Originally Posted by
LarryJ
Yes, it is.
You can not take off if your planned weight at touchdown will exceed your max landing weight (for the runway and expected conditions). If landing weight plus planned fuel burn is more less than your MGTOW then your max takeoff weight is limited to max landing weight plus planned fuel burn.
We have this debate during every recurrent. On the RJ, where half or more of our flights are fairly short, our "calculate" MTOW is landing weight + fuel burn, which of course is always less than "structural" max takeoff weight. So, if our calculated max takeoff weight is 45600, and we load up and takeoff at 45650, are we legal? One side says yes because you are not exceeding a structural limitation of the aircraft. Obviously, if you did this, you would need to burn the necessary amount of fuel to be below your MLW.
The other side would say that no, you are not legal to do this since your "calculated" MTOW is a hard number and can not be exceeded even though it would not structurally compromise the aircraft.
We don't deal with this issue anymore because our W & B is automated via ACARS now, but back in the day when we would have to do manual W & B some guys would apply theory #1 as told above.
Your thoughts?