Odd approach to Nice on Saturday

[BSAA1947]

A good friend and his wife were on BA348 (an A319) from LHR to Nice on Saturday evening and had a rather odd arrival. They are frequent travellers to Nice, so are in a good position to know that this flight was unusual. I wonder if anyone may be able to shed any light on what happened?

The flight seemed normal until very near Nice, at a late stage of the approach (with the cabin crew seated and belted), although my friend does not believe the flaps were extended and did not hear the gear being lowered. He said the power was suddenly increased when the crew presumably carried out a missed approach, and the aircraft climbed at a high power setting for a couple of minutes. The odd thing is they seemed to be flying more or less straight for the following five minutes or so. An announcement was made that the landing was a "no go" as they "couldn't see the airport" and an attempt to land would be made in the opposite direction.

Eventually, after hardly any banking of the aircraft they descended again (with the coast visible on the port side), the gear was heard to lower, and they landed, but seemed to use the thrust reversers for a long time accompanied by extremely heavy braking. There was a final announcement from the cockpit after landing with clearly discernible tension in the voice saying "I'm glad we made it eventually". My friend commented that some of the cabin crew appeared very shaken. Also, when they disembarked, it was very obviously good weather with clear visibility.

I checked the approach plates for LFMN and the METAR. It seems the wind was 090 at 6 knots. Assuming the initial approach was to runway 22, the procedure for a missed approach appears to be a climb to 3000' with a left turn onto 115 degrees. It seems strange that they felt the aircraft turn very little, especially as I would have thought there would be a couple more significant turns onto a final approach for runway 04.

Could there have been a flap problem which resulted in a higher landing speed, hence the very heavy braking?

Any comments appreciated, to help satisfy my friend's (and my) curiosity!

[AmarokGTI]

Certain death narrowly avoided. Well done to the crew, and to your friend for their bravery.

[BOAC]

BSAA - I think you will arrive shortly on a different forum, but to answer your question, no, as there is insufficient information. In addition the 'reported' PAs do not sound correct and were either misheard or misquoted. All we can say is that with the quoted wind (you did not post the METAR so the weather is 'unknown') I would have assumed 04 in use. Come back with more if you wish or it stays one of aviation's mysteries.

[Denti]

As BOAC wrote i would be surprised if 04 wasn't in use anyway. They try to keep you on 04 as long as the tailwind component is not above 10kts, only then will they change to 22 since that cripples their flow-rates.

[BOAC]

There was no reported tailwind on 04.

[Denti]

Umm, missed my point? Was just saying 04 will be in use if possible, even up to 10kts of tailwind, if you accept it even higher (we do up to 15kts). As tehre was no tailwind of course it would have been in use.

[BOAC]

No - just checking.

[BSAA1947]

To BOAC and Denti, many thanks for your input, it's appreciated. I had noticed that if the wind was 090 then 04 would have been the more favourable runway anyway, but it's interesting to learn that 04 is normally in use even up to a 10kt tailwind. That certainly makes the announcement about landing in "the opposite direction" very curious.

My friend was very clear about the wording of the unusual PA announcements. Bearing in mind their odd nature and knowing my involvement with aviation since the 1960s, that was one of the main reasons he thought to mention it to me, hence me consulting the experts on here. I suspect that, as you say, this will remain a little mystery.

Incidentally, I didn't keep the METAR I found for the time of the approach but this is from a couple of hours after -
LFMN 032300Z 09007KT 9999 FEW011 BKN013 13/10 Q1022 NOSIG

As I said, thanks both for taking the trouble to reply.

Finally, to swiftski, I've re-read my initial post and can't find the part which would have antagonised or caused offence to any normal person, or which might prompt such a ridiculous and unhelpful answer. I'm afraid all you achieved with your answer was to allow me to form an opinion of you which I didn't have before, and to cause some unnecessary wear and tear on your keyboard.

[BOAC]

BSAA - from that METAR either runway would have been 'useable' but almost certainly 04 would have been 'in use' unless ATC had some odd restriction in force. I still think the reported PAs strange and were either misheard/reported OR a very dismal attempt at humour which appears to have failed, and would be well out of line with company practice. There is no way one would declare a "no go" as they "couldn't see the airport" in that weather. We'll have to put it in the unknown box, I fear. Seeing 'land' out of the port side does not help either as that could happen on either runway.

[BSAA1947]

Thanks again BOAC. Perhaps there was a bit of mis-communication or, as you say, a clumsy attempt at humour. If the latter it sounds like the cabin crew didn't appreciate it either. Perhaps the unusually heavy braking was purely coincidental. Worth asking the question though.

Thanks very much for your input.

Ian

[Neptunus Rex]

With the lack of bank, could it be that the first approach was to Juan les Pins, from which the track to Nice Airport is not a million degrees from 040?

I think we should be told!

[BSAA1947]

Interesting idea! We'll probably never know.

I'll speak to my friend in more detail about it when I see him next, but can't at the moment, because .... he's in Nice.

[Michael Cushing]

This should resolve the "intended" vs actual runway question:

FlightAware > British Airways (BA) #348 > 03-Mar-2012 > EGLL-LFMN Flight Tracker

[BOAC]

Thanks Michael - indeed the flight track of nightmares. It would appear that for some reason a circle onto 22 was attempted, g/a, reposition onto a 'standard' 04 route - what happened then I cannot fathom but it was a sightseeing tour of unimaginable complexity. It looks as if the subsequent departure ex NCE may have got churned into Flight Tracker.

Lots of turning and banking there, for the OP's 'friends'. Presumably no animals were harmed in the production of that arrival.

[Tagron]

I would hazard a guess that this was a deterioration in the weather situation which just happened to coincide with the approach. There must have been good reason at the time for not using the 04 ILS. But that (later) METAR indicates the cloudbase (BKN 1300) as below minima for 22, or the "environmental" VOR procedures for 04. So either the crew chose to go around due to lack of visual reference or ATC flagged it. The extended go-around route could have been non-standard radar vectors for traffic deconfliction.

In my time of flying into NCE and other French airports, approach ban based on cloud ceiling applied to non-precision approaches. Does this rule still exist ?

[BSAA1947]

Thank you Michael for the fascinating link to the radar track. I'd forgotten to look for that but what an interesting picture it shows.

I guess it demonstrates that if turns are flown smoothly they're not easy to discern from the comfort of the cabin, as there were clearly plenty of turns on that approach and subsequent landing! As BOAC points out there is some corruption of the tracking data, but when zoomed in significantly the genuine track is easy to make out.

Bearing in mind the previous discussion about runway 04 being the normal choice (even with a small tailwind) it's curious that with the wind approximately 090 the initial approach was to 22 (as my friend had originally told me), but I'm confused by the actual track shown. It appears that the aircraft was never even near to being set up for an approach to 22 as, unless I'm missing something obvious (perfectly possible ... ), they seemed to be tracking almost due west towards the threshold of 22 before the g/a. and tight left turn. Even after that point they don't seem to follow the prescribed missed approach procedure for 22, heading roughly 165 then 180 before joining the pattern for a 04 approach, although as Tagron states, presumably this could have been to avoid conflicting traffic. As a result I guess they never needed to get to the 3000' hold at NERAS before making the right turns necessary to set up for an approach to 04. This certainly seems to bear out the reason for the crew announcement to the passengers of the attempt to land in the opposite direction.

Thanks Tagron for your suggestion about the weather being below minima for the 22 approach. I'm kicking myself that I no longer have the METAR data for 1900Z on Saturday. Does anyone know if there is a site where archived raw METAR data from 3 days ago is still available?

So, if we accept there were good (albeit unknown to us) reasons for the initial approach to be on 22 and that the weather might have played a part in the missed approach (hence the curious PA announcements) then the only question remaining for me is why the initial track was almost 090 towards the runway 22 threshold instead of aligned with it? Could it simply be that there would still have been time for a left turn at a late stage to align with 22 had the approach continued as originally planned?

I've found this to be a very interesting exercise in trying to piece together all the facts to explain what was clearly a somewhat unusual scenario. Thanks all for helping me do so.

[Denti]

Hmm, the approach track is not all that far off the normal approach to runway 22, isn't it? Apparently they were taken off the missed approach before reaching the hold, but that again is not unusual for radar vectoring.

[BSAA1947]

Ah yes, I see. Thanks Denti, I hadn't seen that chart before, but the track fits perfectly.

[Doors to Automatic]

BSAA unfortunately this forum is often tainted by those who wish to post silly answers to genuine questions. You do not need to be a commercial pilot to understand when something is not quite right and your original question was a perfectly reasonable one.

I too would welcome an explanation as to why the runway wasn't visible when the weather was "all the 9s' and why a supposed change to a reciprocal course required virtually no banking - before both had been explained by the more sensible posters!