China Flying/Beijing
China Flying/Beijing
chinese verkeersleiding is nog best wel ok
Chinese ATC is a long way from OK. Try asking for anything non-standard and they will not understand you. I hope I never have to an immediate return or dump fuel - I have no idea what will happen.
We had a situation last year where the weather in Beijing was Cat II. Our flight was given an enroute hold then told they were not allowed to land in Beijing. On requesting a diversion to the
filed alternate the Captain was told this was unavailable. Same for the other alternates listed on the flightplan. Flight ended up in Shanghai. Captain received a commendation from the company for his handling of the situation.
Beijing
Airport is normally obscured by a toxic industrial smog with visibility below 2000m.
Runway 36R is the
center runway the furthest right runway is designated 01. In a conversation on another Forum a member who is a controller at Beijing was
unable see the obvious safety implications of this layout.
I have yet to do the same arrival procedure twice. My favourite so far is being cleared for a visual approach from 25nm without asking me if I was able to do this.
Landing to the South requires bizarre combinations of gear/flaps/speedbrakes plus disconnecting the autopilot in order to get the aircraft back on a normal profile. This is a result of the terrain profile but the failure of controllers to understand the capabilities of modern jets doesn't help.
Start descent 200nm from the airport. They always ask you to maintain a specific vertical speed. This has resulted in me pulling full speedbrakes to prevent overspeed as we exited a jetstream.
In several of these situations I have been tempted to tell them "unable" but I'm not sure what will happen next. I figure it's safer to deal with a known situation.
Flying in China
Exercise extreme caution
Expect the unexpected.
Don't screw around with the fuel - the only amount to take is lots.