What's up with New York's La Guardia Airport (KLGA/LGA)?

Question

I have a few questions about LGA:

Is there a curfew for arriving aircraft? When is it? I just realized I haven't heard any planes in a while (or maybe they're on a different approach - I'm not too far from Meadow Lake, this would be the LIE approach I think).

Around 11pm, there were a couple of MD-80s (I'm not sure which types, but they belonged either to American Airlines, Delta Air Lines (maybe Delta Shuttle), or possibly Northwest Airlines (I'm pretty sure they weren't DC-9s, so I doubt it was the latter) that were flying really low. I'm an aviation freak, and they were definitely flying lower than usual. I know the JT8Ds are loud, but this was surprising. They looked lower than usual too. Does anyone know why they were doing this?

Thanks for all of your input (=

Answer 1

As far as the curfew, it is closed to fixed wing aircraft from 12:01AM-6:00AM.  I know when there are ATC delays into the NY Metros for weather they will extend the curfew by an hour or so.

As far as the low flying aircraft, I don't have any info to give you.

I hope this helped answer your question.

Answer 2

Lower approach may be a way to shorten the landing roll by landing at the beginning of the runway. The noise is from 'dragging it in' which means coming in low with excessive power.

CFI