have landed normally at GRX without holding during the period that the two A320's were circulating. (flightradar24's MLAT trace of the CRJ disappears before it starts it approach...)
All of which kind of begs the cynical question, why did the CRJ get a straight in (if indeed it did!) at the expense of the two A320's?
V.V.I.P. perhaps? Wouldn't be the first time some public figure has used his / her influence or his / her money to get preferential treatment and a rapid transit through the airport... Like I said... just curious...