Definition
Instrument approach procedures that publish only circling minimums, with no straight-in landing minimums available. They are charted when the final approach course alignment or the descent gradient does not meet the criteria for a straight-in approach to a specific runway, requiring the pilot to maneuver visually around the airport at or above the published circling Minimum Descent Altitude (MDA) to land on a suitable runway.
Plain English
An instrument approach that gets you down close to the airport, but does not line you up well enough with any single runway to just land straight ahead. So once you have the airport in sight, you fly a visual pattern around it and land on whichever runway is best for the wind.
Context Anchor
Seen on instrument approach charts when the approach is approved only for circling to land, not for a published straight-in landing.
Derivation
"Circling" comes from circulus, Latin for a small ring -- describing the visual maneuver around the airport. The label "-only" makes it clear that this is the sole option: there is no straight-in version of this approach to fall back on.
Why Pilots Care
These procedures let pilots land safely at airports where the runway is not aligned with the instrument approach, but they demand careful altitude and position control to stay inside protected airspace.
Grounding Statement
The key idea is: the instrument part gets you near the airport, and the visual part gets you lined up to land.
Intuition Check
Do not read “circling” as simply flying circles around the airport. Here it means a controlled visual maneuver after an instrument approach to position the aircraft for landing.
Example Sentence 1
Because the VOR-A at the airport is a circling-only procedure, we briefed the circling MDA and planned to maneuver for Runway 27 once we had the field in sight.
Example Sentence 2
Because the final approach course pointed away from the runway, the chart listed only circling minimums.