Holding

[Byrne11]

This is a fairly easy question i keep getting confused on.

Flying holds, why in a hold do you sometimes fly the abeam heading for the delayed time you have calculated before heading to your outbound heading and other times you continue onto your outbound heading.

Thanks.

[eckhard]

If you are referring to a direct entry, sometimes you have to maintain the heading that you had as you flew over the fix for a few seconds. This is in order to get you the correct distance out from the holding axis. If you turned straight away, you would roll out too close to the inbound axis and then overshoot the turn inbound.

An illustration would help but my computer skills don’t stretch to that. Imagine a right-hand hold with an inbound axis of 360. You approach the fix on a track of 030. There is no wind.

When you pass overhead, you hold your heading of 030 for about 10 seconds, then start the right turn onto the outbound heading of 180. You should end up at the correct distance from the inbound axis. If you turned straight away, without waiting for 10 seconds, you would end up too close and then risk overshooting when you turn inbound.

Is this what you mean? I hope so! If not, I apologise for wasting your time.

[Byrne11]

The fact you’ve said direct entry and explained that, it now makes sense to me.

Thanks very much.

[eckhard]

Phew! You’re welcome!

[foliot-pilot]

Are you in ground school or have you done flight training?