An ILS approach chart is really two approaches sharing one chart—except when it isn’t. Sometimes one little detail way upstream makes all the difference.
No Two-for-one here
Fly IFR enough and reading an approach plate becomes something akin to ordering at your favorite diner. You know everything on the menu. When Lorna the waitress tells you theyre fresh out of the sweet potato fries that let you pretend youre getting a vegetable with your triple-bypass cheeseburger, you call for the onion rings instead without asking for your options. Hey, onions are vegetables too, right?
Key Takeaways:
- The ILS Rwy 31 at Salinas, CA, is notably unusual for lacking circling minimums and a co-charted localizer-only option on its approach plate, despite a separate LOC DME Rwy 31 chart existing.
- This design is driven by high terrain that necessitates a distant and high-altitude procedure turn, which consequently mandates a high glideslope intercept altitude of 5000 feet.
- These high-altitude requirements, coupled with TERPS criteria, made it impossible to design and co-chart a compliant localizer approach with proper stepdowns on the same plate, leading to its publication as a separate approach without a procedure turn.
- A Flight Standards policy further prohibits circling minimums on such "stand-alone" precision approaches, completing the explanation for the chart's unique limitations for pilots.
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