When cleared for a visual approach to runway 27 at san the flight crew of an A319 began an immediate...

Narrative:

While flying directly to the vydda intersection at 4;000 ft in san diego; we were cleared for the visual approach runway 27. Both pilots had terrain on nd. I entered a direct to reebo intersection and started a descent to 1;800 ft. We then visually picked up san miguel mountain with the antenna (2;709 ft) on it at 15 miles out. Shortly after that we got a brief terrain warning event.suggest staying on all arrivals and approaches when cleared for visual. ATC should have issued an altitude restricted visual approach clearance: 'maintain 4;000 until established on final; cleared for the visual approach runway 27'

Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: When cleared for a visual approach to Runway 27 at SAN the flight crew of an A319 began an immediate descent to cross REEBO at 1;800 MSL but received a 'Terrain' GPWS warning with respect to San Miguel Mountain; a 2;079 FT obstacle between them and REEBO.

Narrative: While flying directly to the VYDDA Intersection at 4;000 FT in San Diego; we were cleared for the visual approach Runway 27. Both pilots had terrain on ND. I entered a direct to REEBO Intersection and started a descent to 1;800 FT. We then visually picked up San Miguel Mountain with the antenna (2;709 FT) on it at 15 miles out. Shortly after that we got a brief terrain warning event.Suggest staying on all arrivals and approaches when cleared for visual. ATC should have issued an altitude restricted visual approach clearance: 'Maintain 4;000 until established on final; cleared for the visual approach Runway 27'

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	986432
Time
Date	201112
Local Time Of Day	0601-1200
Place
Locale Reference	SAN.Airport
State Reference	CA
Environment
Flight Conditions	VMC
Aircraft 1
Make Model Name	A319
Operating Under FAR Part	Part 121
Flight Phase	Initial Approach
Route In Use	Visual Approach
Flight Plan	IFR
Person 1
Function	Captain Pilot Flying
Qualification	Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP)
Events
Anomaly	ATC Issue All Types Inflight Event / Encounter CFTT / CFIT

When cleared for a visual approach to runway 27 at san the flight crew of an A319 began an immediate descent to cross reebo at 1;800 MSL but received a 'terrain' GPWS warning with respect to san miguel mountain; a 2;079 ft obstacle between them and reebo.