Aborted landing/go around
 

I hope this is the right place to post this. A similar issue was posted in this forum previously (http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/pract...d-landing.html) so I have followed suit.

I experienced my first go around last night. After a lifetime of enjoying flying, I have recently developed a fear of flying. So this experience didn't help matters.

I was pretty scared when this happened, as we were already being thrown around a fair bit and, as we started climbing again, we seemed to be (to this layperson) wobbling all over the place. I learned later that it was the first flight for one of the FAs and she was in crash position. The other experienced flight attendant said it was her worst flight experience.

All that was ever said about the go around was the flight attendant announcing that the pilot had decided not to make the landing. The cockpit never addressed the go around.

I would like to know what the reason was and have listened to the transmission on http://www.liveatc.net/ but don't know the lingo and can't make out what is being said most of the time. I do hear my flight make a request (sounds like 2500?) on the tower recording and on the approach recording, the word "go around" is mentioned.

There was turbulence last night and I think I heard the tower say that another flight was below the "worst of the wind sheer".

If anyone is willing/interested to help me decipher it, I would be most appreciative.

The flight was PD 678 and the go around started soon after 8pm EDT at YTZ (Toronto City Airport).

Just for convenience, this is the ATC recording that delbar is referring to: http://archive-server.liveatc.net/cy...2013-0000Z.mp3.

There's a lot of static, so it's hard to entirely make out what is going on, but I think that your interpretation is correct. It sounded like the plane was deviating from an expected flight path, prompting ATC to ask if everything was okay. The pilot requested some clearance to make another pass due to winds. After a few minutes, ATC clears the plane for landing. It doesn't sound like anything serious is going on.

You have it about right. Gusty surface winds and preceding pilots reporting windshear. It is often better to delay landing by going around rather than attempt it with windshear in the area, which could cause a sudden loss of airspeed close to the ground. Sounds like your pilot made the right decision. BTW he requested a "block altitude" (not a hard assigned altitude) between 2000 and 2500 feet to fly a circuit back over Lake Ontario for another landing on runway 26.

And welcome to FlyerTalk.

Thank you both for taking the time to listen to the recording and for responding to me here.

And thanks for the welcome.

I've been on go-arounds that were caused by nothing more than the tower failing to give landing clearance in time, or a truck pulling onto the runway. They happen, usually for a good reason. They're a pain at the end of a long flight, but they beat the alternative.

Similar go-around experience...
 

After a lot of visits to FT as a quiet user, I present myself due to a similar situation to the one described by the OP: first go-around experience, kind of scared FA at some point during the procedure and me wanting to understand more listening to LiveATC (weather conditions were perfect in my case).

The Tower registration is found below, go-around instruction is at min 13:57
http://archive-server.liveatc.net/ls...2014-1730Z.mp3

Do I understand correctly that "the [run]way is blocked", i.e., I assume another aircraft did not clear it?

Seeing the scared FA led me even to think of a landing gear failure, but luckily this was not the case :)

Thanks in advance for any help in clarifying what happened if you have a minute!!

I believe runway blocked can be anything from another vehicle/aircraft hasn't cleared the runway, debris, animals, etc. Listening to ATC recordings will only give you so much information since the recordings only capture the time where ATCs talk into their mics. They have plenty of off-mic communication as well.

Interesting to see this thread resurrected.

In October 2013 my first and only aborted landing occurred. Apparently there was a truck/plane that hadn't cleared the runway in time (as told by the cockpit).

Sitting comfortably in LH A380 F the thrust was rather impressive. And it was a long flight that I didn't mind being a little longer.

Another plane could have just been slow getting off the runway--even the majority of the plane could have been off, but it's not until the entire aircraft is across the lines marking the runway boundary (which extend a fair amount onto a taxiway surface) that the runway is officially clear. The lines marking the boundary of the runway are two solid lines, then two dashed lines, with the dashed line on the runway side.

A few months back, I saw an AB flight have to abort a landing at TXL when the plane seemed to be within 100 feet of the ground. That plane went back up in the air several thousand feet at least and it didn't land for at least another twenty minutes thereafter.

Missed approaches should not be a cause for anxiety but the opposite. The pilot determined the landing conditions were not suitable and decided to take another try. There are a variety of reasons why it might happen.

It's happened on flights I've been on. On one flight we went around twice before we landed. No big deal.

This was a completely normal event. The runway was not cleared, most likely by the aircraft landing just ahead of Lufthansa and the tower, out of an abundance of caution, instructed Lufthansa to go around for a subsequent landing attempt.

I don't understand why these events would cause anyone the least amount of concern. Go arounds are a completely routine maneuver.

I experienced one on a CRJ200 coming in to PHL. We were less than 25 feet above and probably a quarter of the way down the runway when the engines powered up and we gained altitude.

Heck of a windy day; the aircraft was all over the place on approach. Came on the PA and told us he had a gust push him down the runway and couldn't land with that much ground speed. Second try got it in about 15 minutes later. I made sure to give the pilots a "nice landing!" on the way off.

US1702 crashed on takeoff less than 4 hours later. Not a great day to be flying at PHL. I'd rather they abort and try again than to try to land with any contraindications at all.

Are extra FF miles awarded when the pilot decides to go around?;)