If you do not set your missed approach altitude, what will the flight director do after your initial pitch up?

• A. It will have you diving.
• B. It will maintain level flight.
• C. It will climb steeply.
• D. It will yaw left.

Answer: (A)

You’re being tested on how the flight director uses a missed-approach altitude as a vertical constraint. When you initiate the missed approach, the flight director expects to guide you to a defined altitude to meet obstacle clearance and the published path. If you don’t enter that missed-approach altitude, the FD has no target to climb to, so its vertical guidance can’t command a proper climb. In the PC-12 NGX, that means after you pitch up to start the miss, the flight director can revert to a default behavior that drives the nose down to rejoin the current flight path, which shows up as a dive.

So, without setting the missed-approach altitude, you’ll end up with downward guidance after the initial pitch up, until you provide a target altitude or switch to a mode that defines the climb. The practical takeaway is to always enter the missed-approach altitude to ensure the FD commands the proper climb path for obstacle clearance.