Air carrier first officer reported operating an older non-GPS aircraft to crp where VOR 18 was the s...

Narrative:

We had to fly the VOR 18 into crp in an older model aircraft and there are several safety concerns that came up during the approach. The only reason we were able to find the airport and land was because of my local knowledge and familiarity of the area around the airport.1. The reported ceiling and visibility was 2000 feet and ten NM. However; inflight visibility was only about 1500 feet and five miles. 2. There are MALSR lights depicted on the chart; however they were either not working or not turned on. When we were below the clouds; all we could see were bright lights from refineries between the derived decision altitude (dda) and airport.3. There was a NOTAM that increased the minimums to 780 and two miles.4. The approach is at an angle such that you are not near the runway centerline when you reach the dda.5. There is a 'ghost' top of descent point three miles past the FAF. We don't have anything in our procedures to address this in terms of where to start our descent from FAF to dda.6. If you start the descent at the FAF; you reach dda several miles short of where you expect to.7. Approach control cleared us direct to crp VOR and cleared us for the approach. This further complicates things as we were about 30 degrees off the final approach course while being cleared direct to the FAF. We recognized this problem and asked for vectors to intercept the course outside of crp VOR.

Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: Air Carrier First Officer reported operating an older non-GPS aircraft to CRP where VOR 18 was the sole available approach in reduced ceiling and visibility conditions; which made the approach challenging.

Narrative: We had to fly the VOR 18 into CRP in an older model aircraft and there are several Safety concerns that came up during the approach. The only reason we were able to find the airport and land was because of my local knowledge and familiarity of the area around the airport.1. The reported ceiling and visibility was 2000 feet and ten NM. However; inflight visibility was only about 1500 feet and five miles. 2. There are MALSR lights depicted on the chart; however they were either not working or not turned on. When we were below the clouds; all we could see were bright lights from refineries between the Derived Decision Altitude (DDA) and airport.3. There was a NOTAM that increased the minimums to 780 and two miles.4. The approach is at an angle such that you are not near the runway centerline when you reach the DDA.5. There is a 'ghost' top of descent point three miles past the FAF. We don't have anything in our procedures to address this in terms of where to start our descent from FAF to DDA.6. If you start the descent at the FAF; you reach DDA several miles short of where you expect to.7. Approach Control cleared us direct to CRP VOR and cleared us for the approach. This further complicates things as we were about 30 degrees off the final approach course while being cleared direct to the FAF. We recognized this problem and asked for vectors to intercept the course outside of CRP VOR.

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.

Attributes
ACN	1439985
Time
Date	201704
Local Time Of Day	1201-1800
Place
Locale Reference	CRP.Airport
State Reference	TX
Environment
Flight Conditions	Mixed
Light	Daylight
Aircraft 1
Make Model Name	Medium Large Transport
Operating Under FAR Part	Part 121
Flight Phase	Final Approach Initial Approach
Person 1
Function	First Officer Pilot Flying
Qualification	Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP)
Experience	Flight Crew Last 90 Days 137
Events
Anomaly	ATC Issue All Types Aircraft Equipment Problem Less Severe Deviation - Procedural Published Material / Policy Deviation - Procedural Clearance Inflight Event / Encounter Weather / Turbulence

Air carrier first officer reported operating an older non-GPS aircraft to crp where VOR 18 was the sole available approach in reduced ceiling and visibility conditions; which made the approach challenging.