What is abeam

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Is this what is meant by abeam of the airfield?

Abeam
Abeam927×1159 246 KB

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Yes. My home airfield used the verbiage “abeam the tower” for calling in on downwind.

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If the runway is perfectly parallel to you, you’re technically abeam. That’s what happens when original nautical terms are applied it aviation.

But in the case of a landing circuit, if you are parallel to the end of the runway, as in your diagram, and you look out the port side (left) of the cockpit, and you are aligned with your touchdown point on the runway, that’s also “abeam.”

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Alongside of and close to a place, with that place 90 degrees to your left or right. That place can be an airport, a particular spot on an airport, a navigation point, or whatever. Cheers.

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More precisely, the plane in your picture is “Abeam the numbers” for RWY 16, or “Abeam the approach end” of the rwy used,

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Thanks. I was reading that in the pattern you start your descent when you are abeam of the airfield on the downwind so I was just trying to get clarification on that.

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I want to clarify a little


The image shows ‘abeam the numbers’ or ‘abeam the threshold’

Abeam the tower, or abeam the field would be more midfield typically.

So, more directly abeam would mean that if you’re parallel to the runway, the point directly off your wing is ‘abeam’.

So if you are asked to call in ‘abeam the tower’ and you actually called in where the image in the post shows, the controller might say you’re a little late.

abeam is specifically an object directly 90degrees of your nose, and not an abstract ‘somewhere parallel to’

Also
 Big thank you for using KVNY as your reference airport, its the correct place to learn to fly!

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If the quote said ‘abeam the airfield’ that was vague.

It would be correct to pull power ‘abeam the numbers’ , or even more specifically ‘abeam your touchdown point’ and trim to approach speed at that time.

Specific to KVNY tho, the little magenta circle just south of your line is ‘the numbers’ because KVNY has a significant displaced threshold
 Generally, you start setting in your approach abeam the numbers
 if you waited till the point the arrow shows you’d be starting a little late.

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Bought the One Six Right blu ray a few month ago. I was reluctant because I wasn’t really interested in a story about an airport.

Turned out that it was one of the very best aviation documentaries/movies I’ve ever seen.

One Six Right | Now on Blu-ray & Digital HD | Official Website

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Like this


abeam
abeam927×1159 236 KB

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Yeah, I bought that on DVD before it was converted to BluRay
 Great story, great film work, and so many of the best faces of KVNY
 really a joy to watch.

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Wow. A lot of answers for a simple question!

To sum it up
 Yes.

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I was feeling chatty :grin:

But mostly what I was driving at is that the prase gets used to refer to a lot of different things to be abeam of, so you shouldn’t assume it is generic.

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Also “Report Midfield downwind” was used is some towers I flew before.

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Thank you all so much. That truly clarifies it for me! I am also a big fan of One Six Right. I have been to KVNY more than any other airport in my life. I used to work in Chatsworth for many many years and we were often taking a Gulfstream from KVNY to KRDU to meet with IBM. So I actually spend a lot of time in that area in the sim.

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When I was flying there, most often if you were doing pattern work on 16L, they’d tell you to ‘Report Downwind Abeam the tower’ or just ‘report abeam the tower’. And they really did mean specifically that, since its a pretty busy place they just want you to drop a reminder that they need to think about if you’re clear or if they need you to extend a bit to make room. And that ‘report’ was simply “Skyhawk XXX is downwind abeam”. They’d then either clear you for your touch and go, or give you a ‘Continue downwind I’ll call your base’, or words to that effect. Or sometimes some other weird thing.

For your goofing around in FS tho, You should know that pattern is normally flown by reference to the freeway rather than the runway while on downwind, and not as depicted on your image
 I’d usually just use the brewery as my marker to start the descent.

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abeam is a column of light, normally seen from touches and or search lights.

*grabs coat
 runs.

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