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An airbus pilot reported the potential exists for flight crews to descend to unsafe altitudes with respect to mountainous terrain between the GS intercept altitude for a precision ILS approach to runway 16R and the FAF for the non-precision GS out approach to the same runway at rno.
| Attributes | |
| ACN | 1157916 |
| Time | |
| Date | 201401 |
| Local Time Of Day | 1801-2400 |
| Place | |
| Locale Reference | RNO.TRACON |
| State Reference | NV |
| Environment | |
| Flight Conditions | VMC |
| Aircraft 1 | |
| Make Model Name | Airbus Industrie Undifferentiated or Other Model |
| Operating Under FAR Part | Part 121 |
| Flight Phase | Initial Approach |
| Flight Plan | IFR |
| Component | |
| Aircraft Component | Altitude Alert |
| Person 1 | |
| Function | Captain Pilot Flying |
| Events | |
| Anomaly | Aircraft Equipment Problem Critical Inflight Event / Encounter CFTT / CFIT |
Narrative:
Approach to reno silver ILS 16R; uneventful approach but request change be made to approach for safety; read below. This was a night arrival; no mooni was given a visual on downwind and cleared to land silver ILS 16R. On the airbus nav display when the constraint tile is pushed; the FAF (dicey) is shown with a crossing altitude of 6;401 feet. If a crosswind descent is started on downwind and the pilot puts in 6;401 feet in the fcp [flight control panel] altitude window as his GS intercept altitude; he will most likely level off 2-3 miles prior to glide slope intercept at 6;401 feet missing the mountain (6;219 feet MSL) by 182 feet.this has already happened to someone once; and it's easy to do at night and tired. Many pilots reference the FAF altitude when they put in an fcp altitude to start their visual approach; at this airport you can get lulled in to a false sense of security; the mountain has no lights.as a fix that would help all airlines I recommend moving the FAF further up the glideslope to 7;100 feet. This at a minimum would make most pilots on a visual put 7;100 feet in the fcp altitude window and cause a higher and safer GS intercept and clearance over the mountain at 6;219 feet. Clearance would now be about 1;000 feet. This would involve a chart change. Reference the other ILS to 16; the FAF fix dicey has been taken out; takle is the FAF.
Original NASA ASRS Text
Title: An Airbus pilot reported the potential exists for flight crews to descend to unsafe altitudes with respect to mountainous terrain between the GS intercept altitude for a precision ILS approach to Runway 16R and the FAF for the non-precision GS out approach to the same runway at RNO.
Narrative: Approach to Reno Silver ILS 16R; uneventful approach but request change be made to approach for safety; read below. This was a night arrival; no moonI was given a visual on downwind and cleared to land Silver ILS 16R. On the Airbus Nav Display when the constraint tile is pushed; the FAF (DICEY) is shown with a crossing altitude of 6;401 feet. If a crosswind descent is started on downwind and the pilot puts in 6;401 feet in the FCP [Flight Control Panel] altitude window as his GS intercept altitude; he will most likely level off 2-3 miles prior to glide slope intercept at 6;401 feet missing the mountain (6;219 feet MSL) by 182 feet.This has already happened to someone once; and it's easy to do at night and tired. Many pilots reference the FAF altitude when they put in an FCP altitude to start their visual approach; at this airport you can get lulled in to a false sense of security; the mountain has no lights.As a fix that would help all airlines I recommend moving the FAF further up the glideslope to 7;100 feet. This at a minimum would make most pilots on a visual put 7;100 feet in the FCP altitude window and cause a higher and safer GS intercept and clearance over the mountain at 6;219 feet. Clearance would now be about 1;000 feet. This would involve a chart change. Reference the other ILS to 16; the FAF fix DICEY has been taken out; TAKLE is the FAF.
Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.