Runway Renumbered

I haven’t flown in the Kelowna area since I left the Okanagan in 1993. Last month I was showing off FlightGear to someone who lived in Kelowna, so I started up the program and told it I wanted to start on runway 33 only to be told that runway 33 didn’t exist. I was a bit puzzled since I was almost positive that CYLW’s lone runway was numbered 15/33. And when I pulled out my CFS to double check, the CFS confirmed what FlightGear had told me; runway 33 does not exist and instead the runway is 16/34.

I then checked the Internet for some news of the renumbering of the runway but couldn’t find anything. In any case, today I feel validated thanks to Google’s latest offering: satellite images directly linked to their mapping site. Type in an address and get a computer generated map. Then click on the “Satellite” link in the upper-right corner and just like that, you are viewing a zoom-able bird’s eye view of your map. And by accident I ended up looking at the Kelowna airport and what should I see but a runway numbered 15/33.

The satellite imagery has varying levels of zoom and some areas a better for coverage than others. But the site uses the same dragable system as the regular map site, which is simply amazing, especially when looking at the satellite views.

Update: Check out the Calgary Airport using the new satellite imagery on Google. Once you find it, you’ll see an aircraft holding short for 34. So far so good. Now head straight south from there and check out the golf course to see an aircraft on short final for 34. Amazing!

Tue, 05 Apr 2005 17:01 Posted in

  1. By David about 5 hours later:


    How old is the Google satellite imagery? I have an old CAP 2 (BC instrument approaches) from June 2004, and it shows 15/33 in its airport diagram; however, the latest airport diagram in the online Nav Canada CAMS shows 16/34. I'm guessing that the runway was renumbered last summer or fall, after the Google picture was taken.

  2. By Douglas about 7 hours later:


    According to this article on Search Engine Watch, "Keyhole continuously updates its database with the average age of imagery ranging from 18 to 24 months. Imagery can vary in age from as new as 2-3 months to as old as 2-3 years." But I'm still curious as to when it happened - I suspect there is a NOTAM around that.

  3. By David 1 day later:


    I don't think there will be a NOTAM any more once all of the affected publications have moved to a new cycle (in this case, the CAP and the CFS). If the runway numbers appeared on the VNC or WAC the NOTAMS would have to last longer, of course, since those have long cycles.

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