Handover already cleared to land
 

Flew my first PAR on Wednesday - many thanks to the nice lady at Benson, though we did seem to be left of centreline for rather a long time...!

Anyway, got a bit confused by the RT on handover to tower...

Benson Talkdown: '2 miles to touchdown, cleared land.'
Me: 'Cleared land, G-CD'
Benson Talkdown: 'Decision height.'
Me: 'Visual, G-CD.'
Talkdown: 'Contact Tower, 1xx.xx'
Me: 'Tower, 1xx.xx, G-CD' ... 'Benson Tower, G-CD'
Tower: 'G-CD, pass your message'
Me (a bit flummoxed): 'Err... G-CD is short final for 19, cleared land.'
Tower: 'G-CD cleared land.'
Me: 'Cleared land, G-CD'

Presumably there had been a breakdown in comms in the tower, as Tower didn't seem to be expecting me or to know I'd been cleared to land. Was I correct in reading this back to him, or should I have waited or asked him to confirm cleared land?

Tim

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

The tower ATCO would have given the PAR ATCO the landing clearance (by phone or other method), so he was just confirming that you were cleared to land.

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

Eeek.. A bit naughty.. no ATCO expecting an aircraft to call under those circumstances should say "pass your message". If anything he/she should have simply gone straight in with the landing clearance.

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

Tim

If that happens again say nothing. You've had the landing clearance, you've had the wind check. There's no requirement to call Tower until after you've landed - something along the lines of "Benson Tower, G-ABCD, on the runway from radar".

As others have said - Tower would already have issued the landing clearance to the radar controller, as they are the only ones legally entitled to give it - it being their runway, not radars.

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

Hi TM ,
Maybe confusion with u saying visual? its a helo thing. When they used to call visual on a talkdown they wanted ATC to send them to tower cos 8/10 times they don't touchdown and hover taxi in. Done plenty of IR apps at Benson just say nowt till over touchdown then transfer to twr. As peeps have said PAR controller gets clearance fron TWR at x mles so he/she was definately expecting u, just most fixed wings at EGUB sdn't say nowt till on ground. Though I know someone who asked a Jag pilot who called vis at 2 miles to contact TWR , lol think he had more demanding things to do!!

Neil

Happy New Year

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

Thanks, Neil, that makes sense because on the ILS they don't usually give you the tower handover until after touchdown (for those who don't know Benson, civil ac have to taxi on Tower as Ground is UHF only).

Tim

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

tmmorris
Tower: 'G-CD, pass your message'

Gonzo
so he was just confirming that you were cleared to land.

OR THE ATCO WAS READING THE NEWSPAPER :E

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

Poor phraseology by the twr controller.

After you have contacted twr his/her reply should have been 'G-CD, Benson Tower, you have been cleared to land'

If their defence however, Twr was probably flummoxed because they had not been told by PAR that you were chopping over.

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

Ok, I don't handle many SRAs from a TWR point of view, however, if one did come over to me inside two miles and just gave his callsign I would expect that he had something to tell me. In my experience they usually say "Callsign short final" or "Callsign visual from SRA". I will then say "Callsign confirming cleared to land........"
TWR would have known the a/c was cleared to land.

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

Why not just ring the SUP in the Tower and ask him/her what the score is?

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

So GONZO, would you say that the RT below is correct/good RT?
If any, shouldn't the TWR say "GO AHEAD" as per ICAO PANS standard RTF?

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

If in the UK, totally correct.

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

re: go ahead.

Not in the UK. We have to say "pass your message". I think it may be something to do with the words "go ahead". They sound a bit like an instruction or even a clearance to move forward, so the CAA decided to make our phrase; "pass your message".

I know, I know, it sounds fine to me to, but once upon a time I'm sure someone got the wrong end of the stick and felt the long arm of the law.

:ok:

Traaaaaaaaaaaa.

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

another one for ATC LHR...not a good idea to keep asking an aircraft do they have a problem when they kept their gear down due hot brakes. It disrupts the whole flow process. For info A330/320/1's brakes can get very hot on long taxi times and with no brake fans or fans u/s it is some times is pudent to keep the gear down for brake cooling.

havig said that you guys still run the best show.

Rgds

Bear

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

Bearcat....

If you know that you will be keeping the gear down why not just tel the deps controller?

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

Bearcat,

Thanks. I was about this morning and actually pointed out that the gear was still down to the ATCO. The misident was unfortunate, but we will always ask.

If you know you'll leave the gear down, please tell us.

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

With regard to the PAR (and you know I'm old and among the most harsh when it comes to my fellow ATCers...), I can see the problem. There's just not enough standard phraseology to cover all situations (can you imagine?), and this one might have been a bit tough to do concisely without sounding terse. When somebody calls me and just passes a callsign, I say (essentially), "how may I be of assistance?" That's what happened here. When the aircraft checked in with only the callsign my first thought would have been, "he/she has an additional request. Let's hear it."

Of course, it MAY have been that the controller was reading the newspaper, etc., but I'm willing to give the benefit of the doubt on this one. In my opinion, nothing mean-spirited was intended.

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

TM - it's military speak. As has been said, you've had your clearance, wind etc. Twr are not expecting you to say anything until you've landed and are ready to speak. If you do call them, they are expecting you to want something, hence "pass your message".
The idea is that at this reasonably critical point of flight the pilot can get on with flying the aircraft without interruption. Bear in mind that it's taking into consideration that the a/c could be shot to pieces, engines missing, pilot leaking red stuff all over the place etc. It's also why we still have PAR & don't just rely on ILS.
I'd suggest you ring the folks at Benson & arrange a visit. Make it a long one so you get to watch a PAR from the other end. Oh, and DON'T FORGET THE CHOCCIE BISCUITS!!!
Edited to add-
When you're on the centreline at 8 miles, the only place you can go is off it. Thus we are taught to keep a small closing heading to about a 2-mile final (depending on the type of a/c), nibbling away at it until you converge. Works a treat!
;)

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

Good idea - had already thought of that. Will give NeilMac a ring. Choccie biccies go without saying.

Now that is interesting, and I can see the point, too. In which case she did a fantastic job. The chap in the RH seat, mind you, was ex Oxford UAS and he thought we were a bit too far left, but he's used to A319/A320 now so I guess he's a bit rusty...

Tim

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

Agree wholeheartedly with most of the above... going back to original question: maybe a simple case of unexpected (but not abnormal or incorrect) call catching controller in one of those "mind in neutral" moments (we're all human)... Controller replies with a standard, knee-jerk phrase... realises they've been a bit of a prat but can't retract it... and the ensuing interesting, but not unsafe, exchange followed? My favourite similar gotcha is "Surface wind 320... err calm".

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

Surely that should be reported as "Surface wind calm from the North West"...
;)

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

PA- your fave gets me often! However, in this case the guy's on finals, been cleared to land, had surface wind, had gear check. It's just one of those mil/civ differences. Any instrument approach at a mil field is handled downstairs until the a/c has completed its landing roll or the pilot has reported going visual. Thus when the pilot called Benson yes, I'm sure the controller was taken by surprise, but equally what else could he say but "pass yr message"?

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

"G-ABCD Benson Tower, you have been cleared to land, Wind blah"
That should about cover it :)

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

Jumbo Driver is of course factually correct... but he must fly something with a glass cockpit these days as it seems he needs a simple explanation?

You look at the wind direction gauge, and start speaking "surface wind 320... (now looking at the speed dial, and thinking oh !!!!!!!) ... err calm"

AlPers: what "240andbelow" says sounds good enough for me!!!

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

I know what youre both saying, but a mil ATCO just wouldn't be expecting anything. In muh the same way that a civ ATCO wouldn't expect, when vectoring a mil a/c, the pilot to pass no. on board, his minima for that approach & his intentions.
Either way, it's not a particularly big deal. I would commend Mr Morris for coming onto this thread to ask about something about which he was puzzled. Well done mate! And more credit to a CCF officer (& fairly new one, I think) for actually getting his hands dirty in live aviation!
:ok:

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

The Talkdown controller unfortunately would have just lost his ticket as you have to have passed a clearance before 2 miles. If he had said 'cleared to land 2 miles' fine but not the other way around. Staying off the centreline is what we aim for until approx 2 miles prior to DH, depeding on ac type. A nice converging heading from 8 miles is the best way. Finally the Tower controller should have replied with G---- you have been cleared to land, although unless you wished to go to tower I would have left you alone until you had landed and had the ac slowing down, then switched you to tower, after all no one else was using the runway.

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

DET1 if you really believe the Controller would lose his ticket, I suggest you report to the SMO and seek his advise on anal retention... I presume you are refering to the JSP552 regulation that says, the pilot must be in receipt of a clearance BY 2nms (100% PK answer, well done), and in hanging onto the word "by", implying that 2.1nms = good, keep your ticket; 2.0nms = bad, lose ticket!!!

You are either playing with semantics and trying to be smart arse, or totally overlooking practicality and not asking yourself the reason behind the regulation (which is to give timely notice to the pilot, and avoid them jeoparding other aircraft by continuing the approach but breaking off the approach at a very late stage... I truly doubt 0.1nm would be that significant in this situation?... PAR is a precision approach, OK and I assume like most RAF bases you use RPAR that gives a range readout at 0.1nm intervals? If you are seriously suggesting that if ADC issues a landing clearance to you at 2.1nms (still within regulations) but you are unable to readback and pass the clearance before the range indicator drops to 2nms you must break off the approach, I would sincerely hope not; so presumably are advocating the controller sacrifices accuracy in order to pass the phrase in a particular order simply to comply with the regs. This sounds like a typical CATCS exercise objective; I could understand ATCEB raising this as a minor error, but shocked to hear of a controller losing their ticket on this issue alone.

If you want a laugh, at your own expense, talk to some aircrew mates about it next time you're in the bar?

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

Mike... you forgot position and squawk!

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

'Anal retenttive & visit the SMO', must have touched a nerve. Over 25 years in, have been told am fairly good at my job, unit instructor, standards etc. Like to think I do my job fairly. I wont give you examples of the same problem actually causing loss of tickets. Yes you are right the job id there to be done. In our world that is 'safely, expeditiously using standard RT & phraseology. As someone said we dont have a job without aircrew, however, we do our job correctly we get a hard time for being pedantic, we relax the rules and some jobsworth moans at the Sup because we were not following procedures. I like to think we have a good relationship with our crews but when it comes down to it if we continue to allow the rules to be 'relaxed' then there will be a problem eventually. The 2 miles cleared to land is not the best example, but take the case of a recent decision by a pilot to land at a secret Wiltshire airbase when the RVR was less then 100 meters, was this relaxing the rules. There are faults all round, I was pointing out that this was not correct, if I caused offence then fine. A plea from one who sits in the tower, come up and visit us, watch a PAR, sit on radar, sit in Local for 30 mins and watch why we ask you to 'go around' rather than extend downwind and hopefully things will continue to improve. Rant over, except I will not apologise for trying to ensure that people do the job safely.

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

Actually the aviation came first, which was how I got talked into it... (coming up for 3 years in CCF now). At least the CCF qualifies me for the Benson fg club, which is a fantastic bonus.

Tim

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

Tim... if you're a member of Benson Flying Club, pray why did you consider raising this question on PPRuNe... did you not talk to ATC in the first instance and get their explanation... from the way you word your original post it seems not?

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

Could indeed have done, but (a) wanted to save Benson ATC having to explain something I thought would probably be quite simple (and it was), and (b) wanted to put it into a civil/military context so comments from civil and military ATCOs on the differences were useful. Didn't want to start any rows, but there's something about the ATC forum that tends to go that way whatever the discussion...

Oh well.

Tim

Re: Handover already cleared to land
 

Tim... that's my point?

Most ATCOs won't bite your head off for asking a simple question, unless they are logged onto PPRuNe...

Looking for a military/civil perspective only provides fuel for the small minority who love to take pot-shots at the other side (i.e. military vs civil or vice-versa) and was probably irrelevant in this case, where the problem was specific to one site.