WordNet
n. the path that is prescribed for an airplane that is preparing to land at an airport; "the traffic patterns around O'Hare are very crowded"; "they stayed in the pattern until the fog lifted" [syn: traffic pattern, pattern]
Usage examples of "approach pattern".
They're choosing an unconventional approach pattern, so this may get rough!
Because it represented an atypical approach pattern, Camp Charon's tracking officers would be able to recognize friends even before they transmitted their IDs in-system.
The unidentified vessel has still not communicated and is entering orbit on an approach pattern to land at Reims.
Most likely it was on approach pattern to Reims, which often passed right over them.
He had yet to determine a fixed approach pattern, or an attack plan, or whatever it might be called when you were sailing a submarine into harm's way and you had no idea what that harm might be.