Duffman

About that... thanks to Ligado a 5G freq will be running dangerously close to the GPS band shortly.

APCHCLIMB

You'd be surprised how many 121 pilots give zero consideration to LOC service volume. Not necessarily their fault with the way things work out most of the time.

Same thing with GS service volume.

That's probably the source of "false localizer".

Viperstick

Ditto.......

USMCFLYR

Could be.
I never gave a second thought to the actual service volumes of any NAVAID until I came to this job.
Very little thought to restrictions to those service volumes either.

I'd be very excited if someone could point me to an actual working ILS that has actual false LOC or GS. It would be like finding a needle in a haystack. That is a big part of my job. Find something OT and get in back into service working with The Ops and ATC to accomplish the flight inspection. Most of what we actually find out of tolerance on a LOC for example would be a width measurement. Something that for a pilot would almost be to small to see (for example how many pilot's would actually know the commissioned width of any system which they are flying), then in some inspections that width tolerance is +/- 0.1 degree. Actual FALSE LOC and GS are HUGE discrepancies.

Strange things can happen though. I was putting a system back into service in Louisiana when the technicians basically hooked up the GS transmitter backwards causing an inverted GS signal. On your display the GS cue would have come up from the bottom of the display!

Craziness....I look forward to some of the information provided by those with complaints.

USMCFLYR

Please provide the same information as already requested.
"Ditto" gives me nothing to work with.

pangolin

Commutair. Maine. Unofficial of course.

pangolin

I don’t know if it’s the AC system or the ground signal or too many too close but the LOC will capture and start down on the glide slope with a full scale deflection when it is clearly not captured properly. Arming appc mode “too soon” is contributory. Check ASAP reports. There’s a significant number of these.

tallpilot

The much stronger L1C and L5 signals will negate those concerns in a decade or so.

That’s probably the biggest contributor. Newer systems do a rationality check with the FMS position but older ones are notorious for capturing nothing especially with the long finals and non-standard intercept vectors common at ‘busy’ airports.

Viperstick

While we ruminate about something (HAL taking our place) that is years, probably decades away at least, I think we're missing the big picture.

The title of this thread is "Pilot Shortage." Demand for our services was extremely high and accelerating seven months ago. That drove the pay improvements all carriers saw through the '10s. This black swan event is unprecedented, but like all black swan events, it will eventually pass. When it does and there is again accelerating demand for our services, where are the pilots going to come from? The military has been producing far less pilots than it used to and at least the Air Force still has a serious rated manning shortage. Civilian production has been decimated by the lost decade and the attendant aversion to the high cost and low return on investment prospective pilots faced, hence programs like Aviate to try to prime the pump. After this event, it may again be a hard sell to a college age American to consider a career in aviation. But the fact remains, we are difficult to produce widgets--there's a long lead time and considerable expense to do so. You can't just magically produce an ATP qualified individual overnight.

Management at every airline recognizes this and are taking steps to try to lock in long term company gains at pilots' expense while we're at the nadir of this event. It's not coincidence that Kirby is trying to get voluntary MPG cuts while Bastian is trying to do the same thing. Nor was Kelly's veiled threat of pulling the offered contract at the beginning of the pandemic unrelated to the reality that this is a short term but very intense correction to the long term need for pilots.

With that in mind, consider the following:

1) Pilots have far more leverage than they currently think due to the realities outlined above.
2) Management is using fear during this very intense correction to try to drive long term company gains that wouldn't be economically available in the pre-COVID environment.
3) Airline stocks, after an initial steep decline, have bounced nicely and are currently fairly stable. This indicates Wall Street's belief that there is light at the end of the tunnel and that bankruptcy is not the foregone conclusion some would have us believe.
4) Programs already in place (furlough-plus, half-month COLAs, restricted early out program) along with the company's own messaging (not flight ops or union messaging, that's all doom & gloom for our benefit) points to an awareness of a return to an environment where pilots will be needed, perhaps in very short order.
5) Watch very closely any legislation that would relax rules regarding foreign pilots flying for US carriers. That's where I see the next threat.

Truth in advertising, I'm one of the 3900+ hostages. I'm not willing to slit my own throat.

Viperstick

KDSM rwy 31, A-320 sometime in 2015. Aborted approach, lined up on 23 and landed uneventfully.