Originally Posted by darrenpb

Gotcha. Thanks. I always assumed flights had to circle around the airport in a holding pattern to get in line to land when it is busy. Didn't know they could just zig-zag their way in.

I guess the pattern reminded me of a private flight I was on a few years ago flying from Clearwater to Key West. We were flying down the Florida coastline. As we were crossing over Fort Myers, the pilot punched in a new vector direct to Key West. The plane suddenly banked and turned 90 degrees heading directly out into the Gulf of Mexico towards Mexico. After I told him we weren't heading to Key West anymore, and after the ATC asked him what he was doing and where he was going, and after we had a near miss, he realized he punched in the wrong airport. I thought the same guy might have been flying the plane last night to SFO.