Princess Julianna Airport Question

[TheCosmicFrog]

Hey there,

Something else I'm curious about. How are airliners allowed to land at Princess Julianna Int'l Airport in St. Martin if there is no Instrument Landing System available?

I was under the impression that to be qualified for commercial flight, an airport is required to have and ILS, am I wrong?

What happens in the case of low visibility at the airport?

Thanks in advance,

Aaron.

[RingwaySam]

Aaron,

I'm no pilot, so feel free to ignore me. There are plenty of airports around the world without the ILS. St. Maarten has a VOR DME approach, although judging by the approaches i've seen for myself they tend to make visual approaches.

The weather in the Carribean can change quite quickly, good or bad. Theres plenty of airports to divert to if the weather is bad in SXM.

I was under the impression that to be qualified for commercial flight, an airport is required to have and ILS, am I wrong?

Considering how many Commercial airlines operate there, I'd imagine that is wrong.

[TopBunk]

.... to be qualified for commercial flight, an airport is required to have and ILS, am I wrong?

Simply, yes.

[JEM60]

Having been a Sunset Beach Bar viewer, a VOR/DME approach is no problem. The approach is over the sea, so terrain clearance is no problem, as long as one is either visual, or following the approach chart readouts, like 1500' at 5 miles, 1000' at 2 miles etc.,
I am only an ex-ppl, but this is how it would work in the big ones, also, PAPI's and /or VASI's on the threshold. As long as the bearing selector on the VOR is at the runway heading, it is just like an ILS, but without the glide slope. You still get the deviation left or right from the VOR, allowing for wind drift with the heading that keeps the bearing needle in the right place.
Commercial pilots, am I correct?, it's been a long time since I did the flying bit.

[GK430]

Has anyone been since Hurricane Oscar took the security fencing down in the 09 undershoot a couple of weeks ago?
I hope they have not re-intated it with something too unfriendly

Thanks - will be there soon.

[10 DME ARC]

There is no requirement for a commercial airport to have an ILS. Obviously in parts of the world with regular bad weather then an ILS Cat I/II or III is necessary to keep things moving.
SXM has a non-precision instrument approach, a VOR/DME. Non-precision means an approach aid with no glide slope information, NDB(non directional beacon) and SRA(surveillance radar approach) are other types on non-precision approach aids. Lots of major airports in the US only have ILS’s on one or two runways but have non-precision aids on the others for when the weather is better i.e. 80% of time.