ever wondered what NOT to do at ZLA?

[Keith Smith]

The ZLA Pilot Cert Center has released this article, highlighting the most frequently witnessed pilot deviations within ZLA. It's useful reading for anyone who is thinking of flying in or out of ZLA's major airports that may not be familiar with the procedures.

[Andreas Fuchs]

Great stuff, a MUST read for anyone flying to/from LAX, no matter how many times you have been there already.

[Alex Stjepanovic 963114]

Great article Keith!

[Andrew Doubleday]

If only this would solve the problem of... "Sorry sir, but my FMC!"... Almost as old as hearing "my dog at the homework."

 

Who's the one providing control services? Your FMC or me (the controller)?

 

 

-AJ

[Mike Cassel 849958]

Great work as always Keith.

[Ingo Harders]

Nice Article. Almost as entertaining to read as listening to the "live" broadcast. Hope not too many people read it as that would certainly diminish the entertainment-value somewhat...

 

 

Regards

N405HT

[Aggrey Ellis 964561]

Don't turn on the LAXX5 until instructed to by ATC. If you do, you will be crucified.

[Brad Littlejohn]

Don't turn on the LAXX5 until instructed to by ATC. If you do, you will be crucified.

 

If off the 24s, correct. If off the 25s, not really.

 

Same with the LOOP4.

 

I'm still like the cain we raise when we freak everybody out and flip the boat (east ops).

 

BL.

[Aggrey Ellis 964561]

Don't turn on the LAXX5 until instructed to by ATC. If you do, you will be crucified.

 

If off the 24s, correct. If off the 25s, not really.

 

Same with the LOOP4.

 

I'm still like the cain we raise when we freak everybody out and flip the boat (east ops).

 

BL.

 

Just dont let your FMC fly that departure.

[Brad Littlejohn]

Don't turn on the LAXX5 until instructed to by ATC. If you do, you will be crucified.

 

If off the 24s, correct. If off the 25s, not really.

 

Same with the LOOP4.

 

I'm still like the cain we raise when we freak everybody out and flip the boat (east ops).

 

BL.

 

Just dont let your FMC fly that departure.

 

That's a given!

 

What I was alluding to was that for the LOOP4 and LAXX5, if off the 25s, you're given a heading to turn to in the instructions of the SID. Off the 24s, you are runway heading until told where to go.

 

However.. you did give me a good idea for another article. I'll go have a word with the rest of the guys and see what they like.

 

BL.

[Harold Rutila 974112]

You're not supposed to enforce time on VATSIM technically, but great article!

 

"ZLA is blessed with healthy levels of traffic." Hahaha state the obvious in the first paragraph...love it .

[Keith Smith]

Harold,

 

In terms of operating hours of airports (such as Cl[Mod - Happy Thoughts] D fields that aren't 24/7), we do not enforce times. In terms of noise abatement procedures (changing to the east facing rwys at LAX after midnight, and swapping to Redeye and Moorpark STARS), we do. Essentially, if the time of day would result in you not receiving any service, we ignore it (since ppl fly at all times of the day on VATSIM), but if procedures changes over the course of the day, we try to do it because there's no degradation in the service, it's just an alternate set of procedures.

[Justin A. Martin]

Also, Harold... We brought this up to David Klain a little while ago, if I recall his answer made me believe that...

 

You can treat a Cl[Mod - Happy Thoughts] D field as Cl[Mod - Happy Thoughts] E if it is in the real-world, so you can close the tower, however you can't close the airport. Pilots can fly where ever they want when ever they want, but that doesn't mean the controller is required to grant them ATC services at all airports.

 

Justin

[Ian Elchitz 810151]

Great information and presented with humour - as expected by someone like you Keith.

 

Thanks for putting that together.

[Brian Ratledge 962606]

Great article! Essential information.

[Marvin Bradley 953317]

Love the article. One of the priceless pieces of work you've done.

[Matthew Bartels]

To be quite honest, I find the tone and direction of this article to take an elitist stance. Makes me feel like any new pilot is unwelcome to fly into ZLA Airspace unless you're capable of X, Y , Z. If I were a new pilot coming across this article; one, it would make me feel very unwelcome in LA. Secondly, it might even steer me away from vatsim all together. Remember this is a learning environment. This article in its intent seems to want to help students learn, but its tone seems to do nothing but call out every noobish mistake that is natural and will most likely occur within ones early career with VATSIM

[Thomas Mathieu 998318]

The article mention's filing the LOOP4 or LAXX5 after 9pm local as an error? What if the controllers local time is 2130 but the pilot sets his FS for daytime flight.

 

Often, pilots fly for VA's and have to set FS to a specific time instead of real VATSIM time. My last arrival at LAX happened around 2315 local LAX time, but my set FS time showed arrival at 0452Z.

 

If I reset the time to VATSIM hours, my ACARS reports the wrong time when uploading the PIREP to the VA.

[Ryan Guffey 956726]

The article mention's filing the LOOP4 or LAXX5 after 9pm local as an error? What if the controllers local time is 2130 but the pilot sets his FS for daytime flight.

 

Often, pilots fly for VA's and have to set FS to a specific time instead of real VATSIM time. My last arrival at LAX happened around 2315 local LAX time, but my set FS time showed arrival at 0452Z.

 

If I reset the time to VATSIM hours, my ACARS reports the wrong time when uploading the PIREP to the VA.

 

LAXX5 is valid. LOOP4 is not. We dont go by the pilots time of day. We go by the actual time. Same thing with the VTU and GMD SID's.

[Bryan Wollenberg 810243]

While I can't agree at all with your [Mod - Happy Thoughts]essment, Matthew, you do have one thing right. The article is indeed meant to point out every noobish mistake. How is one to learn if nobody ever points out his mistakes? It is certainly not meant to come across as elitist. It's simply a one-stop-shop conglomeration of errors, so that noobs who actually care about learning the airspace and procedures can view the most common mistakes in one article, learn from those mistakes, and work on doing things correctly. Similarly, we publish general articles on flying, VFR work, Cl[Mod - Happy Thoughts] Bravo transitions, etc. Are we to be considered elitist because we strive to educate the general public on how to transition the LA Cl[Mod - Happy Thoughts] Bravo airspace while VFR?

 

This article along with the other articles on our website (IFR, VFR, all sorts of cool articles), pilot certification program, and extremely friendly controllers, make ZLA a very noob-friendly place to fly. Our impeccable pilot feedback (from pilots of all experience levels) seem to reinforce this fact. Go back and re-read the article, learn some really cool things about our procedures, enjoy Keith's great sense of humor, and no more right turns on the LAXX5 or else!

[Brad Littlejohn]

To be quite honest, I find the tone and direction of this article to take an elitist stance. Makes me feel like any new pilot is unwelcome to fly into ZLA Airspace unless you're capable of X, Y , Z. If I were a new pilot coming across this article; one, it would make me feel very unwelcome in LA. Secondly, it might even steer me away from vatsim all together. Remember this is a learning environment. This article in its intent seems to want to help students learn, but its tone seems to do nothing but call out every noobish mistake that is natural and will most likely occur within ones early career with VATSIM

 

Why would you say that it is elitist? Have you seen that a lot of what Keith mentioned in his article is coming directly from the charts and SOPs used in the real world? Yes, this is a learning environment, but there is a lot that needs to be done on the pilot's side of things that help the controller keep a good solid flow of traffic through his/her sector. Plus, if a pilot files the said departure or arrival procedures, and is cleared for it, like it has been said many times before, it is like a contract. Both sides agree that the pilot is going to file it, and the controller understands that the pilot will comply with what is listed or stated on the chart. If I file VTU5 out of KLAX, ATC should expect me to stay on runway heading until he/she tells me to turn towards VTU. Why? because that's what the chart says to do. I filed it, and am expected to know it.

 

Keith's article also does exactly what you're stating. Those errors are most likely to occur early in someone's piloting career. Why not head that off at the p[Mod - Happy Thoughts] before it ever starts to become a problem? when someone is taught how to do something right the first time, they more than often won't make the mistakes that get them into hot water.

 

BL.

[Thomas Mathieu 998318]

To be quite honest, I find the tone and direction of this article to take an elitist stance. Makes me feel like any new pilot is unwelcome to fly into ZLA Airspace unless you're capable of X, Y , Z. If I were a new pilot coming across this article; one, it would make me feel very unwelcome in LA. Secondly, it might even steer me away from vatsim all together. Remember this is a learning environment. This article in its intent seems to want to help students learn, but its tone seems to do nothing but call out every noobish mistake that is natural and will most likely occur within ones early career with VATSIM

 

You make a stong point. I did not even go near ZLA airspace until I had nearly 600 hours flight on VATSIM for fear of making a mistake on the arrival/departure procedures.

 

My experience with LAX was a wonderful, challenging experience though and the controllers were awesome.

[Matthew Bartels]

We're all entitled to our opinions. I've read a ton of your articles and most of them are very helpful. My issue is this article, including the some of the sarcasm makes it "If you do this in ZLA, then you're not good enough to fly with us." I'm sure this isn't its intent, just an observation which left a bad taste in my mouth.

[Ed Tomlinson 1014292]

We're all entitled to our opinions. I've read a ton of your articles and most of them are very helpful. My issue is this article, including the some of the sarcasm makes it "If you do this in ZLA, then you're not good enough to fly with us." I'm sure this isn't its intent, just an observation which left a bad taste in my mouth.

 

Hi Matthew,

 

There are as many different methods of instruction as there are different ways of learning.

 

True, ZLA is a complex airspace, but the ATC staff there is extremely patient and knowledgeable. And workload permitting, they can help you as a pilot to gain a much better learning experience.

 

The Pilot Certification program has already been mentioned. I would welcome you to make it a goal because the challenge is not only rewarding personally, but it will lift your “gameâ€

[Garry Morris 920567]

Knowing Keith's background, frankly I found the articles not sarcastic but very humorous.

 

You have to admit, this is very very dry material. Sure, we all find this kind of stuff fascinating, but really - do you want to read 30 pages of dry [Mod - lovely stuff] about how to fly a SID? Frankly, when someone tells me I'm going to become one with an inbound 747 if I screw up this part of a SID, my ears will perk up and I'm going to listen a lot better than if they just say "don't turn too early".

 

Teaching is about delivering content to students in such a way as to keep them engaged and interested. If you start to bore them, they'll never learn anything.