NZFF

Hey thanks ZX-Brock!

At the moment i am focusing on the Skyhawk and Caravan doing VFR flights. I was thinking more along the lines of what to actually say.

The other week i flew on FNF on the iceberg scenic trip, we came back to land at Dunedin. It was my first ATC landing. I was a bit nervous as to what to say. Now i know that the circuits are usually left based turns right? That was my first mistake as i flew down along the coast from the city and came in from the wrong way.

Secondly i wasn't sure how to advise the tower when i would be approaching the circuit or where i should enter.

Luckily tower corrected my altitude to stay under 1500. Do i contact ATC once i have entered the downwing leg or before?

And then what should i say? This is what i said 'Dunedin Tower this zulu x-ray papa mike hotel, at 500ft, approaching final leg on runway ?(forgot the number) ready to land' is this correct? i suppose this is where you professionals start laughing at me 'newbie in the house!'

i just want to make sure that i'm not in anyones way as i dont want to spoil the authencity for others.

So i will look at the aip.net site which has the procedures but iwould still love to know where i could find a site that could explain the language between the tower and the pilot and a site on reading airport charts so i can know what all the symbols mean.

Thanks so much for the time you took to write the above help. Maybe i should join someone sometime in a light aircraft so i can learn more.

Anymore help from anyone would be appreciated. Once i have mastered this in time maybe i can help other newbies.

by the way, woo hoo its FRIDAY!!!!

The AIP site is excellent by the way. Great for chart reading!!!

Hi there
PM me your postal address and I'll shoot off a packet with some charts and the legend out of the AIP that shows all the symbols etc
cheers

Also check out theCAA Radiotelephony manual, it gives you the correct phraseology for just about every bit of flying you'll do in NZ. However, different online groups have slightly different ways of doing things, depending on their knowledge and what they're about.

ZK-Brock wrote:

QUOTE (ZK-Brock @ Nov 16 2007, 02:09 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Also check out theCAA Radiotelephony manual, it gives you the correct phraseology for just about every bit of flying you'll do in NZ. However, different online groups have slightly different ways of doing things, depending on their knowledge and what they're about.

Hey thanks, you and towerguy just made my day!!! Thanks for that! The easy part was photocopying it, now comes the hard part,learning it all. This is exactly what i was looking for!

Thanks so much for all your help! I will have to put you on my 'i owe you one list'.

As a very general rule, in controlled airspace (i.e. talking to the Tower) you will only need to initiate a radio call on intial contact (i.e. Entering controlled airspace) or when requested to by the Tower (i.e. at a reporting point or position in the circuit)

The rest of the time the Tower will pretty much tell you where to go and what to do so your "Dunedin Tower this zulu x-ray papa mike hotel, at 500ft, approaching final leg on runway XX ready to land" wouldnt be needed when on finals (unless requested to do so of course).

Many instructions given by a controller require a readback just to make sure you have understood the instructions. Again, as a general rule repeat what he/she has told you followed by your callsign....cut out all the 'filler' as well to speed up radio calls. (i.e. "Dunedin Tower, Papa Mike Hotel, Finals, Runway XX"- Dont need the ZX part of the rego, dont need "this is" etc etc)

ARNZ have good tutorials on this stuff but the best way is to do some Friday Night Flights to practice (if using FSX that is)....some of my radio calls are shockers but id rather make the mistakes there than in the real world!

See: http://arnz.invisionplus.net/index.php?mfo...p;showtopic=203

Thanks Timmo, you have answered a couple of questions there.