B737 captain reported receiving a late runway/arrival change and increased workload associated with ...

Attributes
ACN	1616853
Time
Date	201902
Place
Locale Reference	LAS.Airport
State Reference	NV
Environment
Flight Conditions	VMC
Light	Night
Aircraft 1
Make Model Name	B737 Undifferentiated or Other Model
Operating Under FAR Part	Part 121
Flight Phase	Final Approach
Route In Use	Visual Approach STAR SITEE THREE
Flight Plan	IFR
Person 1
Function	Captain Pilot Not Flying
Qualification	Flight Crew Instrument Flight Crew Multiengine Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP)
Experience	Flight Crew Last 90 Days 222 Flight Crew Type 1106
Events
Anomaly	ATC Issue All Types Deviation - Procedural Published Material / Policy Inflight Event / Encounter Other / Unknown

Narrative:

We were on the SITEE3 arrival into las. The ATIS was advertising ILS 26L and RNAV visual 19R approaches. Because of our direction of arrival we had set up for and briefed the ILS 26R. Just prior to wyynn; approach advised us we would be doing the RNAV visual 19R. This required changing runways very quickly as the arrival also changes shortly after wyynn. We were able to do this; but approach control then refused to clear us for the approach until we called the airport in sight. We had been very busy setting up for the new approach and had not had time to visually acquire the airport. This caused a delay in beginning our descent. Compounding this; las is only visible at night as a dark spot near lights and while it is possible to see the airport; runway 19R does not come into view until short final.we were able to successfully fly the approach and make a safe landing; but this practice is far from safe.

Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: B737 Captain reported receiving a late runway/arrival change and increased workload associated with making the necessary FMS changes resulting in a late descent.

Narrative: We were on the SITEE3 arrival into LAS. The ATIS was advertising ILS 26L and RNAV Visual 19R approaches. Because of our direction of arrival we had set up for and briefed the ILS 26R. Just prior to WYYNN; Approach advised us we would be doing the RNAV visual 19R. This required changing runways very quickly as the arrival also changes shortly after WYYNN. We were able to do this; but Approach Control then refused to clear us for the approach until we called the airport in sight. We had been very busy setting up for the new approach and had not had time to visually acquire the airport. This caused a delay in beginning our descent. Compounding this; LAS is only visible at night as a dark spot near lights and while it is possible to see the airport; Runway 19R does not come into view until short final.We were able to successfully fly the approach and make a safe landing; but this practice is far from safe.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.

B737 captain reported receiving a late runway/arrival change and increased workload associated with making the necessary FMS changes resulting in a late descent.