C182 pilot reports losing situational awareness approaching hef from the southeast. Believing that h...

Narrative:

Returning from a 3-hour trip to hef; I was routed down the dulles airport eastern flyway with direct mulrr direct ticon. Virtually every approach to the airfield I have done in the last 9+ years has been from the south or southwest and I had only had this routing once before. This ticon routing saved time in that we didn't have to go via mrb; but it brought me to the field in a direction I was not used to. The last half hour of the trip was stressful in that I had to descend through a 3;500 ft thick cloud layer with turbulence; and then fly for over 50 miles at 4;000 then 3;000 ft in turbulence. My stress level was fairly high and although I heard the AWOS say the active runways at manassas were 16L and 16R; I was expecting to have virtually a straight in from ticon as I had the only other time I got this routing. In my mind; I was landing from ticon to the airport and I was expecting a straight-in. I was so glad to reach the end of this stressful flight that it didn't register that I was thinking runway 34; but the AWOS had said 16. When I was switched to the tower frequency; I told the tower I wanted the left side and expected him to tell me to enter a right base for 16L (seeing in my mind's eye the short runway heading north. Tower gave me absolutely proper instructions to enter a left downwind for 16R and that was fine; but I was confused and told tower I didn't understand. They gave me additional directions and I tried to comply. They got frustrated; and I certainly understand why now. I just got turned around in my mental picture of what was happening. Fortunately there were no other aircraft at the field. I had a total brainfart; something which has never happened before in 20 years of flying; and which will certainly never happen again. My resolution to myself is to pretend I'm a student again and absolutely verify the landing runway; even on a perfect VMC day. Bottom line was that stress from the IMC descent and turbulence clouded my normally very good situational awareness. This will never happen again!

Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: C182 pilot reports losing situational awareness approaching HEF from the southeast. Believing that he will be landing from a right base entry he does not understand the towers instructions to enter a left downwind for Runway 16R.

Narrative: Returning from a 3-hour trip to HEF; I was routed down the Dulles Airport eastern flyway with direct MULRR direct TICON. Virtually every approach to the airfield I have done in the last 9+ years has been from the south or southwest and I had only had this routing once before. This TICON routing saved time in that we didn't have to go via MRB; but it brought me to the field in a direction I was not used to. The last half hour of the trip was stressful in that I had to descend through a 3;500 FT thick cloud layer with turbulence; and then fly for over 50 miles at 4;000 then 3;000 FT in turbulence. My stress level was fairly high and although I heard the AWOS say the active runways at Manassas were 16L and 16R; I was expecting to have virtually a straight in from TICON as I had the only other time I got this routing. In my mind; I was landing from TICON to the airport and I was expecting a straight-in. I was so glad to reach the end of this stressful flight that it didn't register that I was thinking Runway 34; but the AWOS had said 16. When I was switched to the Tower frequency; I told the Tower I wanted the left side and expected him to tell me to enter a right base for 16L (seeing in my mind's eye the short runway heading north. Tower gave me absolutely proper instructions to enter a left downwind for 16R and that was fine; but I was confused and told Tower I didn't understand. They gave me additional directions and I tried to comply. They got frustrated; and I certainly understand why now. I just got turned around in my mental picture of what was happening. Fortunately there were no other aircraft at the field. I had a total brainfart; something which has never happened before in 20 years of flying; and which will certainly never happen again. My resolution to myself is to pretend I'm a student again and absolutely verify the landing runway; even on a perfect VMC day. Bottom line was that stress from the IMC descent and turbulence clouded my normally very good situational awareness. This will NEVER happen again!

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site as of April 2012 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.

Attributes
ACN	901682
Time
Date	201007
Local Time Of Day	1201-1800
Place
Locale Reference	HEF.Tower
State Reference	VA
Environment
Flight Conditions	VMC
Light	Daylight
Aircraft 1
Make Model Name	Skylane 182/RG Turbo Skylane/RG
Operating Under FAR Part	Part 91
Flight Phase	Landing
Route In Use	Visual Approach
Flight Plan	IFR
Person 1
Function	Pilot Flying Single Pilot
Qualification	Flight Crew Commercial
Experience	Flight Crew Last 90 Days 15 Flight Crew Total 655 Flight Crew Type 374
Events
Anomaly	Deviation - Procedural Clearance Deviation - Track / Heading All Types Inflight Event / Encounter Weather / Turbulence

C182 pilot reports losing situational awareness approaching hef from the southeast. Believing that he will be landing from a right base entry he does not understand the towers instructions to enter a left downwind for runway 16R.