? to LHR APPR re OCK Hold
 

Folks on entering the OCK hold from the west the A320 in my opinion makes a dogs dinner of the tear drop entry. In my opinion it goes out too far into LGW's back yard hence before it goes out too far I always hdg select it back to OCK and then let it do its own thing.

Whats the story....is there a prob here are am I being too conservative?

Thanks.

to be honest never really thought the A320 was any different from any other aircraft. Doesn`t really cause a problem cos Gatwick inbounds are vectored to the south of the airfield. Just the odd LAM departure to miss!!. The odd aircraft venturing to far south does tend to coincide with the instruction hold at OCK EAT is....

Don't forget that there is a DME OCK limit (7 I think) on the outbound leg to keep you within the holding area. You should ensure that you start your inbound turn (and are at holding speed) no later than that point.

camelfeeder -

its not the KK inbounds that are an issue - its the Sam or Kenet outbounds on runway 08 that can get stuck below something that is wide in the Ock hold... quite easy to miss an A/C that is flying wide in the hold and decide to climb against traffic in the stack... wide holds do happen, despite the laid down restrictions as mentioned by eyeinthesky.

Sausdaguna

I must admit I have noticed a wide turn every so often, but not to the extent of checkiong out what A/C it is....... it's just one of those things we have to watch out for!!

We had a problem with MD80s entering the LAM hold turning VERY wide on the initial entry and had to keep a very close eye on them against the BIG hold, but have never noticed any problem myself at OCK.

There've been other issues with the A319 FMS on a westerlie DVR departure from LHR straight going through the BUR-EPM track instead of intercepting it, and then having to turn onto east to regain the track. This caused a few hairey moments against preceeding departures but I believe that's all been sorted out now

Have a look next time you're entering OCK from the west and if FMS isn't turning back before the DME restriction, why don't you raise it with your company as a fault? Perahps you machine is doing the same as the MD80 FMS at LAM?

Let's be careful out there!

Oh yes.........as I found out the hard way.

thanks a mill folks for the feedback.....havent been back to OCK since from the west but i'll pass it on to my collegues re if it has'nt turned by 7dme. Its just the one hold of all the holds in the database that goes out too far. It's a far cry from the days of manually doing it!!!

Regards

Are you sure that there is a 7 dme outbound limit in the OCK hold? I am looking at Aerad Heathrow page H9 and I can't see one. (That doesn't mean it isn't there, of course - the Wembley-Hogg eyes aren't what they used to be!)

G W-H

There used to be a DME limiting distance for the outbound leg of OCK at 9 miles but it disappeared years ago. I think it was to ensure separation against the Mayfield stack which was then used by Gatwick but could be wrong about that.