touch and gos while on IFR plan?

[\__[Ô]__/]

Say I'm going to an airport where the ceilings are 1000' AGL and the pattern altitude is 800' AGL. Assume 800' puts me in class E which won't work VFR due to cloud clearance. Can I file IFR to the field, shoot an approach down to the runway and then do touch and gos staying IFR to avoid the cloud clearance restriction?
Assume visibility is great so the low clouds are the only issue.
And yes, I'm rated, current, proficient, and equipped for IFR flight.

 

[mondtster]

Why not ask for a special VFR clearance or fly a slightly lower pattern to stay in class g airspace (if possible)?

 

[\__[Ô]__/]

I considered special VFR, but it won't work for most airports. Plus I'd already be on an IFR plan, so it seemed silly to jump to VFR for an IFR-like activity and then go back to IFR for the flight back.

I also considered requesting a contact approach which may be the more IFR equivalent, but I wasn't sure ATC would want to deal with half a dozen contact approaches. I'm trying to cause the least disruption possible.

As you note, for some airports I could fly a pattern at 700 and say I'm in G and clear of clouds. I don't like that plan because it has me at the wrong altitude and anyone looking back at what I'm doing is likely to conclude I'm doing something I shouldn't be doing.

 

[luvflyin]

You said flight back so I assume you don't want to just bounce around in the pattern there, then land and call it a day, but will want the next "leg" of your flight after bouncing around there. Here's a way you could get one touch and go in without either you or the controller bending a rule. Do a Circle To Land. Let them know you want to do a Touch and Go and get your clearance for the flight back home. That would let you take a trip around the pattern if that's what you want. You could do it straight in, bounce once and go also.
You could do the series of Contact Approaches and stay within the letter of law, but I'm not betting much more than a cheap cup of coffee that you're going to get it. You'd have to miss approach and get an immediate clearance for the next Contact Approach. Or get a departure clearance back to that airport and get the Contact Approach on the go. For the controller to do that and be complying with the "rules" there would have to be no other traffic that was being delayed for you. Finding a controller to participate in that with you is unlikely.

 

[\__[Ô]__/]

You said flight back so I assume you don't want to just bounce around in the pattern there, then land and call it a day, but will want the next "leg" of your flight after bouncing around there. ...

Yep, but I'm wanting to do two or three touch and gos before proceeding. I want to do this at multiple airports.

You could do the series of Contact Approaches and stay within the letter of law, but I'm not betting much more than a cheap cup of coffee that you're going to get it. You'd have to miss approach and get an immediate clearance for the next Contact Approach. Or get a departure clearance back to that airport and get the Contact Approach on the go. For the controller to do that and be complying with the "rules" there would have to be no other traffic that was being delayed for you. Finding a controller to participate in that with you is unlikely.

I agree that controllers won't be fond of the plan. I suspect I can pull it off, but I think I'll **** off the controllers in the process. That's why I was hoping there might be an alternative to the contact approach plan.

 

[rocketflyer84]

Special VFR means they need to shut down the airspace and let just you in it. If the airport is busy enough to have a tower I doubt they're going to want to shut down the whole delta so some guy who doesn't want to wait for a day with better weather to do some touch and goes. If you're really dead set on touch and goes coordinate with ATC to shoot an intentional missed approach or two. Given the described conditions it's never a bad thing to get some more hours in actual shooting approaches. ATC still may veto it but at least it gives them a lot more to work with and they don't have to shut down the airspace.

 

[mondtster]

I considered special VFR, but it won't work for most airports.

Why wouldn't this work at most airports?

By the way, if the weather was any better than what your hypothetical situation is, ATC couldn't even issue a special VFR clearance. In that case I doubt they'll be even less likely to want to have you on an IFR clearance. I've done traffic pattern work at a towered airport where ceilings were low enough that you couldn't maintain proper cloud clearances for the type of airspace but weather was too good for a special. They didn't seem to care that we flew a bit lower than usual to remain legal.

You may however be able to get a local IFR clearance to do what you want to do, we have low enough traffic counts here in the Midwest that ATC seems to be able to let you do whatever you want, within reason anyway.

 

[luvflyin]

Why wouldn't this work at most airports?

By the way, if the weather was any better than what your hypothetical situation is, ATC couldn't even issue a special VFR clearance. In that case I doubt they'll be even less likely to want to have you on an IFR clearance. I've done traffic pattern work at a towered airport where ceilings were low enough that you couldn't maintain proper cloud clearances for the type of airspace but weather was too good for a special. They didn't seem to care that we flew a bit lower than usual to remain legal.

You may however be able to get a local IFR clearance to do what you want to do, we have low enough traffic counts here in the Midwest that ATC seems to be able to let you do whatever you want, within reason anyway.

There were changes made to the controllers "rules" some years ago that do allow controllers to issue SVFR clearances when the "reported" weather is not less than basic VFR minima. If a pilot says they can't maintain VFR and request SVFR it can be issued.

 

[\__[Ô]__/]

Why wouldn't this work at most airports?

You can't get SVFR unless controlled airspace goes to the surface which it doesn't at most airports (at least most in this area).

By the way, if the weather was any better than what your hypothetical situation is, ATC couldn't even issue a special VFR clearance.

I know there are minimum weather conditions for issuing SVFR but I've never heard that SVFR couldn't be issued if the weather was too good.

Edit: guess that used to be the case

 

[roncachamp]

Say I'm going to an airport where the ceilings are 1000' AGL and the pattern altitude is 800' AGL. Assume 800' puts me in class E which won't work VFR due to cloud clearance. Can I file IFR to the field, shoot an approach down to the runway and then do touch and gos staying IFR to avoid the cloud clearance restriction?
Assume visibility is great so the low clouds are the only issue.
And yes, I'm rated, current, proficient, and equipped for IFR flight.

No.

 

[roncachamp]

Why not ask for a special VFR clearance or fly a slightly lower pattern to stay in class g airspace (if possible)?

SVFR is available only in a surface area. The assumption that 800' puts him in Class E airspace implies the floor of controlled airspace is at 700' AGL.

 

[luvflyin]

I considered special VFR, but it won't work for most airports. Plus I'd already be on an IFR plan, so it seemed silly to jump to VFR for an IFR-like activity and then go back to IFR for the flight back....................

I don't see anything all that silly about that. Unless you got a "through" clearance, you are still going to have to get a clearance back home or to the next airport you are going to whether you just shoot one approach or hang around and bounce in the pattern for awhile. It just boils down to is the airport so slow now that no other traffic is being delayed for your SFVR and/or practice approaches.

 

[roncachamp]

Special VFR means they need to shut down the airspace and let just you in it. If the airport is busy enough to have a tower I doubt they're going to want to shut down the whole delta so some guy who doesn't want to wait for a day with better weather to do some touch and goes. If you're really dead set on touch and goes coordinate with ATC to shoot an intentional missed approach or two. Given the described conditions it's never a bad thing to get some more hours in actual shooting approaches. ATC still may veto it but at least it gives them a lot more to work with and they don't have to shut down the airspace.

If the airport has a control tower it's very unlikely 800' AGL would put aircraft in Class E airspace. The very few airports where it would do not have a surface area and you can't have SVFR without one.

 

[roncachamp]

Why wouldn't this work at most airports?

Because SVFR requires a surface area and most airports don't have one.

By the way, if the weather was any better than what your hypothetical situation is, ATC couldn't even issue a special VFR clearance. In that case I doubt they'll be even less likely to want to have you on an IFR clearance. I've done traffic pattern work at a towered airport where ceilings were low enough that you couldn't maintain proper cloud clearances for the type of airspace but weather was too good for a special. They didn't seem to care that we flew a bit lower than usual to remain legal.

Special VFR does not require weather below VFR minima.

You may however be able to get a local IFR clearance to do what you want to do, we have low enough traffic counts here in the Midwest that ATC seems to be able to let you do whatever you want, within reason anyway.

Even a local IFR clearance requires an altitude not less than the minimum IFR altitude. That's pretty much the reason it's called the minimum IFR altitude.

 

[roncachamp]

There were changes made to the controllers "rules" some years ago that do allow controllers to issue SVFR clearances when the "reported" weather is not less than basic VFR minima. If a pilot says they can't maintain VFR and request SVFR it can be issued.

If that's a change it was made many years ago.

 

[luvflyin]

If that's a change it was made many years ago.

Yeah. It was more than a just a few. Now you have me wondering just when. Do you have access to or know where to get a history of 7110 briefing guides or Explanation of Changes? There was a time though that you just couldn't do it. I think it was within the last 20 years.

 

[roncachamp]

Yeah. It was more than a just a few. Now you have me wondering just when. Do you have access to or know where to get a history of 7110 briefing guides or Explanation of Changes? There was a time though that you just couldn't do it. I think it was within the last 20 years.

I know of no readily available resource like that. If there was ever such a time when SVFR required conditions less than basic VFR minima I think it had to be prior to 1983 when I entered ATC.

 

[roncachamp]

Yeah. It was more than a just a few. Now you have me wondering just when. Do you have access to or know where to get a history of 7110 briefing guides or Explanation of Changes? There was a time though that you just couldn't do it. I think it was within the last 20 years.

I have a November 1952 copy of "ANC [Air Force-Navy-CAA] Procedures for the control of Air Traffic", a forerunner of Order 7110.65. There is nothing in the small section on SVFR operations that suggests SVFR is available only with conditions less than basic VFR. However, it does state that pilots operating VFR must obtain an air traffic clearance "before flying in a control zone at less than 500 feet vertically or 2000 feet horizontally from any cloud formation."

 

[mondtster]

There were changes made to the controllers "rules" some years ago that do allow controllers to issue SVFR clearances when the "reported" weather is not less than basic VFR minima. If a pilot says they can't maintain VFR and request SVFR it can be issued.

If they changed it the local controllers don't know the rules. I was told they couldn't issue me ones a recent as this spring, when the ceilings were such that I couldn't maintain VFR cloud clearances while flying at TPA. I ended up just flying the pattern lower than normal instead.

 

[mondtster]

Because SVFR requires a surface area and most airports don't have one.

Special VFR does not require weather below VFR minima.

I forgot about the surface area requirement. Makes sense, given the OP's situation then.

Like I mentioned above, the local towered airport wouldn't give me a special, even with reported weather above VFR minimums. They said they were unable, so that implies to me that they think they can't do it.

 

[Velocity173]

If they changed it the local controllers don't know the rules. I was told they couldn't issue me ones a recent as this spring, when the ceilings were such that I couldn't maintain VFR cloud clearances while flying at TPA. I ended up just flying the pattern lower than normal instead.

You sure they denied because of lack of knowledge or was it because of their traffic situation? If a tower controller doesn't know they can issue a SVFR clearance despite the official WX reporting of VFR, they need to quit...or at least read Ch7 (7-5-1b) of the .65.

 

[roncachamp]

I forgot about the surface area requirement. Makes sense, given the OP's situation then.

Like I mentioned above, the local towered airport wouldn't give me a special, even with reported weather above VFR minimums. They said they were unable, so that implies to me that they think they can't do it.

It implies they can't, but they can.


ORDER JO 7110.65W Air Traffic Control

Chapter 7. Visual

Section 5. Special VFR (SVFR)

7−5−1. AUTHORIZATION

b. SVFR operations may be authorized for aircraft
operating in or transiting a Class B, Class C, Class D,
or Class E surface area when the primary airport is
reporting VFR but the pilot advises that basic VFR
cannot be maintained.

NOTE−
The basic requirements for issuance of a SVFR clearance
in subpara a apply with the obvious exception that weather
conditions at the controlling airport are not required to be
less than basic VFR minima.

 

[mondtster]

You sure they denied because of lack of knowledge or was it because of their traffic situation? If a tower controller doesn't know they can issue a SVFR clearance despite the official WX reporting of VFR, they need to quit...or at least read Ch7 (7-5-1b) of the .65.

Considering there was no other traffic, I don't think that was a concern. I fly out of a very sleepy class D, a few airplanes on frequency at once is a traffic jam here.

It is a training tower, they might not have known all the rules.

 

[roncachamp]

Considering there was no other traffic, I don't think that was a concern. I fly out of a very sleepy class D, a few airplanes on frequency at once is a traffic jam here.

It is a training tower, they might not have known all the rules.

All towers are training towers.

 

[unsafervguy]

Yep, but I'm wanting to do two or three touch and gos before proceeding. I want to do this at multiple airports.




i hope that i am not the guy that gets to hold for 30 minutes while you play in the pattern..........

bob

 

[Velocity173]

Considering there was no other traffic, I don't think that was a concern. I fly out of a very sleepy class D, a few airplanes on frequency at once is a traffic jam here.

It is a training tower, they might not have known all the rules.

Well, I guess it's possible that they simply didn't know the rules. There are some things in ATC that aren't clear or might be ambiguous but for a local controller to not know this one???

Like Steven said, all towers, all facilities for that matter are training facilities. They might not have students in training at any given time, but they are still training facilities.

 

[Hank S]

I did this while working in my Instrument Rating. Fly an approach into a non-towered field, at some point dependent upon radar coverage or LOAs with various towers, you'll get released to change frequencies and call them back on the miss. Touch n go, full stop, low approach, all the same to them. Follow the charted Missed Approach procedure and call them back. If you're gonna do two laps around the pattern and a second landing, let them know in advance so they don't worry about how long you're off frequency.

Don't think it will be a problem. I usually only did the one landing or touch and go, but don't see why you can't do two.

 

[airheadpenguin]

We do this all the time at untowered fields, fly practice approaches at night, do a full stop every 89 days stay night current AND instrument current

 

[Velocity173]

I don't know of any controller that would issue a through clearance that allows pattern operations and then depart to their destination. I'd like to hear what that clearance would sound like though. "When entering controlled airspace, fly the traffic pattern three times before proceeding on course."

 

[roncachamp]

I don't know of any controller that would issue a through clearance that allows pattern operations and then depart to their destination. I'd like to hear what that clearance would sound like though. "When entering controlled airspace, fly the traffic pattern three times before proceeding on course."

A clearance like that would be in violation of Order 7110.65, but many controllers do things that violate the order.

 

[luvflyin]

Hmm. The through clearance thing could work for what the OP wanted to accomplish. It wouldn't be about shooting a series of Instrument Approaches, just doing T&G's in the pattern there. We're of course talking an uncontrolled airport here. He gets cleared through Kaaa to Kbbb. Given his departure clearance just like if he was originating at Kaaa. There will of course be a void time. Now, instead of dropping off/picking up passengers/boxes like what would usually be done with the through clearance thing, he does some T&G's VFR. On the last one he's just another IFR departure. Dragging it around the pattern at 700 AGL shouldn't be a problem here. Between the time he gets his approach clearance until the void time(30 minutes after actually) there aren't going to be any IFR operations happening.

 

[bobmrg]

Yep, but I'm wanting to do two or three touch and gos before proceeding. I want to do this at multiple airports.



I agree that controllers won't be fond of the plan. I suspect I can pull it off, but I think I'll **** off the controllers in the process. That's why I was hoping there might be an alternative to the contact approach plan.

No. Just no. IFR is a system, and you want to interrupt the flow. No.

Bob Gardner

 

[Velocity173]

Hmm. The through clearance thing could work for what the OP wanted to accomplish. It wouldn't be about shooting a series of Instrument Approaches, just doing T&G's in the pattern there. We're of course talking an uncontrolled airport here. He gets cleared through Kaaa to Kbbb. Given his departure clearance just like if he was originating at Kaaa. There will of course be a void time. Now, instead of dropping off/picking up passengers/boxes like what would usually be done with the through clearance thing, he does some T&G's VFR. On the last one he's just another IFR departure. Dragging it around the pattern at 700 AGL shouldn't be a problem here. Between the time he gets his approach clearance until the void time(30 minutes after actually) there aren't going to be any IFR operations happening.

Problem is, 700 AGL isn't going to meet the requirements of 91.177. The OP would no longer be on an IAP, therefore, the MIA would put him in controlled airspace, IFR, doing T&Gs.

 

[luvflyin]

Problem is, 700 AGL isn't going to meet the requirements of 91.177. The OP would no longer be on an IAP, therefore, the MIA would put him in controlled airspace, IFR, doing T&Gs.

MIA wouldn't matter. He's not IFR doing T&G's. He shoots the approach. When he gets in VFR he bounces around in the pattern VFR. When he's done he departs on his IFR clearance. He could make a full stop, go to the crapper and drop a duece, come back to the plane and say "my void time ain't for another 15 minutes, I'm gonna do a couple VFR T&G's before I depart on the clearance.

 

[Velocity173]

MIA wouldn't matter. He's not IFR doing T&G's. He shoots the approach. When he gets in VFR he bounces around in the pattern VFR. When he's done he departs on his IFR clearance. He could make a full stop, go to the crapper and drop a duece, come back to the plane and say "my void time ain't for another 15 minutes, I'm gonna do a couple VFR T&G's before I depart on the clearance.

The OP said he wants to do T&Gs at an airfield with an 800 ft pattern and ceilings at 1,000 ft. You're suggesting something completely different. Its just basically doing an IAP, cancelling, doing T&Gs and then picking up your second leg of your IFR flight plan. Yeah that's definitely doable but won't meet the OPs requirement.

 

[roncachamp]

Hmm. The through clearance thing could work for what the OP wanted to accomplish. It wouldn't be about shooting a series of Instrument Approaches, just doing T&G's in the pattern there. We're of course talking an uncontrolled airport here. He gets cleared through Kaaa to Kbbb. Given his departure clearance just like if he was originating at Kaaa. There will of course be a void time. Now, instead of dropping off/picking up passengers/boxes like what would usually be done with the through clearance thing, he does some T&G's VFR. On the last one he's just another IFR departure. Dragging it around the pattern at 700 AGL shouldn't be a problem here. Between the time he gets his approach clearance until the void time(30 minutes after actually) there aren't going to be any IFR operations happening.

So how does dragging it around the pattern at 700 AGL conform to the IFR clearance and the Instrument Flight Rules?

 

[roncachamp]

MIA wouldn't matter. He's not IFR doing T&G's. He shoots the approach. When he gets in VFR he bounces around in the pattern VFR. When he's done he departs on his IFR clearance. He could make a full stop, go to the crapper and drop a duece, come back to the plane and say "my void time ain't for another 15 minutes, I'm gonna do a couple VFR T&G's before I depart on the clearance.

Wrong. The MIA does matter. If he's doing pattern work on a through clearance then he's IFR doing touch and goes. He can bounce around the pattern VFR only if he cancels his IFR clearance when he reaches VMC.

 

[luvflyin]

The OP said he wants to do T&Gs at an airfield with an 800 ft pattern and ceilings at 1,000 ft. You're suggesting something completely different. Its just basically doing an IAP, cancelling, doing T&Gs and then picking up your second leg of your IFR flight plan. Yeah that's definitely doable but won't meet the OPs requirement.

Yeah. He did say he wanted to do it at the TPA and not at 700. So what I was bringing up isn't a solution to what he wanted.

 

[\__[Ô]__/]

It's looking like this plan is pretty much a no-go.
I was hoping there was some way I wasn't aware of that would make it work without screwing up the system. Doesn't really sound like it.

 

[luvflyin]

Wrong. The MIA does matter. If he's doing pattern work on a through clearance then he's IFR doing touch and goes. He can bounce around the pattern VFR only if he cancels his IFR clearance when he reaches VMC.

You would have to protect the airspace for the entire time. May be the MIA, may be higher, may be lower depending on the clearance given for the next leg after he continues the flight on through to the next destination. Lower sounds wrong but the clearance could be along airway segements that have MEA's lower than the MIA. I guess I made it sound like nothing would have to be protected during the time at the airport picking up passengers, getting a cup of coffee or just bouncing around VFR in the pattern or whatever. My bad.