Narrative:

We were flight planned on the hyper 4 arrival. Due to a line of thunderstorms on the east side of iad; we were radar vectored to the west side of the airport and told to expect the gibbz arrival. As the gibbz arrival was not appropriate for our direction of flight; we expected to be radar vectored south of iad for a visual approach to 1C. When transferred to potomac approach; we heard an aircraft refuse a heading for weather. They were then issued a hold at mrb; after which the aircraft replied they would take the heading. The controller commented that things work better when they 'negotiate.' there were scattered thunderstorms in the area; and we expected to deviate around a few cells and get into iad without difficulty. We requested a left deviation around weather. ATC asked if we could deviate right instead; and we agreed. We were told to expect a left turn in a few miles. This was adjacent to the weather we were deviating around and I replied we would take a look to see when we could turn back. We were given a left turn directly into the weather and refused the turn. We were then given a clearance direct mrb to hold with a 45 minute efc. We could not accept a turn to mrb because of the weather. We continued to try to get a turn towards iad and were asked if we were declaring an emergency. We were not. While this was going on; we were determining bingo fuel and requested dispatch to enlist the help of the ATC coordinator to get us some priority into iad. At this time; the iad weather was fine for arrivals and departures; we just needed to get to the final approach course. All 3 pilots felt we were given punitive vectors for not accepting a turn into an area which would have contained at least moderate turbulence. That is; we did not 'negotiate.' we switched to potomac and continued to receive vectors. We received a message from dispatch saying ATC would take us with no hold. We could see iad clearly but could not get a turn towards the airport. Potomac asked how long we could hold and how much fuel we had on board. We asked for the distance to the airport via their proposed vectoring and it was more than 60 miles. By this time we were approaching our bingo fuel and if we continued to iad would be left with no diversion options. We diverted and landed uneventfully with 7.5K fuel remaining. There were thunderstorms in the iad vicinity; but this was an ATC vs. A weather diversion. When we finally arrived in iad; we had been on the plane for more than 12+30 hours. ATC needs to realize that safety is our number one priority and we cannot take vectors into convective activity for their convenience.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: B767 flight crew in bound to IAD describes a diversion caused by refusing to accept a vector through a small thunderstorm.

Narrative: We were flight planned on the HYPER 4 arrival. Due to a line of thunderstorms on the east side of IAD; we were radar vectored to the west side of the airport and told to expect the GIBBZ arrival. As the GIBBZ arrival was not appropriate for our direction of flight; we expected to be radar vectored south of IAD for a visual approach to 1C. When transferred to Potomac Approach; we heard an aircraft refuse a heading for weather. They were then issued a hold at MRB; after which the aircraft replied they would take the heading. The controller commented that things work better when they 'negotiate.' There were scattered thunderstorms in the area; and we expected to deviate around a few cells and get into IAD without difficulty. We requested a left deviation around weather. ATC asked if we could deviate right instead; and we agreed. We were told to expect a left turn in a few miles. This was adjacent to the weather we were deviating around and I replied we would take a look to see when we could turn back. We were given a left turn directly into the weather and refused the turn. We were then given a clearance direct MRB to hold with a 45 minute EFC. We could not accept a turn to MRB because of the weather. We continued to try to get a turn towards IAD and were asked if we were declaring an emergency. We were not. While this was going on; we were determining bingo fuel and requested Dispatch to enlist the help of the ATC coordinator to get us some priority into IAD. At this time; the IAD weather was fine for arrivals and departures; we just needed to get to the final approach course. All 3 pilots felt we were given punitive vectors for not accepting a turn into an area which would have contained at least moderate turbulence. That is; we did not 'negotiate.' We switched to Potomac and continued to receive vectors. We received a message from Dispatch saying ATC would take us with no hold. We could see IAD clearly but could not get a turn towards the airport. Potomac asked how long we could hold and how much fuel we had on board. We asked for the distance to the airport via their proposed vectoring and it was more than 60 miles. By this time we were approaching our bingo fuel and if we continued to IAD would be left with no diversion options. We diverted and landed uneventfully with 7.5K fuel remaining. There were thunderstorms in the IAD vicinity; but this was an ATC vs. a weather diversion. When we finally arrived in IAD; we had been on the plane for more than 12+30 hours. ATC needs to realize that safety is our number one priority and we cannot take vectors into convective activity for their convenience.

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.