![]() They’re mostly the same at other airports you’ll use, too. But airports receiving recent improvement grants likely are upgraded to these standards. You won’t see these markings at every airport – for example, not every airport wit the ILS has a tower to instruct you to hold short when the weather is poor. The FAA’s “Pilot’s Guide to Airport Signs and Markings” documents the pavement striping and symbology. Less seriously, a runway incursion can lead to the FAA telling you not to fly for 30 or 60 or 90 days. Nobody, including you, me and the FAA, wants to have stuff on the runway that doesn’t belong there. Runway hold-short signs and markings are especially important. The FAA’s Advisory Circular AC 150/5340-1M, “Standards for Airport Markings,” lists all of the possible signs and paint markings, and is 175 pages long! And the FAA has many more pages devoted to a wide range of runway signage and marking resources. Did your first airport have a displaced threshold? Did it have an ILS critical area? Was it marked for land-and-hold-short operations? I haven’t checked, but even San Francisco International probably does not have every sign or marking known to the FAA.Īs you fly farther and farther afield, you start to see more signs and more markings at the airports you visit. Just like you can have a baseball game without a sacrifice bunt, you can have an airport that doesn’t have every possible sign. That’s why you study up on markings and signs before you start cross-country flying. Or you might be flying from a beautifully maintained grass strip that has no signs at all. A good instructor points out the paint markings and signs as you taxi, but your home field might not have received that big grant to improve the signage. “That way, if you hit something, it’s not your fault.” WHEN YOU STARTĪs a student pilot, you rely on your instructor to guide you around your home airfield. “And keep your nosewheel on that yellow line,” he went on. “Otherwise you’ll be in the weeds.” That advice applies at SFO or ORD just as surely as it does at your nearby municipal strip. My first instructor put it this way: “At night, make sure that you have blue lights on both sides,” he told me. A pilot from here flying into San Francisco International might be overwhelmed by its sheer size, but almost every sign and marking there would be familiar and the meaning known. “Now we look like San Francisco International Airport,” one said. The taxiway signs are bright yellow or black. The hold-short signs at the ends of the runway are now carefully mounted, bright red and well-lit at night. ![]() They got new taxiway lights-real ones, to replace the old blue reflectors-and new paint for all of the surface and runway markings. One of the local GA airports in my area recently got an FAA improvement grant. Beginning on page 16, Jim Wolper has the deets on what to expect on the ground. It's a great photo and example of how airports can be marked and lit. On The Cover: Erik Brouwer captured this image at sunset on December 31, 2014, on short final to the Netherlands' Teuge Airport (ICAO:EHTE).
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