Last usage of runway 23 at LHR
 

Does anyone remember the last time they used the former runway 23 for landings at LHR? I can vaguely remember being there one day in 2000 when the winds were absolutely howling from the SW and I thought I remember seeing ac circle to land from the approach of 27R.

Within the hour the winds shifted back to the west (although still what I recall as a Beaufort force 8 or so) and the landings recommenced on 27R as we nipped off 27L.

Is my memory faulty here? If not, when did they finally put it into the state that it is now? How often was it used for landings? Wondered if in those conditions one was spared the usual buffet on the last mile from the hanger when landing 27R?

Any photos of this runway in use?

I did locate the date for another thread but I'm blowed if I can find it now.

23 was used quite frequently during strong SW winds and there was some surprise when it was closed. It could be a bit of a pain from an ATC point of view, especially after the ILS was decommissioned and we had to do SRAs all day! However, pilots of 707s and DC8s naturally preferred to use it when the main runways had croswinds! Pilots of other aircraft often stayed with 27L, creating interesting situations for trainee radar controllers - and some experienced ones who had never seen that configuration.

When a single aircraft was being sequenced for 27L, calculating its track distance to fit a "gap" left in the 23 stream was somewhat of a black art with the significantly different groundspeeds due to wind effect. Convincing a trainee that the "following" aircraft on 23 had to be ten miles from touchdown at the same time as the "one ahead" on 27L took some doing!

Tower controllers had problems with 27R departures as vortex effect had to be avoided with traffic on short final for 23.

23/05 eventually went the same way as all the other subsidiary runways, the Airport Operator wanting the concrete for reasons other than landing and take-off. Modern aircraft are (most of the time...) more able to cope with crosswinds than the previous generations especially old four-podders (although some side-stickers could provide some entertainment). If the landing aircraft on 23/05 were any more than 2nm apart the air holding delays became huge but for as standard separation had to be distance and not time despite ridiculously low groundspeeds 2.5 nm or more had to be used. Mandatory Wake Vortex separation 'blew away' any chance of tightening up spacing even though the preceding vortex rapidly dissipated by the time the following aircraft came in a position to encounter it. Turbulence was probably more of an issue. It was an awesome sight to see five heavies lined up on 23 and the tower controller crossing tugs on the dual taxiways. Ground movements became more of a problem when the inner taxiway outside the Deltas and Echos was developed for parking and there would be a queue of aircraft leading up to 27R with a 23 vacater trying to squeeze through to the Echos and Foxtrots. I often wondered if it would have been easier if aircraft had turn indicators so that the taxying aircraft could give way to the lander. As HD says the 27L versus the 23 was a real black art but very rewarding when it worked. Had to resort to unofficial 23 LAHSOs on a few occasions. It was also great fun on 05 providing 'back-to-back' SRAs espectially when it was a stiff CAVOK north-easterly. Towards the end of the life of 23 it was not unusual to find oneself supervising a tower-full of controllers who had never seen it in use and the experience died away before the runway was withdrawn to be just the 'outer taxiway'.

Wow that would be a windy day for the paths of the typical types using Heathrow to cross.

Missed approach off 23 versus something like a FK50 departure off 27L I could understand the posibility but would there be anything operating from 27R that would rotate before the centerline of 23?

Regards,

DFC

HD actually means 'jet-efflux' effect.

I was never convinced there was a problem, but we were told to apply it.

Perhaps I should have said turbulence rather than vortex. It wasn't the rotation bit.... it was the winding up for take-off with the lander 250 yards behind!

Thank you for the replies. Am I correct in reading that they also used 5 for arrivals at times? For some reason I was only thinking of the opposite direction but of course it makes sense.

Did they ever use this for departures? I would imagine if you had 40 knots on the nose it might have worked rather nicely.

I remember that day very well...

I ended up doing 23/27L arrivals cross-runway operations and it was pretty hard work. If I remember rightly, the wind was straight along 23 at about 55kts and I watched an Al Nippon 747 land and come off the runway half way along the Europier (now where taxiway Uniform is). That was also the same day that a Cathay Cargo 747 took runway 27L and nearly had a podstrike.

Damn near filled my looms with fruit.

05
 

05 was withdrawn long before 23, I arrived in the late 80s and never saw it. It was withdrawn with Terminal 4's arrival I think. 05 was was an even remoter operation and it was usually snowing if it was needed as it obviously needed a really strong NNE wind.
HD will have plenty of war stories about the 05 arrival and the 09R take-off as this was the standard mode.

The BOAC 707 G-ARWE that caught fire and an engine fell off in 1968 came back onto 05R.

Withdrawing a valuable runway just for the revenue convenience of Heathrow, at the nation's major airport, is something that, if they were up to the job, the CAA should never have allowed to happen. Exactly the same during the years that followed when Heathrow maintained the fiction that the runway existed but if you requested 23 you were told there would be a 2 hour delay while infringing parked aircraft were removed, and it never seemed to occur to anyone to have a procedure to remove such parked aircraft beforehand, when the wind was getting up in the relevant direction.

The last movement I can actually recall seeing onto 23 must have been 1988 (because I recall seeing it from the M4 when my old E-reg car was new !). It was a 747, which just looked strange coming from that direction.

For those writing about ATC when intersecting runways were in use, have you ever been to Chicago O'Hare, any day ? Six runways, all intersecting in varying combinations, and all in use simultaneously.

OK. Now I understand. Not nice having a sudden 120Kt crosswind that you did not expect!

Regards,

DFC

Yes, I've seen (and done!) 05R single runway ops with a howling northerly wind. One day a Trident opted to try 10L but the drift was so bad the crew couldn't see the runway because of the side metal pillars on the cockpit window! They were diverting all over to places with northerly runways. A foreign aircraft diverted to Birmingham after holding for over an hour and we later heard Brum had closed. A friend of mine had been flying a BA aircraft and diverted to Brum. He landed behind the foreigner, which ran out of fuel as it turned off the runway at the far end and blocked the turn-off so my buddy was stuck behind on the runway!

If I recall the usual tower response to the first call from an inbound aircraft on 05R was "Report crossing the river". That was the Thames, about 3.5 miles out. A Trident crossed the river just as a snow storm hit the north side of Heathrow. I urged him to keep the speed on, but just as he crossed the threshold everything disappeared in a white-out and he went round. "We tried our best", he said.

I cleared Speedbird 707 for take off once on 10R with traffic about a mile out on 05R. The gentleman replied that he'd rather wait until that one had landed and I said something like "It's not that one I'm worried about - it's the one 2 miles behind him!" Luckily the guy poured the coal on and everything worked fine.

Approach was fun too.. There was a trainee on South Director one day who'd never seen 05. In accordance with standard procedure the Air Man rang down for a heading for westbound departure off 10R. With lots of confidence of "I've done lots of westbound departures before" the trainee gaily said "250". The usual "two bells" from the Air Man signified that the departure was rolling so I asked the trainee if he was confident the outbound would out-climb the traffic on final approach to 05. "Oh Chr*st"... Quick bell to the Air Man got the outbound stopped on 200, thereby preventing aluminum rain (as our US friends call it) over Virginia Water.

ATC was also frustrated by the inordinate amount of time needed to bring 23 into use, but we were in the hands of the airport owners.

23 produced some great "events". An A310 landed well-down - like almost at the Block 85 and was obviously having problems stopping. It managed to reduce speed enough to lurch off to the left at the end and disappeared behind T4!!! I saw a number of aircraft "have a go" at RAF Northolt, even after 23L ILS was installed. Problem was that the closing heading to lock-on put them nicely lined up for Northolt..... and some took a bit of convincing that they were wrong.

In reply to WHBM, yes, I've been to Chicago and seen it. A colleague of mine went there in the 70s on a familiarisation trip and came back grey-haired. When he queried some of the happenings the US controllers told him the trouble with Brit controllers was that they worried too much.... 'nuff said. I showed some O'Hare controllers round London Approach... looking at the traffic patterns on the radar one of them counted the range rings and said: "Let's see, this is 100, 200 miles, right?" "Not quite - 10, 20 miles". His response was dramatic.

Oh Happy Days...... Wonder if it all happens now?

Used 23 quite a few times in the early 90's flying Midland 737's, sometimes used it late at night on calm days inbound with the mail from EDI for controller SRA training, always happy to oblige. I do remember taxing out one very windy morning and seeing a Springbok 747 land on 23 right beside us, very impressive.

Of course there is still a 23/05 runway available for howling SW winds but unfortunately it's up the road at Stansted. Does anyone in ATC know who many times since it shut the x-wind has been out of limits for 27L/R and aircraft have had to divert?

Max Angle... Grey cells here somewhat depleted now but I think it was a TWA Captain who would not taxy north on the outer taxiway to 27R whilst 23L was in use. He thought it was a bit too close!

Brilliant!!!:):):)

Yup, that is exactly where we were, it did seem pretty close at the time.

I was posted to LHR in '89 and 05 was still in use around then as I can remember watching it in action and working it as a tower u/t. It only went out of service when they decided to build some parking stands on what was the 05 threshold.

Sat on my desk beside me is a (the?) 05 runway designator strip, that I liberated when the runway was finally withdrawn.

Once they'd built the stands on the 05 threshold, that was the main reason it then took so long to get 23 up and running. Any aircraft and associated equipment parked on the 05 threshold stands had to be removed before 23 could be used. I recall it either being 2 or 4 hours notice required.

There is a recent Swanwick Manager who did his LL validation board when RWY 23 was in operation.(AB).
I believe the day of the board was the first he had seen 23 for real.
Can anybody confirm this?

I don't know to whom you are referring, but this happened on a number of occasions when I was at Heathrow so it wasn't unknown. I also saw many fully valid controllers who had never seen 23..... until they arrived on watch to take over!

Over + Out
I always understood that to be the case too. Apparently some working with him that day were also seeing it for the first time. I gather SRG said if he could cope with that he could cope with anything!
Cheers,
N

"Keep smiling, it makes people wonder what you're up to..."

To digress slightly, anyone recall the last time a braking 'chute was deployed on landing @ LL ?

I don't know about LL, but I heard one land at KK back in the early 80's. A US Navy A-3 Skywarrior, converted to be a VIP transport, on a flight from somewhere in southern Europe.

I heard it get clearance to land from the Tower. The next comms from the aircraft was a question as to whether he could drop his braking-chute on the runway, or should he turn-off first!

But, back to LL ....
I remember reading an article in the 90s which was all about SAS and their DC-9 operations arouns Scandinavia. It explained that some of their fleet were equipped with braking-chutes for use in the winter months on frozen runways in the far north.

I suppose, in theory, some of those a/c could have operated into LL, but I can't imagine that they'd ever need to use them.

TU-104s and the odd Caravelle used them at Heathrow, but Heaven knows why. Maybe they had no brakes! A Tower request to a TU-104 not to drop the chute until off the runway usually resulted in a billowing great shroud falling on to the runway for Checker to retrieve, resulting in a go-around for the next arrival...

Thanks GoN & HD
I know an Air France Caravelle used one in early 1979 on rwy 23. I was onboard the Trident that landed just ahead of it & I heard the AFR burst a tyre on landing & caused a lot of delays ! :hmm:

Furthering the thread drift but what about the last time 05 was used. I flew into LHR many many times but never on 23 though on return from our honeymoon we did use 05 to arive back in a freezing UK after a week in sunny Faro.
Great view from right overhead Heathrow as we approached -presumeably something like over head the Airport and then a long downwind southwest to comeback in across the Thames upstream from Staines. Was 05 a 'talkdown' appraoach ?

Also saw a Swissair Caravelle pop the chure in the 60s quite a sight when not expecting it.
Also amusing to see the FO climb out of the flightdeck window and shimmy down a rope to check on something after it stopped

PB

Apart from the westbounds that HD mentioned, the big problem with 05 was track distance from BIG/OCK. Most crews thought it would be straight onto base leg and down but the outbounds got in the way and you had to take them over final and then downwind left before turning back. There were nearly some red faces when they realised that "we've just enough fuel if we leave the hold now" didn't account for this.
Other joys of 05 SRA's was when IBE broke cloud and all he could see was water, as he was over one of the Reservoirs (can't remember the names now) and knew LL was inland so called "over the sea going round"! Took some convincing second time round. Also TWA (ah those were the days) saying "we'd like to go visual now" at 6nm when no-one else saw the Runway until 2 nm. "Confirm visual?" to which he replied "Hell no, but we'd sure like to be visual now". Not sure if it was a comment on my SRA.

<<Was 05 a 'talkdown' appraoach ?>>

Being very young (!), I don't know if PAR was ever used on the subsidiary runways but certainly SRAs were employed, as windowjob mentioned. There was never ILS on that runway.

***I've found one piece of info: Runway 23 was permanently withdrawn from use on 27 October 2002. The last movement was SAA Boeing 747 ZS-SAU, which landed at 0746.

Dunno 'bout you HD but as an 05 Number 2 Director I've done alternate SRAs to 05 with a second, and adjacent, Number 2. Tremendous fun, especially if you got a 'good' guy who just got on with it and you trusted each other. It was best to try and put them to tower in the correct order though otherwise it would confuse the hell out of the 10R/05 man shooting ("Roll NOW!") the gaps!!

Well . . . got to say . . . as if it were yesterday but regrettably it is not.

My LL Twr Validation was on 05! . . yep not seen it before and SRG did offer another appointment if I wished? . . . No ta, been up most of the night looking forward to the day.

As you may recall '' Air '' was combined for 05 Ops, ie Just the one air controller/frequency as all three runways were yours (05, 10L, 10R).

It worked a dream with the other Air person doing an invaluable job (planner/slot negotiator/phones/holding point sequencing etc) just left you with the sometimes heart rendering decisions and yes clearing traffic 4 take off on 10R with traffic on short(ish) final for 05 . . it had to be judged shall we say. (on the brakes > power up > go now meant . . go NOW honest, it's a long way to block 85).

I believe the afternoon watch ended up with a few rejected take offs and the usual excitement when it did not quite work out . . . just stop before block 85!!

Anyways a big thank you to CM my Air2 man who always managed to sort the Dep order and renegotiate the slots or otherwise make sure that I got away with it. I cannot remember who was on GMC but they too had little experience of 05 Ops. And thanks to SRG who let me loose to spend many an enjoyable shift at probably the best posting . . in those days at least.

Oh and yes those track miles . . leave BIG 320 then left 280 towards Amersham'ish then the long downwind left for SRA to 05 having sequenced with the LAM and BNN traffic.

Happy days . . . Really

<<My LL Twr Validation was on 05! . . yep not seen it before and SRG did offer another appointment if I wished? >>

Wasn't with Harry "The Colonel" was it? If so he was probably as terrified as you!

Guess we must have worked together...

Take care Bren McC

<< Wasn't with Harry "The Colonel" was it? If so he was probably as terrified as you!>> Wish I could remember that far back . . it may very well have been!

Guess we must have worked together ... we certainly have Old Bean . . hope you are keeping well. :ok:

There were 2 schools of thought on doing SRA's to 05. Some Watches had 2 Directors with each doing alternate one's as Talkdownman says and some had the first Dir sequencing to final and then at 6nm hand over to the 2nd for the full SRA as he would just have transferred the first to Twr at 2nm or more. This meant that each Dir only did 1 job i.e sequencing or SRA'ing rather than doing both at the same time, plus the Twr always knew who to ring if there was a problem or to give a landing clearance.

How could you ever explain to SRG nowadays "shooting the gap" with a departure from 10R cleared for take off (or at least told "Roll Now Take off clearance to follow") against tfc that still hadn't landed on 05!

Very interesting thread. Anyone comment, ballpark figure, how often traffic uses 09L for departure for whatever reason. I know the Cranfield Agreement prohibits this as a norm but the up to date SIDS suggest it's an option?

And with Hoon revoking the above agreement, about to become commonplace again?

S1E,

It's always an option...when 27L/09R was being resurfaced a few years ago, it would be closed every night at 2230. If we were on easterlies, that would mean quite a few 09L departures.

Not sure of a ballpark figure to be honest. I think there were a few 09L departures a few weeks ago one night....Maybe wrong on that one though.

Wow this is bringing back some memories for me, i used to live in Staines, and remember well the times 05R was in use, does anyone remember the time that it was used for 2/3 days solid in the 70's and in the summer! Tunis 727's swissair cv990's TWA 747's . I presume there was work being carried out on the main 2 runways.
I saw RWE going in whilst messing around near the house, something i will never forget, some very loud explosions!

Used to listen in to atc and remember the SRA approaches, actually taped a few times, but sadly wrote over them, would have made good nostalgia.
Saw the rocket land on it once while at the threshold, that was scary.
The only other times when using 05R was extremly cold ne wind, the 707's passed over us at 700' the smell of the kerosene and the screaming JT3's.

I have been at EGLL for 25 years now and only seen o5 used once, and that would have been between 91 and 94, i believe this was the last time, must have just been before the whisky stands were built.

I have towed ac to base when 23 was in use and remember holding for an inbound A320 when said a/c went around, turned out another tow,er was towing from T4 straight across the 05 threhold! Thats when i realised how dangerous using this runway was.

Also the near miss with a 747 and a F28, one was landing the other departing both from 23.

05 SRO one Christmas in the mid 80s, now that was a very interesting day.
E Watch on duty, well a few of them anyway.
Ba111 left Heathrow 05 for JJ, tailwind all the way, for some reason could not land at JJ, decided to return to LL, now a screaming headwind, enters OCK stack , must leave stack now or will have to divert, vectored as mentioned with about 70 miles from touch down, declares Mayday at 5 miles,

In 2001 there were 15 departures off 09L
In 2002 1160
In 2003 1099
In 2004 492
In 2005 762
In 2006 236
In 2007 43
In 2008 21
So far this year 96.

Great thread and a lot of fun to pull some of the greybeards in to fill us in about how LHR was before the boring 2 parallel arrangement.

My airline only mentions in the 10-7 pages that 9L is normally not used and does not publish anything for a 9L departure. Yet the above post says that they have done it quite a few times the past years. What circumstances metit this? Is there obstacle data available? I will try to pull it out of our ACARS tomorrow and see what we have from that end. What kind of clearance does one receive from clearance delivery? Radar vectors with an "expect?"

Also, what is a good link on a discussion on a 3rd runway there? I know this is a political hot potato, but if I were King for a day I would be pouring concrete tomorrow morning... Save more fuel and carbon footprint by just landing than we would holding http://images.ibsrv.net/ibsrv/res/sr...lies/smile.gif

There is a full range of 09L SIDs in the AIP, quite surprised that you have no details of them.

The vast majority of 09L departures will have been when the southerly runway was closed (from 2230 when it was being resurfaced, or when being de-iced etc). Other times we may use it might be when it has a significantly better RVR or when the 09L ILS is u/s and the weather precludes visuals/SRAs.

<<My airline only mentions in the 10-7 pages that 9L is normally not used >>

Good Lord, Fred - what airline do you fly for?!!