lighthouses? (airport, safe, location)

[jasonkramer]

i just passed through western Montana and i noticed spinning lights up on some of the mountains. why are they there and what exactly are they?

[MTSilvertip]

Aircraft Beacons.

In the days before all the electronic systems beacons were set up so aircraft could see them from the air and not get lost or run into a mountain in the dark.

Not sure why, but they still operate in Montana, but don't always help. We still have people fly into mountains in storms for example.

Airway beacon | Ask.com Encyclopedia

[jasonkramer]

I see. thank you very much.

[oldtrader]

Not sure why, but they still operate in Montana, but don't always help. We still have people fly into mountains in storms for example.

In storms, the beacons are not really visible due to weather conditions blotting out the lights making them useless. And as the number and location of lights is near airports, a lot of mountains do not have lights, and pilots that are not familiar with flying in Montana and our mountains fly too low and hit mountains in the dark of storms. There are only 19 of those lights in the whole state of Montana, which is the size of the entire North Eastern United States, so you can see that is not many lights.

Montana is the only state, that still maintains the lights usually near airports. In the mountains, our airports are down in valleys. These lights help a pilot line up to the runway, and give them notice of what elevation will clear the mountains when landing at a valley airport. Just a safety precaution, due to the location of the airport and where you have to be sure to stay above a hill or mountain peak, to make a safe landing. Most states do not have the type of flying conditions near an airport, that Montana does.