Land without clearance

[good egg]

Interesting, I'd hazard a guess that we reach for it about once a month, and out of those about 99 times out of a hundred we work out who the arrival is talking to prior to touchdown

[terrain safe]

Well the Aldis lamp works well through green tinted windows, really well. Any spare colleagues available nowadays? Not in the modern world. And the paperwork now is even worse. What a wonderful time to be an ATCO!

[good egg]

I didn't say a "spare" colleague...not had one of those for a long time...but we tend to work as a team at my unit...don't you?
As for paperwork...for the jobbing ATCO I'd say it isn't particularly onerous?

[HEATHROW DIRECTOR]

Nimmer is right. AFAIK Aldis lamps were not at Heathrow during my time, going back to 1972. There were none where I worked abroad in the late 60s either. It must be a rare commodity now - well worth taking to Antiques Roadshow!

[NudgingSteel]

I'd be disappointed at any ATCO who just lets a non-speaking inbound run "just to see what happens" for a massive number of reasons. Whether it's to get a landing clearance onto the R/T (in case of tx failure on the a/c, thus saving a possible go-around followed by non-radio arrival procedure); to alert any vehicles or other a/c around the runway; trying to establish if there's any other problem the crew are dealing with and have just forgotten; just to confirm that there's somebody actually monitoring the arrivals; etc.

Or best case scenario....the runway's clear, the crew have simply forgotten, they land safely...then end up getting dobbed in, potentially into a world of trouble, when their mistake is pointed out on the frequency.

Utterly avoidable.

[Gonzo]

Agreed,

In today's world it would not be satisfactory to sit back and watch.

I would expect ATC to be doing everything possible to contact (whether by RT, datalink, light, signal squares, whatever) the aircraft.

It shouldn't be forgotten that if a modern aircraft is suffering a genuine radio failure, there's probably a lot more wrong with that airframe than mere radio problems.

[kcockayne]

These are fair points to consider. If I was still an ATCO I would have them right at the front of my thinking. When this happened the world, & aviation, was a lot simpler place. The essential point that I was trying to make was that in a very simple & non-critical situation, there was no need to rush off on reporting action. Everyone learnt from a friendly discussion, rather than being dragged over the coals. However, I do acknowledge the need to ascertain whether, or not, the a/c or crew have a problem; & to help to deal with it. In the case mentioned I was pretty certain that nothing was amiss - although, I do accept that I did not KNOW that to be a fact.
As I said, everyone learnt from it , & the points which have been made were part of that learning.

[Dan Dare]

CHIRP has something to say on the subject. To paraphrase: it's a runway incursion, but pilot landing or going around could be critisized or praised either way; ATCO should transmit blind and use signals.

[zkdli]

you should read the reports on the runway incursion at EGBB from a couple of years back. Make your toes curl it would! CAA prosecuted the pilot as well.

[black_jack]

Had one acft land without a clearance a few years ago at a small airport. 5min before official air traffic service hours were due to end, night-time VMC, long day flying, tuned the radio to the wrong frequency & from the silence the crew assumed I had gone home early. Didn't broadcast on the military frequency coming in (which I was monitoring in order to get an idea of where they were- the joys of non-radar environments) nor follow unmanned joining procedures and flew straight in. Got quite a fright because the working position had my back to that particular final approach, saw the landing lights, sent out the fire & rescue assuming they had a radio failure. Pilot came up to the tower rather sheepishly after shutting down to apologise. Luckily no harm done, but definitely makes you think about the what-ifs...

[eastern wiseguy]

So far as using an ALDIS ..I had a BA 757 land without clearance...he had set 118.1 instead of 118.3. We never heard from him when transferred from APP. I shone the ALDIS at him...transmitted blind...and he landed safely. It was a buggah of a job to convince him that he HAD a clearance to land.

KCockayne

The pilot did not call me & I was intrigued to see when he would. There was no traffic to affect the a/c, so I didn't say anything & let it run.

...

[Paul Cantrell]

A couple things on this very fun subject:

30 years ago as a newly minted helicopter pilot, I flew a wrong course and ended up at a towered field thinking I was going to be landing at a non-tower field. About a mile from the tower, I crossed a large hill / small mountain, and saw the control tower. Oops. Since I didn't know where I was, I didn't know which frequency to use. Obviously with further experience I would have known to just give 121.5 a call, but being that I was well below the traffic pattern and there were lovely areas of grass all around the ramp area I elected to just land on the grass and shut down and figure everything out on the ground. Tower was a bit miffed and suggested I have a talk with my instructor, but still to this day I think that landing on the grass was probably a better idea than continuing around in the air while waiting for a light gun signal. Of course, knowing where I was would have been even better!

On the subject of light guns, in the past (at least in the US) light guns had a very wide beam which was very desaturated, i.e. sometimes it could be difficult to tell green from red from white. The "new" ones give a very very saturated green or red light, such that I doubt it's simply a filter in front of a light source. Very nice. The other change, however, is that the beam seems much more narrow, to the point that when tower is trying to hit us with the light gun, it appears to flicker when I know they are actually trying to give us a steady indication. When I practice this, I'm typically 1/2 mile from the tower... perhaps at further distance the beam spread will be larger and less likely to flicker, but I'm curious whether other people have commented on this? It seems like a steady beam could easily be confused with a flashing indication, i.e. tower means to give a steady green, but the pilot sees a flickering green and doesn't think that he's actually cleared to land. Comments?

[vector4fun]

Happened fairly regularly where I worked, maybe once per month. Normally just transmitted clearance in the blind, and never got too worked up over it. As said, completely different from someone who showed up on the runway without talking to approach or anyone else. Had the old light guns which were useless more than a mile away in daylight.

Did have one chap hauling checks who lost electrical system 200 miles out one night and forged on, no lights/radios/transponder or IFR clearance. About an hour after midnight, I cleared a DEA/Customs plane for TO and he replied "What about this Cessna on final" I about jumped out of my skin. No radar target, (very old radar on very old tower display), no lights, not visible to me in any way, but the pilots could see him from the threshold about to cross the fence. They followed him to the ramp and gave him a "special" welcome. Don't think he'll repeat that decision.

[GASA]

To be fair, if someone is radio fail I wouldn't necessarily expect them to follow the radio fail procedures. They can be quite complicated sometimes, especially for a private pilot flying alone who might not have much experience. At least with today's radar you can see them and keep everything out of their way :P

[towerguy]

I've not used one in anger in many years but do still check it for serviceability every night shift. (The last real comms failure had the B737 pilot call me on his cell phone.)

They are very useful however for spotlighting while bunny hunting after hours at regional airports!