Small Aircraft; Low Wing; 1 Eng; Retractable Gear
Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP); Flight Crew Flight Instructor; Flight Crew Instrument; Flight Crew Multiengine
Flight Crew Last 90 Days 21; Flight Crew Total 15276; Flight Crew Type 175
Confusion; Situational Awareness
Deviation - Track / Heading All Types; Deviation / Discrepancy - Procedural Clearance; Deviation / Discrepancy - Procedural Published Material / Policy
Air Traffic Control Issued New Clearance; Air Traffic Control Provided Assistance; Flight Crew Became Reoriented; Flight Crew Requested ATC Assistance / Clarification
Chart Or Publication; Human Factors; Procedure
During the terminal phase of a single pilot IMC maintenance ferry flight to MRN (Foothills Regional) I requested the RNAV (GPS) Runway 21 Approach into MRN. ATC approved the request and cleared me to the CIKIS IAF. Scanning the preloaded route of flight in my G1000 PFD; I inadvertently selected the CICAC FAF as the desired steer point and turned in that direction. ATC observed the aircraft tracking to the wrong fix and directed a heading change in the direction of the IAF. At that instant; I detected the switch error and made the appropriate correct selection. The approach continued and the flight terminated without further incident. There can be no excuse for my having failed to confirm the exact GPS steer point selected; but in the interest of preventing a future incident such as this; I might question why two of the fixes on this approach would be labeled with identifiers so similar in spelling and pronunciation that this error could almost have been predicted; especially in the high workload environment of single pilot IMC during the terminal phase of the flight. I suspect that I'm not the first pilot to bite on this one; and the controller was probably spring-loaded to detect and correct my error. Can't TERPS label these fixes with less ambiguous identifiers?
A pilot flying an RNAV Approach into a non towered airport flew direct to the Final Approach Fix instead of the Initial Approach Fix as cleared. The fixes have similar sounding names which contributed to the navigation error.