What is Terminal Instrument Procedure?

Terminal Instrument Procedure, or procedures, are the navigational procedures aircraft use to find and land at the airport of destination. All aircraft on instrument flight plans, and many on VFR flight plans use these published procedures to accomplish the instrument approach and landing. Such procedures are usually made up of the ILS, ADF, VOR, or other radio navigation aids such as the GPS. The GPS is becoming one of the most popular systems for IFR or the terminal procedures because of its wide spread, worldwide availability and its lack of ground based equipment at most airports. Almost any airport can now or in the near future expect to have at least one terminal instrument procedure. Use of the GPS and the most recent gps addition of WAAS (Wide Area Augmentaton System) will make even precision approaches available in the near future at thousands of small airports around the world that had previously done without such procedures due to the prohibitive costs. Terminal Instrument Procedures are soon to be as common as the airports themselves.

Lowell M. Wiley

ATP Pilot

Flight Instructor

15 Jan 2008