Wind check!

[Stifler's Mom]

I'm trying to figure out why some pilots always ask for wind checks, even on calm wind days. I don't mean the occasional squirrelly approach where you can tell something is off. I mean every single leg. Can't they tell what the wind is by the way the plane is flying? And if not, can't they see the windsock?

This is the million dollar question in ATL?

 

[FlyChicaga]

Do y'all only land on runways that have a windsock on the approach end? Apparently I've been going to all the wrong airports, or at least landing in the wrong direction. Even if there IS a windsock in the vicinity of the runway I'm using, it's rarely lit well enough at night to be of any use to me anyway. All I have to go by, other than the winds calls from tower or ATIS (or cneter if tower's closed) is the crab angle on final.

Nah, it's not needed. But like most things, if it's there, I use it.

 

[klingon67]

I usually ask for wind checks at SDL when you have been doing pattern work on 03 and the wind shifted to 210 degrees and they keep landing you with a tailwind until you inform them.they are not the sharpest knives in the drawer.other than that when the summer monsoon is active and its fun to hear wind variable 220 to 050 at 25 gusting to 45.not that knowing the direction helps my landings.

 

[Milkdud99]

Wind Check!

 

[PastFastMover]

I just read somewhere that AA has it in their FOM that they are required to ask for wind checks.

Where did you read that?

 

[sky37d]

I have asked for wind check, a couple, and it is has been something I didn't want to hear. However, also frequently, I have had it offered, and again, it was not something I wanted to hear. The most memorable was "Wind 270 at 33 gust to 40".

Fortunately, I was landing on 27. It was the day I was supposed to take my IFR check ride. The examiner called me up, after I landed, to say it was "real windy, we shouldn't fly today".

 

[Milkdud99]

Wind Check!

Wind is 359@10 G 55

 

[Bill Mostellar]

Someone may have already said it, but we have to add winds to our approach speed if there is a gust factor. That could be the reason you hear it so often.

I don't usually ask unless the plane is telling me that the winds on final are different than what the ATIS said there winds are supposed to be at the field.