Taxi Tips

Most of the airports in the United States are fairly small, and comparatively few are equipped with control towers. The layout is usually pretty simple; and even a student taking his first lesson can often make the trip from the airplane's tiedown spot to the runway with little difficulty. Most airports, however, does not mean all airports.

A sizable number of airports do in fact have control towers and multiple runways. Getting to and from the runway gets more complicated when there is more real estate to navigate. Throw in an airport with an airline terminal or a based military aviation unit - or both - and maybe more than one FBO, and before you know it, what seems like a small airport suddenly has become confusing.

A few years ago, the FAA and the aviation community recognized that there was an increasing number of runway incursions - defined as an accidental, unauthorized movement on a runway that is in use by a departing or landing aircraft - and general aviation was playing a bigger role in those incursions than it should have. The number of incursions has dropped thanks to an industrywide educational initiative by such organizations as the AOPA Air Safety Foundation, but that does not absolve pilots from taking all steps possible to avoid future incursions - not just on runways but also on taxiways and congested ramps.

To become eligible for a private pilot certificate, you are required at some point in your training to make three solo landings at an airport with an operating control tower. If you are not training at one already, this is a new environment in several fashions. Not only do you need to learn your way around what normally will be a bigger field, but you also will be learning new radio techniques. And you may not fly the standard traffic pattern that you've been using. Later, on a solo cross-country or as a certificated pilot, you'll find yourself flying to towered airports.

Before going to that towered airport for the first time, there are some strategies that you can use to make the experience as rewarding and educational as possible while minimizing any anxiety. First, you should be thoroughly familiar with the airport signage that is depicted in the Aeronautical Information Manual (AIM), Chapter 2, section 3. The signs follow a standard color pattern; each has a unique meaning. You can break down the learning process into blocks by starting with the signs you will see when you taxi into and out of the ramp area. Know what to look for. You may see signs that tell you to contact or monitor a specific frequency, request you to follow a specific procedure, or give directions to various points on the ramp. Others simply tell you where you are on the airport. Leaving the ramp, you may see hold short lines, which will be lines on the ground that are perpendicular to your direction of travel. These will almost always require some kind of clearance from the ground controller before you can cross them.

Next, be familiar with the actual taxiway signs. All taxiways have a letter designation, and some have double letters (i.e., taxiway AA, which will probably be called "double Alpha" by the controller.) Some have yellow letters on a black background - indicating the taxiway you are currently on - while others have black letters on a yellow background (usually accompanied by an arrow, these indicate a direction to a specific taxiway or runway). Circumstances may dictate that these signs also be painted on the pavement, which can make night surface movements a challenge.

What do you do if you are on an airport with parallel taxiways that are close together and difficult to figure out? Simple: When turning onto a taxiway, you will always go around the sign. For example, if you see parallel taxiways Sierra and Tango, and you�ve been instructed to turn onto Tango, go around the sign with the "T." This little piece of advice was given to me a long time ago, but just remembering that logic has made taxiing for me so much easier over the years than it otherwise would have been. At crowded, busy airports, in bad weather, it can make all the difference.

As you move closer to the runway, you may see signs that have the runway numbers on them. The FAA makes sure that the signs are always aligned with the runway configuration. If you see a sign that says 36-18, Runway 36 will be to the left (that is, as you approach from the east) and 18 will be to the right. Along the runways, you may also see black signs with white numbers. These tell a landing pilot (or one aborting a takeoff) how much runway is left in thousands of feet.

At this juncture you may see signs along taxiways that tell you when you should start monitoring a specific tower frequency, describe noise abatement procedures, and warnings about flocks of birds.

Once you get to the runway, you can expect to see yellow lines that are called hold short lines. These are two sets of yellow lines and two sets of dashed lines painted together. Another memory jogger here: If the solid line is facing you like a wall, with the dashed lines behind, then you cannot cross them without permission. You have "hit the wall." If the dashed lines are facing you and you can taxi "through" the breaks in the lines, then you can cross without permission. In fact, this will be the case and the expectation when clearing the runway.

Sometimes, prior to reaching these hold short lines, there may be some lines on the ground that look like a railroad track or a ladder. These are intended to stop you before you cause interference with the instrument landing system (ILS) signals being used by incoming traffic. These critical area hold short lines, as they are called, are almost always located just before the regular hold short lines - but occasionally might be some distance away. Tell yourself that you must stop and climb the ladder before moving to the hold short line (or, before getting to the top of "the wall").

Before you take off for a toweed airport, study the available airport diagrams. You can obtain them at AOPA Online, and if your instructor subscribes to Jeppesen for her instrument-approach charts, she may have an even better quality diagram you can use. The relative size of the airport will often determine the quality of the chart available.

Try to determine ahead of time which runway is likely to be in use, remembering that towered airports will use more than one runway at a time (winds permitting), and then try to anticipate how you will be asked to proceed to parking once on the ground. Most of the time, it will be pretty obvious, but not always. Don't assume that you will be given what seems to be the most direct route, as the flow of traffic or the prevailing winds can force controllers to do things that seem counterintuitive. Maybe another local pilot can help you here, or you can even call or visit the tower in question and ask the controllers. That will also give them a heads-up that you are coming; their knowing you are a student or an inexperienced pilot will almost always get you some extra help. Or, on a visit to the airport, monitor its tower and ground control frequencies on a handheld radio to get an idea of the kinds of arrival and taxi instructions issued there.

If you study the diagrams of the airport closely, you can often find a pattern. At the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport, the major taxiways running from west to east are sequentially designated D (Dixie/Delta), E (Echo), F (Foxtrot), G (Golf), S (Sierra), and T (Tango). Houston's Bush Intercontinental has double-lettered taxiways: NW, SW, WD. Study the chart, and you can see that these also designate which side of the airport the taxiways are on: November Whiskey is North Whiskey, Sierra Whiskey is South Whiskey and Whiskey Delta is West Delta. An elegant way to avoid confusion once you see the pattern.

Study the charts carefully. If necessary, use a photocopier to enlarge them, highlight the information you know you can't do without, and make sure the copy is clipped to your kneeboard. In this post-September 11 world, it is even more important that you go only where you are told to go. If you are lost or confused, ask for help. If you state that you need a so-called progressive taxi, the ground controller will monitor your progress, talking you through each stop and turn. And if you get a long and complicated taxi clearance, it's OK to write it down and look at the chart long enough to get oriented. It may help to draw the clearance on your chart, using a marker or highlighter. The only time that you should plan to move immediately is when you are holding short of a runway and you are told to cross it. Once on the other side, you can pause to make sure you are proceeding in the right direction. If the clearance doesn't make sense, speak up. It may be a mistake by the (human) controller.

If you need further proof that misunderstood taxi clearances are not to be taken lightly, consider the Cessna 441 that was holding on a runway in St. Louis at night several years ago. The airliner that was next to use the runway did not see the airplane in time to avoid it, and fatalities resulted. An AOPA Pilot article about that accident may be found on AOPA Online.

Taxiing at larger airports isn't hard. In fact, it's something that you should require yourself to do early in your flying career. A little study ahead of time and a willingness to ask for help when needed will go a long way.

Chip Wright is a 5,500-hour airline transport pilot and a captain for Comair. He is a CFII-MEI. In his spare time, he is building an RV-8.