This is an excerpt from a report made to the Aviation Safety Reporting System. The narrative is written by the pilot, rather than FAA or NTSB officials. To maintain anonymity, many details, such as aircraft model or airport, are often scrubbed from the reports.
Two incidents happened within a short time of each other, including a near miss with a helicopter.
After departing the airport in the SR22, we first saw the helicopter with ADB-S traffic alert and began looking outside for it.
When we saw it, it was directly in front of us about 200-300 above us and about 1,000 feet laterally. We passed beneath it, realizing it was close.
We proceeded to ZZZ1 for traffic pattern work. We joined the left downwind for Runway XX and did two landings to a full stop.
We noticed that the wind had changed to favor Runway XY so we switched to XY on the ground and did two landings before departing to the south.
During this whole time we were broadcasting our intentions but realized that we were on the wrong frequency and changed to the correct one around the time we switched runways.
We noticed there was other traffic using XY while we were first using XX. However we continued to use XX because the AWOS clearly showed XX to be the best runway for wind at that time.
Later in the day we found that our radio silence had rattled nerves and caused problems for the flight school. We spoke to the flight school manager and offered our apologies for causing a disruption.
There were no close calls or issues other than no communication that we observed.
Primary Problem: Ambiguous
ACN: 2165094
When you click on the link it will take you to the ASRS Online Database. Click on Report Number and put the ACN in the search box, then click Search. On that page, click on “view only the 1 most recent report.”
It has been my experience that most NORDO aircraft actually have radios on board, but are inop, on the wrong frequency, or volume too low.,,,
If the pilot were on the wrong frequency, didn’t it seem to be abnormally quiet with the other traffic he could see in the pattern? Also, would what he was seeing in the pattern seem much different to what he was hearing on the wrong frequency, such as calls to a non-existent runway, or more/fewer calls for the observed traffic? How about pilots’ customary calls that open/close with the airport where they are flying?
Seems some details are missing here, or this pilot was rather oblivious. Would he notice if he were going the wrong way on a VFR flight where he was looking for ground waypoints, or would he just make everything look right in his mind?
Surprised this one hasn’t triggered a deluge of comments…
Forget the ‘wrong frequency’ part.
I’m assuming this pilot was listening to the correct AWOS, and knows how to interpret a windsock…such that he/she correctly determined that the conditions initially favored “XX”, then they eventually switched to favor “XY”…
Switching runways when there are planes in the pattern is always a…challenge (not the word I’d like to use, but…); at least they did it on the ground.
However, this is the concerning piece:
“We noticed there was other traffic using XY while we were first using XX. However we continued to use XX because the AWOS clearly showed XX to be the best runway for wind at that time.”
I’m guessing that Airport ZZZ1 has (at least) two different runway surfaces, and that “XX” and “XY” aren’t opposite directions of the same pavement. I’m also betting that ZZZ1 doesn’t have a published “recommended calm wind runway”.
They determined, visually, that they could fly a VFR pattern on XX, without interfering with traffic in the pattern on XY…which apparently worked. So I’m also guessing the two different VFR traffic patterns are geographically separated, and don’t overlap or intersect at any point…
Not a great idea, but has anyone done anything “illegal” to this point?
Regardless, instead of apologizing to the flight school for “rattling nerves”, the real question is: Why weren’t they also using “XX” initially?
Was it the flight school’s ‘Practice Crosswind Landings’ Day?
Not quite understanding the problem on this one; there should be no ambiguity concerning which frequency to use for the CTAF at any airport. They’re all published and are conspicuous.