Chicago MDW Circle-to-Land

[richjb]

I'm looking for guidance for the Chicago Midway circle-to-land in VFR conditons procedures, ala, ILS 4R circle-to-land 13C. The maneuver is required since approaches to 13C cannot be accomidated due to KORD traffic flows.

What altitude is recommended, or normally used, for the circle maneuver? Field elevation is 600 ft MSL. The 4R ILS circle to landing minimums are 1180 ft MSL. Is pattern altitude, 2100 ft MSL used or the standard air carrier 1,000 ft. AGL circling altitude used?

Today's circle got interesting at 1200 ft MSL. I'm looking for advice here!

Thanks!

Rich Boll
Wichita, KS

[westhawk]

I deleted my original comment because what I wrote wasn't really that funny anyway.

Rainboe has it right. You can use a higher circling altitude if wx permits and you don't stray too far from the airport. It might even be worthwhile to ask ATC what they expect. They got a little excited with us once when we circled at MDA. Apparently, they were not expecting us to take the CTL clearance so literally! All the airliners were circling at 1,000' HAA as per their OpSpecs. Ours allowed us down to published mins. Perhaps It would be better if they cleared us to circle visually at a specified altitude and maximum DME from the VOR once we call the airport in sight.

Best regards,

Westhawk

[Rainboe]

The whole point of circling approaches is poor weather approaches to non-precision runways without aids. Therefore circling should be flown at 1200' circling minimum, but there is nothing to stop you doing it higher at whatever you are comfortable with. But ATC may be expecting you to be at 1200' in case you affect one of the other approaches being flown by another aircraft. Bear in mind go-around procedures on circling approaches- follow what is printed on the Jeppesen however it looks!

[richjb]

Thanks!

Thank you Rainboe and Westhawk!

I agree with all that was said. I didn't feel at all bad about circling at the MDA, but rather I'm wondering if they, meaning ATC, expected a higher altitude.

I have a call into the MDW ATC tower for their perspective on how they expect aircraft to circle at MDW. I was hoping to find a pilot a two who are frequent fliers into MDW who might provide their company's procedure for the airport.

Thanks again folks!

Rich

[canyonblue737]

Originally Posted by richjb

I'm looking for guidance for the Chicago Midway circle-to-land in VFR conditons procedures, ala, ILS 4R circle-to-land 13C. The maneuver is required since approaches to 13C cannot be accomidated due to KORD traffic flows.
What altitude is recommended, or normally used, for the circle maneuver? Field elevation is 600 ft MSL. The 4R ILS circle to landing minimums are 1180 ft MSL. Is pattern altitude, 2100 ft MSL used or the standard air carrier 1,000 ft. AGL circling altitude used?
Today's circle got interesting at 1200 ft MSL. I'm looking for advice here!
Thanks!
Rich Boll
Wichita, KS

in VFR conditions most people break it off at ERMIN and keep coming down to around 1800-2000 feet MSL. Aim for a modified base over Interstate 55, easily seen heading directly for the Chicago skyline on the base leg. Don't stray north of the highway, but aim to turn final over it and it creates a nice 3 mile final from 1800 MSL or so. ATC kinda expects this for spacing but of course what you didn't wasn't "wrong" but you know how the real world can be...

[Ignition Override]

Various controllers often assume that every pilot has done these maneuvers-and that there is no first time. We rarely go into MDW and our company uses the higher of 1,000' or circling minimums. In training and simulators, we can not do real circling approaches, and MDW have only seen 31C circle to 22L.

Just a question, did anyone have time to set in the localizer frequency for 13C, or is there one? If it was set in, did anybody verify that the localizer needle was in the middle of the HSI etc? Pilots in 'glass c0ckp1ts' rarely select the VOR mode.

As a contrast, coming into DFW on a clear night, which has many parallel runways, the localizer is the ONLY thing, assuming that you look at your CDI, which will keep you from lining up with the wrong runway unless the controller catches it. Many of the runways have PAPI lights

[richjb]

Thanks all for the additional information. Circling at 1,000 ft AGL (1600 MSL) probably would have been the better choice given the flow of traffic that day.

13C had a PAPI. I did not wish to have my F/O head's-down tuning LOC and setting HSI's during the circle. Rather, I used the capablites of my FMS. I used the FIX page to set a fix on RW13C and extend a radial out on 316', the runway centerline. I can do this in the Collins 6100 series FMS. I understand that this is not possible in the Simth's or Honeywell FMS's the airliners use. I then used the track bug to be certain that I was parralleling the outbound downwind leg and the base leg.

The actual circle worked out well. It was just uncorfortable seeing all the people on the ground waving (pointing?) at me!

Thanks again. I'll keep the suggestions on begining the circle at ERMIN in mind for the next go-around into MDW!


Rich

[Capn Bloggs]

I understand that this is not possible in the Simth's or Honeywell FMS's the airliners use.

My 717 Honeywell can.