Charts for Kandahar

[atomtomgo]

Hey there. I know the airfield is nowadays pretty much a VFR airport, but I was wondering, are there any departure and arrival or FLIP charts publicly available for OAKN / Kandahar?

I was looking through different map providers and found no hint on any charts for Kandahar.

 

The AIP from 2018 suggests that there were an ILS for runway 23, TACAN HI approaches for both runways and RNAV approaches for both runways, aswell as at least one instrument departure route.

Edited September 12, 2024 by atomtomgo

[graveyard4DCS]

I've put together a set of charts for Kandahar airport, along with some useful additional information. These charts are the official instrument procedures issued by the US DOD FLIP, but published on the internet for use by all crews landing at Kandahar. They can be downloaded by all members from my personal page.

As you will soon discover, all the information dates from 2008-2010, and the northern aprons do not correspond to the airfield as represented in the game. Therefore, I'll soon be publishing another version for the 2017-2019 era.

I will also take the time to guide you on how and where to find this type of data.

List of charts.

Example of departure chart.

Example of landing chart.

[graveyard4DCS]

For those who'd like to find departure and landing charts for other airfields in SW Afghanistan, I published an article explaining how to find them for various eras: How to Find Airport Charts for Afghanistan?

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Timeline of websites publishing AIPs for Afghanistan.

I'll release other sets of charts for SW Afghanistan in the coming weeks.

Edited September 23, 2024 by graveyard4DCS

[atomtomgo]

Bought it.

 

Thanks a lot for your work!

[graveyard4DCS]

Tactical or standard procedures?

As you might have noticed already, the civilian departure and landing charts don't give a lot of information regarding military procedures, especially in the very particular context of counterinsurgency.

Indeed, counter-insurgency (or COIN) operations such as those in Afghanistan present very special characteristics for fighter aircraft: the departure and/or recovery airfield is located in a hostile environment. While this may be the norm for helicopters and tactical transport pilots, it is very rarely the case for fighters and strategic transport aircraft, which generally have sufficient range and autonomy to operate from a relatively safe location.

But operating either from Middle East or from former Soviet Republics was very costly in terms of resources: many hours were spent in transit, therefore consuming costly hours of flight without operational value.

For the case of Kandahar, if the airfield was used by the US forces since the very first weeks of the war in 2001, we have to wait until 2004 to see the first British Tornado, 2006 to see the first Dutch F-16, and 2008 to see the first French Mirage 2000D or Belgian F-16.

Deciding which type of operations to carry out (tactical or standard) requires a balanced decision in terms of risk management: what's more likely to happen?

• am I more likely to be shot down by an insurgent preparing an ambush near the airport?

• or am I more likely to collide with another aircraft on arrival or departure?

If the first risk predominates, tactical operations should be chosen. If this is not the case, standard procedures should be followed, which have long been tried and tested and are known to all parties.

Estimated risk balance between SAM threat and traffic hazard for Kandahar airport.

I'll propose a dedicated study of the SAM threat around Kandahar in a dedicated topic, but we can say that with the increased number of troops deployed along time in and around Kandahar airfield, as well as the deployment of dedicated security and surveillance tools (like CCTVs or C-RAM radars), the SAM threat has steadily decreased to reach a minimum during the "surge" in 2011-2012, and has started to increase when NATO countries started to disengage after 2014-2015.

In the mean time, if we have a look at the airport's activity, it has steadily increased until 2015, with Kandahar becoming the main hub or "APOD" (Aerial Port of Debarkation) for all operations in Southern Afghanistan.

In September 2009, an article said that "with the increase in forces in southern Afghanistan, Kandahar Airfield has become the busiest single-runway airport in the world. Peaking in late May at an estimated 5,500 flights per week, the airfield has maintained more than 5,000 flights per week through June and July, said Col. Bill Buckey, the airfield’s operations officer, a Marine augmented to NATO’s International Security Assistance Force. Previously, the busiest single-runway airport in the world was the London Gatwick Airport, averaging around 5,000 flights per week."

But the difficulty was that not only that the airport was busy in terms of movements, but it was also the wide differences in performance between the different users: the single runway was used for helicopters, tactical transport aircraft, strategic transport aircraft, UAVs and fighter jets, not to mention the civil airlines that also operated there...

All in all, we can consider than during the 2009-2017 era, very standard procedures were the most appropriate: for example overhead break arrivals for fighter jets, and 3° slope straight in approaches for other aircraft. On the contrary, before 2008 and after 2018, tactical procedures would be more appropriate, like high angle final descent.

For example, you have here a tactical take-off and tactical landing for a mighty C-17.

For those who are interested, I have detailed on my personal page tactical take-off and landing procedures in Kandahar for fighter aircraft.

Edited September 30, 2024 by graveyard4DCS

[graveyard4DCS]

Tactical landings often imply high angle of descent procedures (video here), and are fairly difficult to execute properly and are prone to accidents for several reasons:

• air density in Kandahar is reduced compared to standard conditions, resulting in lower aerodynamic performances:

  • the average temperatures in Afghanistan are higher than in most Western countries;

  • Kandahar's altitude is around 3000 ft: it's more than twice the altitude of the highest airport in UK for example;

• aircraft are often heavier than usual, due to unexpanded ordnance and additional fuel kept for diversion;

• engine RPM is usually low due to high angle of descent (and on purpose in order to reduce infrared signature), resulting into a longer response time in case there's a need to add extra power;

• the lack of training on unusual angle of descent makes it more difficult for pilots to detect abnormal conditions, and make them react later than they would on a normal landing;

• the pilot is aiming at the very beginning of the runway in order to benefit from the longest possible landing distance, in order to ensure that it will be possible to stop a heavy aircraft before runway end.

For all these reasons, there have been a number of incidents involving fast jets landing in Kandahar, the most famous of which was undoubtedly the crash of the RAF Harrier on May 14, 2009. Fortunately, despite the total loss of the aircraft, the pilot, Martin Pert, was uninjured and went on to become the leader of the Red Arrows.

The account of his ejection is particularly interesting, not least because it describes the tactical landing procedure that has been discussed here. It is also noteworthy that the pilot does not minimize the errors that led to this accident, contrary to what often happens in such circumstances...

Edited October 7, 2024 by graveyard4DCS

[TonyG]

For fun, I’ve added ILS/ICLS to Kandahar. 

• Kandahar
  • ICLS RWY05 Ch.5
  • ICLS RWY23 Ch.3
  • ILS RWY05 109.50 JAK
  • ILS RWY23 108.55 OKN

https://github.com/madmoney99/DCS-Beacon-and-ICLS-Mod

[Dony201]

There is an app on the play store for android called AirMate. It has charts for Kandahar along with other charts for Afganistan. It's free too.

https://www.airmate.aero/

 

[Nealius]

A resource for the tactical approaches that doesn't require registration or a fee for that person's own personal gain would be nice.

[Mav87th]

@graveyard4DCSLove your approach charts. However there is one navigation point missing information about its location (actualy two perhaps)

CANVU and BAMRE

I managed to find the information in the Navtech oakn01maorg0 from 22 feb 12

CANVU

• N 31 27.0
• E 065 45.2

BAMRE

• N 31 32.2
• E 065 53.9

Both points are used in the SID departure platesnull

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[graveyard4DCS]

16 hours ago, Mav87th said:

@graveyard4DCS Love your approach charts. However there is one navigation point missing information about its location (actualy two perhaps) CANVU and BAMRE

Thanks for the head's up!

However, please note that IFR waypoints are seldom used by fighter jets for departure and recovery procedures, let alone VFR ones. That's most probably the reason why you don't see them appear in the docs I compiled. Nevertheless, you'll find some of the VFR waypoints in those charts instead.

Obviously, these IFR waypoints are heavily used by all civilian and military strategic transport aircraft following IFR rules to Kandahar.

[Mav87th]

Exactly - was setting up my transports and tankers in my mission template from your charts and was missing those two

Expect players to do tactical takeoffs and landings.

[graveyard4DCS]

For those interested, and following this general discussion about diversion airfields and fuel calculations, I released a generic kneeboard page for diversion at Kandahar airfield.

In a couple of days, you will also find another kneeboards with precise fuel calculations for the F/A-18C Hornet and Mirage 2000C.