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Post by Dave.K on Dec 1, 2013 8:42:26 GMT 12
www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=7mxmFCw-Dig#t=31 A pilot landing at the inland airport of Queenstown, New Zealand, > recently put a GoPro camera in his cockpit, recorded in stunning HD > the last minutes of his flight, and posted it on YouTube. The video, > which has since gone viral, shows the plane skirting sunlit mountain > peaks and forbidding valleys, and piercing a thick blanket of clouds > above the runway. > > The landing would be all but impossible if the pilot were not relying > on a digital GPS-based navigation system, called Required Navigation > Performance (RNP), first designed by Alaska Airlines pilot Steve > Fulton and developed by GE Aviation. Fulton, who now works for GE > Aviation, knows Queenstown well. He served as the test director and > rode in the jump seat with Qantas crews when GE rolled out the system at the airport in 2004. > Fulton said that flying in the mountains, and the nerve-wracking night > landings in Alaska that gave him the inspiration for RNP. > > What would happen on a day like this before RNP? > > Queenstown-bound flights would have been diverted, frequently to > Invercargill, which is on the coast south of Queenstown. Passengers > would then have to board a bus for a 2 hour 15 minute ride back north > to Queenstown.
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Post by johnnyfalcon on Dec 1, 2013 12:18:59 GMT 12
That is stunning! 25 seconds from visual to over the threshhold
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Post by skyhawkdon on Dec 1, 2013 12:58:00 GMT 12
Wow, that is very cool footage and the soundtrack is a very good choice!
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Post by suthg on Dec 1, 2013 13:24:11 GMT 12
I'm sure I have seen that link on here before but it may have been a personal email link. Tricky bit of flying all in faith on instruments for the actual penetration of the cloud to 500ft? just under the clouds within 3km? of the runway... banked gentle turn to get lined up. Lovely music and scenery.
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Post by Dave Homewood on Dec 1, 2013 13:50:43 GMT 12
My goodness, what amazing footage! Thanks for posting it Dave!
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Post by baz62 on Dec 1, 2013 14:05:00 GMT 12
I'm sure I have seen that link on here before but it may have been a personal email link. Tricky bit of flying all in faith on instruments for the actual penetration of the cloud to 500ft? just under the clouds within 3km? of the runway... banked gentle turn to get lined up. Lovely music and scenery. I posted it on here last week, if it is the same one. Pretty cool huh? |
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Post by Dave.K on Dec 1, 2013 19:56:33 GMT 12
Sorry Baz, didn't see it, just got an e-mail and posted it, it is cool though!!
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Post by kiwithrottlejockey on Dec 1, 2013 20:22:48 GMT 12
Tricky bit of flying all in faith on instruments for the actual penetration of the cloud to 500ft? just under the clouds within 3km? of the runway... banked gentle turn to get lined up. Lovely music and scenery. Back in 1996, I was with three friends on the Freshfield Glacier high up above the Tasman Glacier (having been silly enough to climb the steep, loose Haast Ridge the day before). We were on the way over to the West Coast via Pioneer Pass (well, that was the intention, but when we got to just below the pass later that morning, we were cut-off by a huge bergschrund crevasse with no way across, necessitating a traverse further north and a very steep crossing over Governor Col instead) and we had bivvied the night before on the Freshfield Glacier intending to set-off the following day about mid-morning (we were only going as far as Pioneer Hut that day). While we were packing up our bivvy, the first Mount Cook Airlines flight of the day from Christchurch to Queenstown via Mount Cook descended down the Tasman Valley, which was filled with low cloud a couple of thousand feet below us. We watched the HS748 way below us descending and disappear into the cloud between the two huge mountain ranges on either side of the Tasman Glacier. I presume the cloud was only a thin layer, but it was still rather freaky watching that airliner disappear below us like that. No such thing as GPS and RNP back then, although I guess those Mount Cook pilots knew the terrain like the backs of their hands, as I understand most of them had done time flying skiplanes around the Aoraki-Mount Cook/Westland national parks area prior to being promoted to the company's scheduled airline services. |
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Post by hardyakka on Dec 1, 2013 20:22:56 GMT 12
That is stunning! 25 seconds from visual to over the threshhold I think you'll find that the footage has been sped up a fair bit. Look at the speed of the cars on Kawarau Road as the plane crosses the threshold. It does not detract from the amazing footage in the slightest, but it has been manipulated. I've noticed that a lot of flying footage does seem somewhat slow and benefits from a bit of "time-lapsing" (airshow low passes by high performance aircraft excepted of course... ) |
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Post by johnnyfalcon on Dec 1, 2013 21:05:55 GMT 12
Yeah, I was surprised at the apparent speed of his approach, but being a light aircraft pilot myself I doubted my first impression
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Post by kiwithrottlejockey on May 1, 2016 12:27:13 GMT 12
I understand Air New Zealand carried out an A320 night landing at Queenstown yesterday evening. Nothing online in the news media yet (although I heard it mentioned on Radio NZ National during a news broadcast earlier today), but a post was made HERE at PPRUNE last night by somebody who witnessed the approach to Runway 05 up the Frankton Arm of Lake Wakatipu. |
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