Don't just take off because u are cleared

WannFly

WannFly

Final Approach
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Not sure where to post hence posting here. Today holding short of 18, told tower I am ready for departure. Didn't look at final, my bad, before calling in. Tower came back with hold short for landing traffic as I looked towards final and saw a dual jet in the air. It was a MD-80 I believe, alleging air. As it flew to touchdown I could actually see the trail of wake , looked pretty cool. Noted the touchdown point and reset my timer to ensure 3 min delay. Winds were rt down the runway at 6 kts. Exactly 20 seconds later tower came back and said cleared for take off, caution wake turbulance.

I was under the impression that controllers are required to give a 3 min separation. Anyway, I responded with unable, will hold for another 2 mins, then got the take off clearance again after 2:30 seconds.

May be MD-80 doesn't generate as much wake as a 747, but I just wasn't comfortable taking off right after a dual jet landing and ensuring I take off after it's touchdown point, which was about 4000 ft down the runway.

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I think you’re smart for declining the takeoff clearance. Never accept a clearance that you feel uncomfortable with. Good call.

One thing that I’ve tried to get into the habit of is audibly calling ‘clear left-clear right’ before crossing any threshold, especially in a high wing.

Fly safe!
 
Similar thing happened to me a few weeks ago except the touchdown point of the jet was only about a thousand feet down. I took the runway and fast taxied about 500 feet and then went full power for t/o. I would have done the same thing as you if the touchdown would have been much longer.
 
Nope, no 3 minutes. Tower just needs a clear runway in that case. They can also use anticipated separation for that clear deck.
 
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N659HB said:
Thought the fighter pilot helmet and visor was pretty cool. :)

Sorry I couldn't make it to GMU.

We now return this thread to its original content...
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It was! I felt like I should change it to better represent my true self as a lowly piston single pilot. :D

No worries! We’ll catch ya on the next round!
 
Why you giving him less shet about not making it than me, who never said he'd attend? o_O
 
That must be one heck of a long runway if someone is putting down MD-80s 4,000' from the threshold and stopping safely.

I'm not sure the wake of a landing aircraft is of much consequence to your take off, since the vortexes are going down and you've got no down left on your roll out.

The general advice of 3 mins for them to blow themselves away is good, but not a controller issue. (as previously mentioned)
 
If he touched down at 4000 feet he was out of the touchdown zone and should have gone around. If he was at the fixed distance marker a safe takeoff could have possibly been made. Had to be there to make a judgement. Never a bad thing to wait.
 
ATC did nothing wrong. No 3 min required or needed. I would have departed. There’s no chance you couldn’t have safely rotated after his touchdown. It takes several thousand feet for an MD80 to touch down and get slow enough to get off the runway.

At any rate, good call for you. You are the PIC and should never accept a clearance you aren’t comfortable with.
 
Before take off, towered or not, before I cross the line

Clear Right, Clear Left, Clear on the box


And as far as thinking the tower provides "saftey"




The second you trust someone to look out for your saftey, that's the time you're likley to end up on Katherine's report.
 
Greg Bockelman said:
Possibly, but probably not. That would have been pretty short. And I would have taken off right away if that was the case.
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so, then safe to assume somewhere between 400 and 4000 feet? is 4000 feet more believable than 400? I dunno.
 
N659HB said:
Second that. Good call, indeed.

BTW @Ryanb, what happened to your avatar? ;)
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I always clear final when crossing threshold, and left and right when on intersecting runways, and I usually look on the final before I call to mitigate just a hold short response. Today I made the ready for departure as I was looking...

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Ravioli said:
That must be one heck of a long runway if someone is putting down MD-80s 4,000' from the threshold and stopping safely.

I'm not sure the wake of a landing aircraft is of much consequence to your take off, since the vortexes are going down and you've got no down left on your roll out.

The general advice of 3 mins for them to blow themselves away is good, but not a controller issue. (as previously mentioned)
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Roger. 18 here is 10k feet

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Greg Bockelman said:
Possibly, but probably not. That would have been pretty short. And I would have taken off right away if that was the case.
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Nopes, I would have taken off too. This was well past rny 27 crossing, 3000+ for sure. I could have started my rotation after that, but that defeats the purpose of asking for full length (town at the south end)

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WannFly said:
I always clear final when crossing threshold, and left and right when on intersecting runways, and I usually look on the final before I call to mitigate just a hold short response. Today I made the ready for departure as I was looking...
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Flying out of nontowereds is really good practice for towereds with controllers who are, um, not fully in the moment, or overworked. I always spin a 360 in the runup area to take a real good look around before departing.
 
It's always a good habit to look first before calling ready for TO.
I see too many pilots who don't even face traffic on final before calling, and then without looking, they depend on the tower to ensure it's safe to TO.
There's no point to call if you see someone on short final, the tower will have to call back for you to hold short.

You're based at FAR aren't you?
If so then 18-36 is 9001' long.
It sounds kind of odd that they would touchdown so long on a 9000' runway. I would think that company rules would say that they have to touchdown in the touchdown zone, that's 1000' from the threshold.
Good call on not taking off if you're not comfortable with the situation.
 
champ driver said:
It's always a good habit to look first before calling ready for TO.
I see too many pilots who don't even face traffic on final before calling, and then without looking, they depend on the tower to ensure it's safe to TO.
There's no point to call if you see someone on short final, the tower will have to call back for you to hold short.

You're based at FAR aren't you?
If so then 18-36 is 9001' long.
It sounds kind of odd that they would touchdown so long on a 9000' runway. I would think that company rules would say that they have to touchdown in the touchdown zone, that's 1000' from the threshold.
Good call on not taking off if you're not comfortable with the situation.
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Yup kfar, I was little surprised too to see it land so far, I have mostly seen them land pretty close to the threshhold. But again they are allegient air, so who knows ( no offense to any alliegient air pilots on POA) ... these are the guys who didn't read NOTAM, and then declared emergency just so they could land... a while back

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WannFly said:
Not sure where to post hence posting here. Today holding short of 18, told tower I am ready for departure. Didn't look at final, my bad, before calling in. Tower came back with hold short for landing traffic as I looked towards final and saw a dual jet in the air. It was a MD-80 I believe, alleging air. As it flew to touchdown I could actually see the trail of wake , looked pretty cool. Noted the touchdown point and reset my timer to ensure 3 min delay. Winds were rt down the runway at 6 kts. Exactly 20 seconds later tower came back and said cleared for take off, caution wake turbulance.

I was under the impression that controllers are required to give a 3 min separation. Anyway, I responded with unable, will hold for another 2 mins, then got the take off clearance again after 2:30 seconds.

May be MD-80 doesn't generate as much wake as a 747, but I just wasn't comfortable taking off right after a dual jet landing and ensuring I take off after it's touchdown point, which was about 4000 ft down the runway.

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The 3 minute rule is for intersection departures. If your at the end, or an intersection within 700(i think) feet of the end, it doesn't apply.

EDIT: Disregard. The 3 minute rule is for successive departures. It's 500 feet
 
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Greg Bockelman said:
But doesn’t that just apply to 2 departing aircraft? I think it is different when one is departing after a landing aircraft.
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Yes sir. As I know you are aware Greg but maybe a refresher to those who aren't, the vortices descend at about 300-500 fpm. In the OP's case let's assume the long landing aircraft crossed the threshold at a super high 250 ft (not probable). In 30-40 seconds they are at the ground. No way the preceding arrival is off the runway with you rolling down it in less time. This is why the rules governing wake for every arrival/departure scenario don't include a departure behind an arrival on the same runway.

*To each their own and people can exercise whatever caution level they are comfortable with. If you ever fly into a busy airport and you insist on 3 min you may not be departing for a while if aircraft are touching down every 1 1/2-2 mins and hopefully you aren't blocking access to the runway for others.
 
@WannFly - I think the controller did you a disservice with the wake turbulence warning behind a landing aircraft when you were departing. What @Radar Contact supports my belief.

Now then, if you were preparing to depart with a quartering tailwind there could have been more wake to worry about, but that was not in the narrative and not very likely since they would have flipped the field to a quartering headwind which would have only improved the situation.
 
@WannFly - I think the controller did you a disservice with the wake turbulence warning behind a landing aircraft when you were departing. What @Radar Contact supports my belief.

Now then, if you were preparing to depart with a quartering tailwind there could have been more wake to worry about, but that was not in the narrative and not very likely since they would have flipped the field to a quartering headwind which would have only improved the situation.[/QUOTE]

I would've issued the caution with the initial clearance just to cover my butt. Issuing it 3 minutes later in this case was a waste.
 
WannFly said:
I was under the impression that controllers are required to give a 3 min separation. Anyway, I responded with unable, will hold for another 2 mins, then got the take off clearance again after 2:30 seconds.
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Good call! My CFI was very firm on reminding me to never accept a clearance I am not comfortable with

Radar Contact said:
To each their own and people can exercise whatever caution level they are comfortable with. If you ever fly into a busy airport and you insist on 3 min you may not be departing for a while if aircraft are touching down every 1 1/2-2 mins and hopefully you aren't blocking access to the runway for others
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I've never heard of a 3 min separation for departing aircraft (doesn't mean there isn't one, just never had a CFI tell me about it). Last time I was at John Wayne in the Archer we were instructed to line up and wait pretty much right after a SW 737 started down the runway. Not long after his lift off we were cleared for take off. I just used the rules we were taught about the vorticies, and how to plan take off and touchdown

*Incidentally, I did have tower get all bent out of shape on me once after I asked for 3 minutes in the runup area. We got our clearance on the ramp then as we pulled into the runup tower advised "I have your squawk and release ready, advise when you're done with the runup" - okay, great I thought, this will be quick... but midway through the runup they asked if I was ready and I asked for 3 extra minutes (partly because I wanted to also brief the obstacle departure procedure we were assigned), which got him a little bent out of shape. Mind you, this was not a busy airport, I think they're on the border of actually needing a control tower. w/e
 
Tantalum said:
*Incidentally, I did have tower get all bent out of shape on me once after I asked for 3 minutes in the runup area. We got our clearance on the ramp then as we pulled into the runup tower advised "I have your squawk and release ready, advise when you're done with the runup" - okay, great I thought, this will be quick... but midway through the runup they asked if I was ready and I asked for 3 extra minutes (partly because I wanted to also brief the obstacle departure procedure we were assigned), which got him a little bent out of shape. Mind you, this was not a busy airport, I think they're on the border of actually needing a control tower. w/e
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Controller was out of line. You are the PIC, not the tower controller. If it were blatant I would have called the tower chief and have a discussion. NEVER allow a controller to rush you.
 
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