In Situation B, I wonder whether I should have made a right turn to tuck in behind the other aircraft. In Situation A, I wonder whether I should have completed my deadside turn and joined liveside further away from the threshold, rather than over the numbers, but then this isn't an overhead join. I am very confident that I was in the downwind position when I made my downwind call and that they were in the downwind position a further mile out from the runway. In my inexperience, I felt that turning downwind was the best option to avoid conflict, but did not anticipate that the other aircraft would turn downwind at exactly the same time and then catch me up. I could have turned right, but I genuinely believed that the other aircraft was leaving the circuit and I was concerned that I might be needlessly following another aircraft on an extended crosswind leg for no reason, taking ME outside the circuit. In Situation A, I felt that I was already live-side and so struggle to understand what options I had. Looking at FlightRadar, it seems lots of aircraft regularly fly circuits that take them out of the ATZ (which is not what I was taught to do). On the one hand, this whole situation would have been avoided had the other aircraft turned downwind at a reasonable point and hadn't flown such a colossal circuit that took them outside the ATZ. The situation was not as simple and clear-cut as the rules sound and given my limited hours, not one I've really had much experience of (nor would time with an instructor help much, as it's pot luck as to what other traffic is around). I did not fit in with the established traffic in the circuit, nor did I give way by turning to the right, but I'm replaying things over in my mind because I'm not sure how I should have actually handled things in practice. Now, strictly speaking, I am at fault here. I announce that this is what I am doing, to avoid conflict, report turning base, then I report final and land, only to hear them make a call that they are going around. My working assumption was that - if they were already aware of me - that they would likely extend their downwind and so - in my head - I felt the best course of action was to make an early turn to final to try and get out of their way, given that at this point I was inside and ahead of them. I am on the radio at this point and advise that I am visual with the aircraft to my right and questioning to myself what to do. By the time I am ready to turn final, they have caught up with me and are flying what I estimate to be 0.5 - 1 miles off my starboard wing, circuit height. Not ideal, I accept.īy the time I am late downwind, however, I can see them at 4 O'Clock catching up with me. In actual fact, on checking FlightRadar after the flight, I'm pretty confident that their circuit was so big that their crosswind leg took them some way outside of the ATZ.Īt this point however, my perception was that there is unlikely to be much conflict given that I turned earlier and I expect I am reasonably ahead of them. I am - as far as I can tell - correctly following the circuit but appear to have cut up another aircraft already established in the pattern, except they are flying what seems to be a massive, oversized circuit and - in practice - appear to have turned downwind after I did, whereupon I no longer have sight of them. Just before I make my downwind call, they come on the radio and also call downwind. So, I turned downwind in the usual downwind position. This was the first point I thought: there is a potential for conflict here, so I kept my eye on them, thinking that if they turned downwind I would make a right turn and fit in behind them.Īs it happened, their crosswind leg continued.and continued.and continued.and they seemed to be departing from the crosswind and leaving the circuit. Overhead, I struggled to get any message in because of the frequency clog, but while descending deadside I made my call and was informed of 2 other airfield in the circuit: one departing on a T&G, the other late downwind (which isn't relevant to this story).Īs I completed my 180 turn to come back over the numbers to the live side, I had sight of the departing traffic climbing out crosswind. In the event of conflict in the circuit - at various locations - just HOW should you give way in practice? Not who and not when, but how?Įarly last week, I made a standard overhead join to my local airfield which is relatively busy with a FISO.
In the grand scheme of things this was very trivial and entirely a non-issue, but the story is actually secondary: what I'm trying to do is ask what seems like a simple question: So, long time lurker here but recently acquired PPL sharing a recent minor event.
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