Another One Bites The Dust

[solmanic]

Just got a message from a student pilot mate alerting me to this crash on Wednesday. VH-JGR was a good unit with a brand new motor - climbed like a champion.

Pilot survives Beaudesert plane crash

Of course we have our opinions as to what happened. The crash site is just south of Kagaru, a privately owned grass strip in the training area commonly used for PFLs by students. One instructor (no need to mention names) routinely demonstrates his preferred EFATO technique wihch involves a 180 degree limit turn without power to land back on the runway in the opposite direction.

Based on the fact that the plane appears to have hit on its left wing which is shown folded right over the top, it is possible the pilot was attempting this manouevre and stalled. Would have been a very low speed impact judging by the fact that the fuselage is still all attached. I reckon he was in a steep left turn and the wing dropped in the stall, impacted the ground and the plane cartwheeled landing back on its wheels. Wheel struts are fully collapsed. The pilot's door can be seen still attached to the top of the wing strut so it's likely that as the plane rolled the door peeled away with the wing and he was spat out on the ground. So very, very lucky.

[101RRS]

One instructor (no need to mention names) routinely demonstrates his preferred EFATO technique wihch involves a 180 degree limit turn without power to land back on the runway in the opposite direction.

You would have to be awfully high to execute that manoeuvre.

[solmanic]

This is the problem, the instructor demonstrated it to me personally at around 150-200ft AGL!

I, and the other student I know who has experienced this, would never be game to do this unless there was no othere alternative. I am sure however, that there are students who try this as a practice exercise because they've seen so-and-so do it.

[JDNSW]

When I was learning, the procedure for EFATO was "land straight ahead - under no circumstances attempt a turn back". And this accident would appear to demonstrate why. Looking at the wreckage, the pilot was very lucky to survive, although the crumpling presumably gave controlled deceleration. If the approved procedure has changed, it would be interesting to know why - when I was learning, there was fifty years of accident history to say "don't turn, just dodge the worst obstacles". If you suffer an engine failure during takeoff, for a start, you are climbing, and without power, even if you react immediately, you are on the wrong side of the lift/drag curve and need to get the nose down to regain best glide speed. as soon as you turn, the nose needs to go down further to stay at the best glide speed, or at least avoid a stall. Not many survive a stall out of a turn at low level, and even if everything works perfectly, in most cases you still won't make it back to the field because of the height lost regaining speed and in the turn. Of course, if the runway is long enough, there may be a case, but I would want to be above 500ft even so! And the automatic reaction should be to not turn. John

[solmanic]

When I was learning, the procedure for EFATO was "land straight ahead - under no circumstances attempt a turn back". ...If the approved procedure has changed, it would be interesting to know why

Nope. It hasn't changed. It's just this instructor likes to show that it is an option if there is nothing suitable straight ahead. It's inevitable though that once a student sees an instructor do it, they will try it themselves. Never mind that the instructor has about a million hours more flying experience and can feel the plane like it was part of his own body.

[JDNSW]

Nope. It hasn't changed. It's just this instructor likes to show that it is an option if there is nothing suitable straight ahead. It's inevitable though that once a student sees an instructor do it, they will try it themselves. Never mind that the instructor has about a million hours more flying experience and can feel the plane like it was part of his own body.

If the instructor is doing this, I would regard it as a very dangerous practice, and you should raise it with his CFI (unless he is the CFI!). There is about a century of training experience that says it is safe so rarely that it should not even be countenanced as a demonstration.

I should add that I know personally of several cases where a landing has been made straight ahead, and not only has the pilot walked awy, but the aircraft has required minimal repairs (usually after finger trouble with the fuel tap!). On the other hand, there are some airports I have used where straight ahead does not look at all attractive - Archerfield comes to mind. Fortunately, never been there - only time I have had engine trouble (dropped a valve) was at 8,500ft AGL and close enough to Wagga.

John

[stallie]

There is no place for that demonstration IMHO to student pilots.

Your (the) instructor should take you up to a safe height, line up on a distant object, note heading, then begin a climb at the same speed and config as a normal takeoff. Then pull the power off and ask (show) you to turn 180 degrees without extreme aerobatics. When you are on the reciprocal heading with wings level, note height loss. It will be a lot more than you think.

In a prefect world this could be your minimum turn back altitude. But remember to factor in a couple of seconds delay for the s^%t f##k factor as I call it.

When I used to fly the RFDS pc12 (single engine) our turn back height was 800 feet and we were well trained for this twice yearly and the aircraft glides very well.

Solomonic, you state that you would consider the turn back if there were no other options available. May I respectfully suggest you reconsider that plan. Read the accident report here (ignoring the drug bits which are only possibly relevant, but caused CASA to implement the DAMP process, but I digress ). Faced with a ditching or turning back he turned back. Six people died.

Investigation: 200204328 - Piper Aircraft Corp PA-32-300, VH-MAR

Below 1000 feet, leave the turn backs to highly trained professionals where the procedure is written in to their ops manual (RAAF PC9, RFDS etc).

[GregTD5]

Would be interesting to know the statistics, but I would think that there has been a lot more people killed trying to turn back to the airfield than if they had continued straight ahead.
I was wondering why the Albatross and Trojan at Archerfield don't gain height when they put the wheels up, choosing to use all the runway at about about 20 foot They told me that is to get the airspeed up, so that they can gain height and return to the landing strip if engine fails.
Think I'll stick to rotary wing, we don't that much room.

Greg

[stallie]

That is a false theory Greg, but has a surprising degree of popularity, probably because its fun.

If your engine is going to quit say 10 seconds after liftoff, the pilot that has been climbing out at best rate of climb speed will always end up higher than the pilot that has been zooming along low then pulling up to convert speed to height once the fan stops.

[JDNSW]

That is a false theory Greg, but has a surprising degree of popularity, probably because its fun.

If your engine is going to quit say 10 seconds after liftoff, the pilot that has been climbing out at best rate of climb speed will always end up higher than the pilot that has been zooming along low then pulling up to convert speed to height once the fan stops.

My view would be; not exactly false, but exaggerated. It has some validity in that the aircraft will accelerate faster in ground effect (less power requirement for a given lift, so more available to accelerate), and if the engine quits you really would like to have a bit of margin above the best climb speed so you don't drop below best glide before you drop the nose. But the advantage is there only for a small margin in speed above best climb, and as against that the faster you go the more power is lost in drag. To maximise energy (this is what you have up your sleeve to pick a spot if the engine quits), you want to waste as little as possible in drag.

John