Skydiving on towered aiports

[glowfast 0]

Does anyone else skydive onto a towered airport?

Do they sterilize the entire airport airspace or just a section to allow jumpers to land safely?

[adamUK 3]

You might want to ask the guys at Skydive St George in the UK. They're at a towered airport and their airspace is controlled by ATC. They also run commercial passenger flights into and out of the airport but it's not a busy one.

[BMFin 0]

Why do you ask?

[Elisha 1]

Skydive Santa Rosa WAS a towered DZ. It was a tandem mill (Cessna 182) at Sonoma County (Charles Schulz) Airport up until it closed in 2005. They marketed the dz as the only tower controlled airport in the state/country...but when you think about it, its a mixed blessing for the business.

Probably no chance in hell to re-open a dz there now with all of the commercial traffic since then.

[justme12001 0]

Skydive (North) Myrtle Beach is a towered airport, I have jumped there a fair amount. I'm sure it varies from airport to airport, but I found it to be an aggravation. The tower liked to put us on hold as we were coming on to jump run. The usual reason was either a plane was landing or about to take off.

I've jumped at quit a few airports that were not towered and never have had a problem with planes landing or taking off while we are dropping.

[riggerrob 558]

Pitt Meadows is a "towered" airport and people have been skydiving onto it for the last 15-ish years.

Since Pitt Meadows (CYPK) is near Vancouver International Airport (CYVR), it is a "releiver" airport for air traffic destined for CYVR or Abbotsford. Because the airspace is so busy, CYPK is Class D or E airspace. When the tower is manned (dawn til midnight) it becomes Class D airspace and all air traffic must get permission from CYPK's tower.

The Pitt VOR beacon is part of the standard landing approach to CYVR ... traffic avoidance requires any aircraft to talk with air traffic control (ATC) above 5,000 feet (same height as the Golden Ears Mountains).

The pea gravel bowl is in a field off the approach end to runway 26 right. Since that field is swampy and abuts the end of the runway, it is useless for anything except growing hay.
When we jump, the Pitt tower shifts all local traffic away from runway 26 right. That is easy because runway 26 left is parallel and longer and aligned with the prevailing winds. Since the standard pattern for runway 26 left is on the south side of the airport, that puts small airplanes a more than a mile from skydivers.

If the ground winds shift to north or south, Pitt's tower might shift all landing and departing airplanes to runway 18/36. That puts traffic off the western edge of the DZ.

If skydivers miss the DZ, the most common error is westwards, which pits them in the middle of Pitt Airport. They have to stand where they land until we can send out a radio-equipped van to pick them up. That van must ask permission from the tower before they can drive onto taxiways or runways. They also need the tower's permission before crossing any runway or taxiway. Walking across runways or taxiways is forbidden.

[Andy9o8 0]

Quote

If skydivers miss the DZ, the most common error is westwards, which pits them in the middle of Pitt Airport. They have to stand where they land until we can send out a radio-equipped van to pick them up. That van must ask permission from the tower before they can drive onto taxiways or runways. They also need the tower's permission before crossing any runway or taxiway. Walking across runways or taxiways is forbidden.

Aha! What if they actually land on a runway or taxiway?
Think carefully about your answer.

[theplummeter 14]

Earlier this year I was flying air ambulance in New Mexico and west Texas and ended up flying into Hobbs, NM which had a tower and a skydiving operation. It seemed like a headache for both ATC and the drop zone as they got held while I landed (IFR flight plan) even though I volunteered to take a different runway and had them in sight.

[theonlyski 3]

theplummeter

Earlier this year I was flying air ambulance in New Mexico and west Texas and ended up flying into Hobbs, NM which had a tower and a skydiving operation. It seemed like a headache for both ATC and the drop zone as they got held while I landed (IFR flight plan) even though I volunteered to take a different runway and had them in sight.

I was just wondering how much a jump pilot would want to sit there on the ground as the 3 planes in front of them are holding for release.

"I may be a dirty pirate hooker...but I'm not about to go stand on the corner." iluvtofly
DPH -7, TDS 578, Muff 5153, SCR 14890
I'm an asshole, and I approve this message

[riggerrob 558]

Andy9o8

Quote

If skydivers miss the DZ, the most common error is westwards, which pits them in the middle of Pitt Airport. They have to stand where they land until we can send out a radio-equipped van to pick them up. That van must ask permission from the tower before they can drive onto taxiways or runways. They also need the tower's permission before crossing any runway or taxiway. Walking across runways or taxiways is forbidden.

Aha! What if they actually land on a runway or taxiway?
Think carefully about your answer.

..................................................................................

We teach "aim for an open, grassy field" during the first jup course. 99 percent of (Pitt Meadows) skydivers land on the grass.

The last time I saw anyone land on a runway, they heard an "embarrassing" (heels together, etc.) lecture from the chief pilot and spent half of the next day re-doing the canopy-control part of the first jump course. It did not help that the day before, I had to extract them from the top of a tree: the only tree landing I had to deal with in 15 years worth of jumping in Pitt Meadows.

Bottom line: if you land on asphalt on Pitt Meadows Airport, you are not welcome back.

[grimmie 173]

Call the USPA. They will give you all of the info needed for jumping at a towered airport.

Brown Field in San Diego handles various Navy teams and a tandem operation landing off site. Their tower is excellent handling jumpers, but the manager is a skydiver. A rare exception to the rule.

[AnalMike 0]

Bozeman, MT used to allow jump operations on their very busy towered airport. We stopped jumping there when they told us essentially somewhere between 11:00 am - 2:00 pm was too busy with commercial traffic to jump. Just easier to relocate 30 miles away to a much calmer, non-towered airport. BUT they weren't too bad to deal with, a lot of us knew the tower guys personally, and invited them on tandems to keep the relations positive. It is all about maintaining that relationship with the tower guys. They are people just like you and me, making and keeping them as friends makes it very easy to have an op on a towered DZ. As for procedures, we regularly jumped while other VFR traffic was flying around. They always waited until we opened before releasing traffic to ensure visual separation but it all went fairly smooth!

Hope that helped somewhat.

Anal Mike

HEE HAW!!!
http://www.droguedonkey.com

[wayneflorida 0]

Andy9o8

Quote

If skydivers miss the DZ, the most common error is westwards, which pits them in the middle of Pitt Airport. They have to stand where they land until we can send out a radio-equipped van to pick them up. That van must ask permission from the tower before they can drive onto taxiways or runways. They also need the tower's permission before crossing any runway or taxiway. Walking across runways or taxiways is forbidden.

Aha! What if they actually land on a runway or taxiway?
Think carefully about your answer.

Land on the runway/taxiway?- Wait for the flashing white light, or if you have a radio handy ask for progressive taxi instructions.

[riggerrob 558]

wayneflorida

***

Quote

If skydivers miss the DZ, the most common error is westwards, which pits them in the middle of Pitt Airport. They have to stand where they land until we can send out a radio-equipped van to pick them up. That van must ask permission from the tower before they can drive onto taxiways or runways. They also need the tower's permission before crossing any runway or taxiway. Walking across runways or taxiways is forbidden.

Aha! What if they actually land on a runway or taxiway?
Think carefully about your answer.

Land on the runway/taxiway?- Wait for the flashing white light, or if you have a radio handy ask for progressive taxi instructions.

..............................................................................

Our agreement with Pitt's ATC insisted on radio or telephone permission before walking across asphalt.

[glowfast 0]

Thanks for the feedback guys.

We will be a tandem only op jumping at the end of the runway at least a mile from all other traffic in the area.

The tower manager has never seen skydiving before so is very caustious and wanting to close down the whole class D airspace whilst jumpers are in the air even though we would never be anywhere near other planes.

As you can imagine this has made us very popular with the other airport tenants. We are doing a test day and hopefully this will prove to the tower we can jump safely without closing half of the countries airpspace

[riggerrob 558]

Be polite to the pilots and take your trash away at the end of the day.

[rjblake 1]

The Flying Dutchmen parachute club is located at Rotterdam The Hague Airport in The Netherlands. The airport deals with around 51,000 aircraft movements and 1.5 million passengers per annum. The DZ/PLA is located a short distance from the airport itself and jumpers are ferried back to the club by buses. A passport is required to clear security and get to the aircraft, alongside business travelers and holidaymakers heading out. I'm sure there are some puzzled expressions seeing jumpers heading out through the gates kitted up and ready to go

[Blis 1]

rjblake

The Flying Dutchmen parachute club is located at Rotterdam The Hague Airport in The Netherlands. The airport deals with around 51,000 aircraft movements and 1.5 million passengers per annum. The DZ/PLA is located a short distance from the airport itself and jumpers are ferried back to the club by buses. A passport is required to clear security and get to the aircraft, alongside business travelers and holidaymakers heading out. I'm sure there are some puzzled expressions seeing jumpers heading out through the gates kitted up and ready to go

You guys have to actually go throught the gates? :O

At my home DZ we have a small area next to airport itself where "civilian" planes are and that's also where we load the plane. We use the same runway as the big passenger planes and other traffic so pilots have to always deal with the tower and request permission for drops. Most often we get to drop immediatly but occasionally we have to wait couple minutes in the air for our slot...

[CrashProne 4]

Long before I decided to start jumping, I flew for an outfit off the Olympia airport in Washington. There is no scheduled airline service there, and it's not really that busy of an airport. The DZ was in a field 1/2 mile off the airport and they used a van to haul jumpers to the plane. It really was a pretty easy deal, and had the potential to work just fine, but as it turns out, that DZO had a bit of a history with the local FAA office, and it wasn't a good one. He also didn't seem to get off to a good start with the tower and/or airport manager, so is felt like nobody wanted us there.

When the FAA guys met me one day on landing and asked me to deliver a nasty letter to the DZO, I had to cut my losses and move on. As a brandy new commercial pilot, I couldn't afford to be in the middle of his fight with the FAA.

[hackish 8]

We're at a sorta-towered airport. FSS. I call it tower-lite edition. The key to making it all work well is consistent professional attitude and building a relationship with FSS / ATC.

Ottawa Terminal is very familliar with the operations and does a really good job about routing incoming traffic when there is weather for commercial jets to avoid. While a pilot flying VFR could fly any number of patterns on climb or descent we do the same thing every time and it works well for everyone. ATC knows exactly where the AC will be, they get a call precisely 3 minutes before the drop and so on. It's all about being consistent and predictable.

-Michael

[Di0 1]

rjblake

The Flying Dutchmen parachute club is located at Rotterdam The Hague Airport in The Netherlands. The airport deals with around 51,000 aircraft movements and 1.5 million passengers per annum. The DZ/PLA is located a short distance from the airport itself and jumpers are ferried back to the club by buses. A passport is required to clear security and get to the aircraft, alongside business travelers and holidaymakers heading out. I'm sure there are some puzzled expressions seeing jumpers heading out through the gates kitted up and ready to go

that's insane. I kinda want to do it once! :)

Also why passport? You're not leaving the country? I would expect a normal ID to be sufficient, I'd hate to take my passport while skydiving and risking losing it.

I'm standing on the edge
With a vision in my head
My body screams release me
My dreams they must be fed... You're in flight.