Welcome to Flightinfo.com

  • Register now and join the discussion
  • Friendliest aviation Ccmmunity on the web
  • Modern site for PC's, Phones, Tablets - no 3rd party apps required
  • Ask questions, help others, promote aviation
  • Share the passion for aviation
  • Invite everyone to Flightinfo.com and let's have fun

Holding question

Welcome to Flightinfo.com

  • Register now and join the discussion
  • Modern secure site, no 3rd party apps required
  • Invite your friends
  • Share the passion of aviation
  • Friendliest aviation community on the web

jkkdca

Member
Joined
Jun 14, 2004
Posts
15
Guy I was flying with said some people like to hurry into the hold because they think if they get there first they will exit first. When we are issued the hold is our place already set for exiting or are there tricks we pilots can use to get a lesser wait?

I told him I thought since we are issued EFC's it doesn't matter how fast we get there.

Thanks for any replies.
 
I always try to go as slow as possible, so I won't have to hold as long.

I heard that if you taxi at 60 knots+ to the runway you can takeoff before everyone else too.
 
Hard to figure out the original poster is serious or not, because the question is tantamount to asking "if you stand in line in walmart and stand agressively, will you get to the front any sooner?"

Ah, no.

A hold is a wait..you're waiting at a point in space. Unless you're a rotorwing aircraft you won't be hovering there, so you fly a holding pattern. Well enough...but you're still holding at a point in space. Does it make any difference that you hold at a faster airspeed or a slower airspeed? That really depends how much room you wan to take up and how much fuel you want to burn, doesn't it?

If you're standing in line, you're standing in line. You can't "stand harder" or "stand faster." You simply stand. A hold is standing in place, waiting to be told you can go. You can do it fast, slow, with your legs crossed, or with one hand in a trash bucket and the other making small circles over your left ear, if you like...but you're still in the hold.
 
I think what he is trying to ask is: is it first to enter the hold, the first to exit?

For example if an airport shuts down for weather and everyone gets clearances to hold at point x, most slow down to decrease hold times. If HE hurries to the hold point and beats everyone that would normally be in front of him do they take him out of the hold first?

There are many reasons that this doesn't make sense, but I'll let the pro's tell him about it.
 
Last edited:
It has always been my experience that, if you're on an airway or arrival that has a lot of traffic on it into a busy airport, you've already been sequenced for arrival on that route long before you get to the holding fix. So, it doesn't matter how fast you get to the fix. It normally goes that the aircraft at the lower altitude in the hold gets cleared out first also. Unless you're holding at CCC into JFK, and an A340 from Europe comes in. He's probably got less diversion fuel and options than you - so he's gonna get priority. It is what it is. :)
 
Why is it necessary to report entering the hold while in radar contact...with the time no less?
This is just my 'guess'. Doesn't really matter to me if it's right or not; it's the law and it makes it reasonable to me.

Normally, in radar contact, ATC sequences by headings, like a big traffic pattern. But when the pattern gets to big, they put somebody on hold. That puts him out of the pattern and out of mind. In other words, the report is to bring you back into the controllers mind as a part of the bigger picture that he is working.
 
Nosehair,

My point is WHY "it's the law" (or rather, in the AIM)

Believe me, the controller doesn't need a reminder of what's going on. He has data strips, and assigns you holding and sees you enter on radar, so why is it in the AIM to report entering when in radar contact? Most of the time in the holding airspace, the controller is already swamped and every time when I report entering holding, the controller acknowledges but you can tell from his tone that he is trying to do something else (coordinating with the next controller or whatever) and considers the call a nuisance.

I find many things in the AIM outdated. It desperately is in need of a complete re-write.
 
the controller doesn't need a reminder of what's going on.
You'll have to have an actual contoller confirm my theory, but in my years of experience, I have been 'forgotton' a few times. Maybe not actually 'forgotten', but when the vectored traffic is so heavy, he just has to 'prioritize' his working traffic so that you remind him.

You are probably right that most times it is a nusiance, and the overloaded controller tells it in his voice, but....

Like the requirement to report leaving an assigned altitude; I am of the old school before radar, so it is ingrained in me, but I know most pilots don't do it any more, relying on the mode c txpnder, but, every once in a blue moon, the 'leaving altitude' call catches a mistake. A mistake in communication that could be deadly.

To me, because it is hardwired into my system, I see these AIM calls as additional insurance and not a nuisance at all. To you, and everyone trained in a radar environment, you see these calls as absolutely unnecessary.

I think it calls for some judgement on each call.
 

Latest resources

Back
Top