Lets not forget that its entirely possible for the F/O to have more total time, or more time on type, or more experience at the airfield in question than the Captain. Its even possible for all 3 conditions to be true.

A wise commander makes use of the skills of their subordinates.

I think this one allows First Officers to have the occasional go:

YouTube - Hard landing near crash PART 1/3 - London City Airport - IS THE PILOT A HERO OR IDIOT ?

:p :p :p :p

- SOP dependent? - but is wary of contravening company regulations?

There is no need for a Cat C airfield 'first visit' to be flown with a TCpt UNLESS the airline OM specifies that. INN and CMF did not require such in BA

Captain only approaches
 

From my experience, captain only approaches are combination of experience and economics. New FOs on the line need to build up experience and therefore are not (themselves) confident to carry out CAT 3 airport approaches until they have gained some reasonable time on the aircraft.

From the economic point of view, captains need to be signed off by a training captain to CAT 3 airports after a number of approaches. As training captains are an expensive resource the purse usually stretches only as far captains to train them.

FOs can carry out monitored approaches to CAT 3 airports, so can fly down to a pre-determined hand over point that has been briefed previously.

As to CAT II and CAT III approaches, again, talking from my experience, they are flown by the FO whilst the captain looks out in order to pick up early visual clues in the low visibility conditions in order to be able to take control of the aircraft at the decision point.

If no contact is established then the FO flies the go-around.

In our company a captain needs to have 12 months experience as a captain before being able to be checked out on a cat C runway. All Cat C runways need checkrides before you can operate there so not even every captain can land there.

Back before JAA there was no restriction on F/O's in most cases ( in our company) so if a qualified (checked out) capt decided to let a F/O land it was his perogative. Now we are not even allowed to let them do the takeoffs in most Cat C airports.

I think it's partly due to the increase in regulations in general and awareness of being sued should the proverbial hit the fan. Plus we have a lot of co's who come straight from school compared to 10-15 yrs ago so it takes a while for them to build the experience to cope with possible very tricky circumstances.

Last but not least (with us) the change from 737-300s to mostly 800s means the higher approach speeds (& turning circle) make it more difficult to get into Samos or Madeira etc. I have 13,000+ hrs on 737s and am often glad when turning onto the platform after yet another "sporty" approach - though I always enjoy it, it does keep you on your toes!

Ladies and Gentlemen- thanks very much for your informed replies to my initial post - it is greatly appreciated!

Nick