Capt Fathom, I never used the word "approach." The video shows the aircraft flying down the runway at X height. Who knows, it may have been a go-around, but the video shows what is essentially a fly-by, hence my question-mark above.

The fact is, that it was rather foggy!

As it's been said many times, "welcome to the third world". Even India has CAT3 ILS at its major airports. Sad for a country that once led the way. We have great coffee shops and places to buy furry kangaroos but can't get the planes in. Pathetic really, almost comical.

Took the words right out of my mind BG. A question? Was YMTG out of question?

QUOTE

"Qantas and Virgin were both diverted to Mildura by air traffic control when Adelaide airport notified it that fog was closing it to arrivals. At the time air traffic control had reported that Mildura was clear. It acted on the best information it had, directed the affected airlines to go to Mildura, and then everyone was caught out by the unforecast fog that also affected the visibility at that airfield."

I doubt that ATC would have "diverted" the aircraft to MIA, it would have been the captains' decisions to divert there, not ATCs.

QUOTE

" Pilots are entitled to elect under their company’s operating procedures to fly an approach and abandon it if they cannot make visual contact with the runway at the decision height at which they continue the landing or power up the engines and climb away."

Pilots aren't "entitled" to do this under SOPs, it's expected of them by law... :ugh:


Not having a go at the pilots, they did a good job under tough circumstances, just more sh!t reporting....

I'm sure we all remember from PPL met. about visibility in fog. The distance through the fog is much less when looking straight down from overhead the airport than it is when you are in the soup and looking through 2km of water droplets trying to find the runway.

What a day...

I was on that flight
Things I remember

Cockpit said high headwinds to Adelaide
Cockpit said we were Diverting from Adelaide to Mildura for fuel and to wait for fog to lift at Adelaide
I recall one go-around with ground visible ( certainly wasn't a prec.. Large thrust and pitch change ) not saying there wasn't one.. Just didn't notice it.
Cockpit advised that next approach is a landing and he will call brace as it may be bumpy landing.
On final(?) captain called brace brace
Followed by front cabin crew repeatedly yelling "heads down stay down" until we had slowed down on rwy

I got a picture and will post later of out window view.

I was towards front of aircraft

My memory is being taxed after a loooong day. Left Brisbane at 6 arrived Adelaide at 7:30ish so there may be some inaccuracies


Pic on taxi
http://img195.imageshack.us/img195/4782/31ow.jpg
* said cockpit as can't recall who made PAs

QF were there prior
1384 aircraft still there when we left at 3

Kris

I am not interested in talking to media

YMTG runway is only 1524x30 so a bit tight I would imagine.

I was wondering about the military option, YPED. I happened to be listening to ATC before 1384 diverted, and ATC mentioned to 1384 that YPPF was now clear of fog. It is likely that YPED would have been clear as well.

What hasn't been mentioned so far is the way 3AW reported this (in the person of David Armstrong and that Journalist's Journalist Neil Mitchell). I admit I'm paraphrasing the exact wording here, but the story was retold as: "The Virgin 737 pilot was guided to a safe landing by the Qantas pilot who had landed before him . . ."

A 73 conducted an auto land into AD this morning in the fog and got in whilst no one else was getting in.( I'm not sure if they made previous attempts.) My question is, could they have used auto land as a last resort and landed below minima or is this a standard procedure in foggy conditions?

YPED was never clear (until around the same time AD became clear) and Parafield was for only a short period before it rolled in again.

Roundabout

Yes they could have but if you arrive to an airfield and it goes under minimums and you have fuel to an alternate field that is CAVOK , you would be shot for doing an unauthorized auto land into that runway. Sometimes **** happens and these aircraft got on the ground, thats what its all about...

That 737 that auto landed was me. We arrived into Adelaide with Melbourne diversion + 45 mins hold, because I had a feeling in my loins departing Sydney, and after a pulse quickening curfew arrival into Sydney with unforecast fog a week prior.

We held for about 25 mins while aircraft diverted left right and centre all around us.

When vis was reported as 820m we shot an approach and were just able to see expanding Hials at minima. Borderline stuff to be sure but we waited until vis was reported above requirements and got lucky.

Elected to auto land to enable all my attention to be on expanding segment.

First in, then others followed as fog quickly dissipated. Although around the terminal it seemed more clagged in than the runway.

Funny thing is, there were no requirements to divert really as metar had fog clearing 30 min after we arrived so if you'd trusted the metar you'd have gotten in.

Tough call when she's fogged in to put all your eggs in the metar basket but legally if you had 30 min on arrival at about 10:30 from memory you didn't have to go anywhere.

But we had bucketload so was a no brainier to wait it out.

Hats off to the mildura crews getting it down safely but I'd be damned if I'd leave an auto land capable airfield to head to a tinpot non-ils runway if I knew it had fog also.

That's the million dollar variable though isn't it. Was fog on the mildura metar?

At least it was not in the middle of WA in a F28 at night with only an NDB for the approach.

There is no way there was fog on MIA metar when the other crews elected to divert, surely, why divert? It was all down to fuel levels on arrival ADL.


601,
Better than being in a Baron in WA southwest with a NDB offset in 400m vis? Lol been there done that...Its all good mate...

Yeah sorry bad wording on my part. I'm sure they wouldn't have diverted Mildura if fog was there on ETA, but I wonder if it was a total surprise or if it was on the taf but not metar, then appeared out of the blue, much like Adelaide.

Totally agree with By George, third world country masquerading as a first world country.Airport operators more interested in selling fast food and a so called government flat out sabotaging the economy.
It's unbelievable that internationals arriving at our so called "Premier City" have to divert for fog. Reminds me of the story of the United Captains last Aussie Flight,"just like to congratulate you guys on being the second best controllers in the world." Controller not realising he was being set up responded, thanks very much, who's the best? Everybody Else!

ATC personell have othing to do with it, it is the government......oh sorry private companies that dictate our national interest......

Sorry AoA, Didn't mean to imply ATC are responsible for incompetent Government policy.

I'm told there was a video taken by someone on the ground of the 73 trying to land? Has anyone got a link to it?

Well done to the VA crew, I guess the seat covers where changed later on!! :eek:

Video here if link works
 

Video here if link works to 7 news

Virgin plane makes emergency landing at Mildura Airport - Yahoo!7