Circling at night or dealing with tailwind

[rsampaio]

Hey guys! Hope you're all well and having a good week.

Yesterday evening I flew my C172 into KCMA and did the full VOR RWY 26 approach from VTU. The winds were 060@09, ceiling and visibility OK. Once established on final approach course I contacted tower and they asked if I wanted to circle to RWY 08 or make a straight-in to RWY 26. I thought for a couple of seconds and replied it should be fine to land on RWY 26 (dealing with a 9 knots tailwind). After the flight I wondered if it would've been a better decision to circle, despite being night. In that specific situation I guess I did a fair choice, but what if visibility was not that good (maybe just above minimums)? What if the tailwind was stronger? Thinking about airlines that don't allow circling at night and supposing a stronger tailwind, would the pilot be forced to divert?

[Keith Smith]

More and more aircraft in the real world have IFR-approved GPS systems with approach capability. This opens up the possibility of flying RNAV (GPS) approaches. Prior to GPS, it was common to only have approaches for a limited set of runways. Nowadays, terrain notwithstanding, it's common to find approaches with straight-in minimums for most runways on the airport. In your case, you could've flown an RNAV approach to runway 8 instead.

Circling at night at true circling minimums is a very challenging operation. In VFR conditions, though, it's really no different than night time pattern work...so not all 'circling' is created equal. It depends on the weather.

For flights being flown on Part 135 or Part 121, if their op spec prohibits circling at night, and there is a published maximum tailwind component then I have to imagine they're out of options and would need to divert.

[rsampaio]

Thanks, Keith. Forgot to mention I was flying /A. Guess it is a good time to learn how to operate the GPS properly and start filling plans as /G.

[Keith Smith]

Very good. I happen to enjoy /A and /u a great deal when I'm flying the sim. In your specific case, I would've accepted the 9kt tailwind. The 172 needs very little room to land when flown correctly and a 9kt tailwind doesn't pose an issue in terms of runway length at CMA.