In both mid-air accidents last year, the pilots were talking to ATC.

Fearless Tower said:
The thing is he wasn't instructed to make either left or right.

He had been originally cleared for right traffic on 26R, then they told him to shift to 26L without any further guidance as to whether they wanted him to go back to the right or continue in the left traffic.

I have been in that same scenario at SDM, but they specifically told me to make right traffic after landing 26L.

IMO, that was the first error in the chain.
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Ahh, I see now. Right traffic is used quite a bit for both runways there. That makes things quite complicated when it gets busy, I would imagine.
 
I know pilots on this forum are dismissive of ADS-B, but traffic alerts with relative altitude and climb/descent are extremely useful. As far as this goes I can't wait until 2020.
 
Cogito said:
I know pilots on this forum are dismissive of ADS-B, but traffic alerts with relative altitude and climb/descent are extremely useful. As far as this goes I can't wait until 2020.
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Not dismissive of it overall, but leery of the known possible failure modes. Just like any aircraft system.

Overall better SA? Yes.

Going to lull some poor sucker into thinking it always shows ALL traffic and they'll die learning it doesn't? Also yes.

It'll happen. All it takes is the fuselage or wing blocking an antenna, not even that hard to get there.

The irony that the RF system has blind spots just like the pilots looking out the window, isn't lost on this radio geek and systems engineer... let's just hope the blind spots don't overlap much.
 
I think ADS-B is pretty amazing and useful in most situations. I just worry about the guy in the pattern who's so focused on looking for other traffic on the display that he doesn't maintain proper airspeed. Or scan enough outside.

See/avoid ain't perfect, but the pattern is high workload and you can only do so many things at once.
 
Cogito said:
I know pilots on this forum are dismissive of ADS-B, but traffic alerts with relative altitude and climb/descent are extremely useful. As far as this goes I can't wait until 2020.
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Does it give alerts in the pattern?
 
Cogito said:
... but traffic alerts with relative altitude and climb/descent are extremely useful. As far as this goes I can't wait until 2020.
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After my near miss, my CFI and I flew a short cross country and I brought my Stratus 2 and iPad with me. LOVED seeing traffic around. Spotted several aircraft that either did not have a transponder, or if they did, it wasn't on. We had an aircraft within 500 feet of us at our 12 o'clock and Foreflight alerted us. For me, it is now required equipment whenever I fly.
 
Hmmmm,

The fighter pilot survived because he used a parachute. If the Cessna was a Cirrus would they have survived? It's possible!
 
rtk11 said:
After my near miss, my CFI and I flew a short cross country and I brought my Stratus 2 and iPad with me. LOVED seeing traffic around. Spotted several aircraft that either did not have a transponder, or if they did, it wasn't on. We had an aircraft within 500 feet of us at our 12 o'clock and Foreflight alerted us. For me, it is now required equipment whenever I fly.
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If you don't have ads-b out, then your traffic picture will be pretty limited.
 
rtk11 said:
After my near miss, my CFI and I flew a short cross country and I brought my Stratus 2 and iPad with me. LOVED seeing traffic around. Spotted several aircraft that either did not have a transponder, or if they did, it wasn't on. We had an aircraft within 500 feet of us at our 12 o'clock and Foreflight alerted us. For me, it is now required equipment whenever I fly.
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If you had traffic within 500ft at your 12 o'clock and you had to have ForeFlight tell you about it, well...
 
Lindberg said:
Does it give alerts in the pattern?
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Here's my understanding, and someone correct me if i'm wrong.

In the pattern, lets assume you are below ATC radar contact. As a result, your ADS-B-In will not contain local traffic updates from the ground towers, and will only show direct plane-to-plane broadcasts. Additionally, your ADS-B-In will only display broadcasts from other aircraft on the frequencies of your ADS-B-In receiver (1090 and/or 978). So you will not see other non-ADS-B-Out airplanes at all, and if you only have 978 UAT ADS-B-In, you won't see 1090ES equipped airplanes either. As a result, its helpful to have a dual-band ADS-B in receiver, and it also goes without saying that it's really important to keep your visual scan up.
 
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Yup. My 330 tells gives me an alert when it can't pick up ADSB signal. Depending on where I am and terrain, that can be well above pattern altitude.

And I think we can all agree that its a bad idea for a very small camouflaged jet to do 250knts+ 500' above pattern altitude around small airports with small aircraft traffic.
 
George Mohr said:
Here's my understanding, and someone correct me if i'm wrong.

In the pattern, lets assume you are below ATC radar contact. As a result, your ADS-B-In will not contain local traffic updates from the ground towers, and will only show direct plane-to-plane broadcasts. Additionally, your ADS-B-In will only display broadcasts from other aircraft on the frequencies of your ADS-B-In receiver (1090 and/or 978). So you will not see other non-ADS-B-Out airplanes at all, and if you only have 978 UAT ADS-B-In, you won't see 1090ES equipped airplanes either. As a result, its helpful to have a dual-band ADS-B in receiver, and it also goes without saying that it's really important to keep your visual scan up.
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Yes, it's important to have a dual-band ADS-B receiver like a GDL 39 ($600.) The radar coverage in the Los Angeles basin, according to an ATC seminar last week, is now down to the ground.
 
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Cogito said:
Yes, it's important to have a dual-band ADS-B receiver like a GDL 39 ($600.) The radar coverage in the Los Angeles basin, according to an ATC seminar last week, is now down to the ground.
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Radar coverage or ADS-B tower coverage? Those aren't the same thing.
 
denverpilot said:
Radar coverage or ADS-B tower coverage? Those aren't the same thing.
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SoCal Tracon Speaker said Radar Coverage in LA Basin is now down to the ground. How is ADS-B different in this regard? Do they not upload all Radar Targets to ADS-B?
 
Cogito said:
I know pilots on this forum are dismissive of ADS-B, but traffic alerts with relative altitude and climb/descent are extremely useful. As far as this goes I can't wait until 2020.
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From the number of times I've gotten traffic alerts when either I'm on the ground or the other airplane is, I disagree with this. That trains people to ignore alerts, which means it will have little to no effect in the airport traffic pattern. It also doesn't spot the Champ or glider in your path.
 
All of my near hits have been while under ATC control, while on an IFR flight plan.

The closest one was about 18 years ago, going into KDAL. I was an FO in a 737-200. We were between Mesquite and KDAL at 3000' (IIRC), being vectored to downwind to the 13s. We got a freq change, so I looked down at the radio to make it, As I did, we got a TCAS RA, and before I could even look up, the Capt. said S**T!, disconnected the autopilot, and pulled hard up and left. I looked out my side window, right into the cockpit of an opposite direction 182, right at our altitude. It was so close that I could see that there were 3 guys in flannel shirts, wearing DC headsets, one with a red ball cap. The backseat guy had his head in between the 2 front seats. I don't think they ever even saw us. ATC never said a word about it. Had to clean my shorts after that one!
 
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Slipkid65 said:
All of my near hits have been while under ATC control, while on an IFR flight plan.

The closest one was about 18 years ago, going into KDAL. I was an FO in a 737-200. We were between Mesquite and KDAL at 300' (IIRC), being vectored to downwind to the 13s. We got a freq change, so I looked down at the radio to make it, As I did, we got a TCAS RA, and before I could even look up, the Capt. said S**T!, disconnected the autopilot, and pulled hard up and left. I looked out my side window, right into the cockpit of an opposite direction 182, right at our altitude. It was so close that I could see that there were 3 guys in flannel shirts, wearing DC headsets, one with a red ball cap. The backseat guy had his head in between the 2 front seats. I don't think they ever even saw us. ATC never said a word about it. Had to clean my shorts after that one!
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You were vectored at 300 feet? I hope that was 3000....
 
MAKG1 said:
You were vectored at 300 feet? I hope that was 3000....
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Uhh, yeah.... it was a typo. Even I wouldn't fly a transport category jet at 300' 10 miles from the airport. At least not on purpose!
 
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