Circling Approach

The scenario must include visual maneuvering from the final approach course to a base or downwind leg appropriate for the landing runway — not a token turn. You may circle to a runway less than 90° offset from the final approach course, provided you make at least 90° of total heading change (ACS Appendix 3, Task G). Skills demonstrated:

• Comply with the procedure considering turbulence, windshear, and your airplane's maneuvering capability and approach category (AA.VI.G.S1)
• Confirm traffic direction and comply with ATC restrictions (S2)
• Maintain crew coordination and checklists (S3)

Until descending below the MDA (or the preselected circling altitude above it), you must hold these tolerances (AA.VI.G.S5):

• Airspeed: ±5 knots
• Heading/track: ±5°
• Altitude: +100/−0 feet

The descent must also be planned: establish the approach and landing configuration and a descent rate that ensures arrival at the MDA — or the preselected circling altitude above it — prior to the missed approach point (S4). The −0 floor is the heart of it: the circling MDA is an obstacle-clearance surface, not a target.

Category comes from VREF, or 1.3 VSO at maximum certificated landing weight if VREF isn't specified — it's assigned at certification, is permanent, and you may never use a lower category's minimums. Speed bands:

Operating faster than your category's upper limit — straight-in or circling — requires the higher category's minimums: a Category B airplane circling at 145 knots uses Category D minimums (IPH ch. 4). Situations that push you up-category: overweight emergency returns, flap-inoperative approaches, icing speed additives (IPH ch. 4).

Under FAA Order 8260.3 Change 21, circling approach radii grew with altitude: the IPH's example — a sea-level airport with a 1,500-foot HAA has a CAT C circling approach radius of 2.86 NM, a 68.5 percent increase over the pre-Change-21 radius. The purpose: give pilots protected airspace to maneuver instead of being forced into high-descent-rate, unstabilized finishes that the old tight radii produced (IPH ch. 4). The trap: charts built under the old criteria still exist, and published circling minimums provide obstacle clearance only within the protected area for your category — flying faster than category speed shrinks your margin two ways at once (IPH ch. 4).

A minimum of 300 feet of obstacle clearance in the circling segment. Remain at or above the circling altitude until the aircraft is continuously in a position from which a descent to a landing on the intended runway can be made at a normal rate of descent using normal maneuvers (IPH ch. 4; the same words as 91.175(c)(1)). That's why the ACS builds the maneuver on a base or downwind leg (AA.VI.G.S6): a recognizable pattern position is what makes "continuously in a position" a fact instead of a feeling.

Missed approach, immediately — 91.175(e)(2) requires it whenever an identifiable part of the airport is not distinctly visible during a circling maneuver at or above MDA, unless the loss is caused only by normal banking. Technique: make the initial climbing turn toward the landing runway, then maneuver to intercept and fly the missed approach course (IFH ch. 10). The turn direction depends on where you are in the circle, which is why the ACS requires you to brief and fly the miss-while-circling case: turn in the appropriate direction using the correct procedure and appropriately configure the airplane (AA.VI.G.S7). Executing a missed approach after the MAP while circling gets its own risk element (R7) because the published protection assumed you started at or above the MAP.

Through an approved air carrier training and checking program a pilot may receive a limitation restricting circling to VMC only — on the certificate it reads "ATP CIRC APCH VMC ONLY," and it can attach to the certificate, the type rating, or both. Removal requires evaluation on Tasks G and H of Area VI by a qualified evaluator: for the certificate-level limitation, in an airplane representative of a class for which the pilot holds ATP privileges (not necessarily the type); for a type-rating limitation, in that type — which also removes the certificate-level limitation. An FSTD may be used in accordance with an approved training program (ACS Appendix 1).

The IPH calls circling one of the most challenging maneuvers in the NAS, especially for CAT C and D turbine airplanes — low altitude, day and night, often with precipitation degrading visibility, depth perception, and the ability to judge the descent profile, usually to a runway without electronic descent guidance from the circling MDA down (IPH ch. 4). At night, unlighted obstacles inside the circling area may be invisible; where penetrating obstacles aren't marked and lighted, charts prohibit night circling outright (IPH ch. 4). Many operators answer R2 with policy — higher circling minimums or VMC-only circling; know yours.

A higher, briefed circling altitude above the MDA buys stall margin, obstacle margin, and a more normal descent geometry to the runway — because the MDA plus a jet's wingspan plus a 30°-bank pattern turn is a thin place to live. Pick a round number above the MDA that still keeps you below the clouds; the expanded Change-21 protected areas were designed to let pilots use that extra airspace to maneuver instead of flying high descent rates (IPH ch. 4). The tolerance then applies at your chosen altitude: +100/−0 until you're in position to descend normally (S5). Brief the altitude, the pattern, and the descent point before the FAF — improvising them at the MDA is the unstable-finish risk (R5) in action.

Build a real pattern from the pieces the ACS names (S6): maneuver to a base or downwind for the landing runway. Practical scaffolding:

• Displacement: offset from the runway far enough to allow a normal base turn — inside your category's protected radius, which you know from the chart's era and your category (IPH ch. 4)
• Track discipline: the ±5° tolerance applies to your desired heading/track (S5) — announce the legs ("downwind heading 350, abeam in 20 seconds") so the PM can monitor something concrete
• The descent point: leave the circling altitude only when continuously in position for a normal descent — for most patterns that's rolling out on base or final with the runway made (IPH ch. 4)
• Configuration: landing configuration established per S4's stabilized descent requirement; no configuration surprises inside the circle

Help: the MFD's map keeps the runway, your track, and the protected-area picture in one place while your eyes are mostly outside; the heading bug flown in HDG mode gives the PM a track to monitor against the briefed pattern. Hurt: an autopilot still coupled to the final approach course will happily fly you away from the circle; a flight director commanding the old missed approach is compelling nonsense in your primary view. The operator-standard answer is to brief exactly what the automation does during the visual segment — what's engaged, what's armed, and who disconnects what at the MDA. The ACS grades it as risk management (R4) and as the configuration/coordination skills (S3, S4).