Flight Training - October 2014 - 34

Tower close to the airport.

Tower taller than 1,000 feet agl.

Maximum elevation figures.

Communication frequencies for
Flight Service.

Runway graphic.

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TALL TOWERS AND OTHER OBSTRUCTIONS. The
FAA requires towers of significant height to be
painted with bands of aviation orange alternating
with white. Some must have red flashing beacons
or even brilliant white strobes, but when visibility
drops, a tall tower can be exceedingly difficult to see.
Guy wires are even less visible and just as capable of
stopping an airplane.
Did you know that the FAA has no authority to
prevent construction of towers or other obstructions, even those close to airports? Builders are
supposed to file Form 7460-1 with the FAA for
anything built more than 200 feet tall or close to a
public-use airport, but they don't always do that.
The best that the FAA can do is object, which is
one reason AOPA tries so hard to persuade cities
and towns to pass protective zoning around their
airports-not only for towers but also for residential
encroachment. More than 2,000 public use airports
have closed since 1969.
First, a quick review. Towers shorter than 1,000
feet above ground level (agl) are shown on sectionals as inverted V shapes. If greater than 1,000 feet
agl, they're shown as a tall tower, in this example
1,551 feet above mean sea level (msl) or 1,001 feet agl.
The actual tower location is more or less the dot at
the bottom of the symbol.
A (UC) notation usually means Under Construction, but it also can mean the obstruction has been
reported but not verified. In other words, it may not
be exactly where shown.
If you see displaced threshold markings on a
runway but no obvious obstruction nearby, it may
be that a road near the runway is the obstruction.
It's not actually the road that is the obstruction; it's
the height of cars and trucks that are likely to drive
along the road. For interstates, the presumed height
is 17 feet; for other public roads, 15 feet; and for private roads, 10 feet.
MIND YOUR MEFS. Should you ever accidentally
find yourself in the clouds, a sectional feature called
the maximum elevation figure (MEF) could help
save your day. But do those figures include towers or
other obstructions?
If the obstacle is 200 feet agl or less, no. Higher
than that, the FAA's cartographers figure its height
above mean sea level, add 100 feet, then round
up that figure to the next 100 feet. A tower with a
reported top of 2,424 feet msl will bump up the MEF
to 2,600 feet.
A better choice when flying VFR would be to avoid
accidentally entering instrument meteorological
conditions.

COMMUNICATIONS CONFUSION. It's easy
to forget how useful VORs can be for communicating with a distant flight service
station.
Communications frequencies shown
above the VOR information box-here
122.2 and 122.4-can be used to talk and
listen to the FSS. But does that R after 122.1
mean you should talk or listen on 122.1?
Talk. It means the FSS can (R)eceive on
122.1, but you must listen on the VOR frequency, assuming there's no line under the
frequency indicating no voice capability.
It may seem a low-tech way to exchange
information in this modern world, but
it works just fine, and in sparsely populated parts of the country-such as over
the desert southwest where I used to
fly-it can be the only way to reach an FSS.
The H in a circle at the top right of the
box means you can listen for hazardous
inflight weather advisory service on the
VOR frequency.
BLUE AIRPORTS AND SFARS. If you
learned to fly more than 10 or 15 years
ago, you were taught that blue airports
have either a control tower or a flight service station on the field. Now, blue means
only a tower.
Something not often seen on sectionals is the airport name in a box,
indicating that special FAR Part 93 rules
(SFARs) are in effect for that airport.
For instance, there are numerous special
rules for Ronald Reagan Washington
National Airport (DCA), including one
that that prohibits airlines from using
that airport for flights over 1,250 miles,
thus pushing more international flights
to nearby Washington-Dulles International Airport (IAD) and Baltimore/
Washington International Thurgood
Marshall Airport (BWI).
Other symbols are used for some FAR
Part 93 areas, such as the partial circle with
feathering on the inside around favorite
honeymoon destination Niagara Falls.
Those rules restrict flight below 3,500 feet.
There are other restrictions too.
Other SFAR areas, including Arizona's
Grand Canyon, use solid lines with a row
of small blocks on the inside. Within that
large area are sectors and corridors, each

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Flight Training - October 2014

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Flight Training - October 2014