 | | | | | |||||||||
| |||||||||||||
           Government Weather Flight Planning Tools General Aircraft Magazines Books & Tapes Organizations 
|
|
July 2010 
Lighten Up Your LandingsI once counted as many as 10 pitch pumps between a jet transport arriving at 50 feet above the runway and touchdown. As the power came to idle (a bit further down the runway than necessary), the copilot planked it down with a predictable, rather heavy kerplunk. All survived. And they could use the airplane again. But there’s got to be a better way. It’s the last couple hundred feet where many pilots lose the finesse, presuming they had any to begin with. It’s the case whether operating VFR or IFR, since most operations this close to a runway are visual. Learning Your Retrofit Panel We’ve been doing this long enough to remember when the extent of new avionics upgrades included a couple of flip-flop nav/coms and an audio panel. Even back then, some owners stumbled with otherwise simple switchology. Worse case was missing a radio call. Things have changed. Today’s avionics upgrades, however, usually involve tightly integrated glass and advanced automation. Just learning how to power up all those neat toys usually requires more thought and planning than the nav/coms of 20 years ago. The safety implications are obvious; the operational ones perhaps somewhat less. Five Reasons To Uncouple Your Approach We admit it: The modern autopilot is a marvelous technological innovation, capable of smoothly flying even antique airplanes better than most of us on our best days. Especially when operating in the en route environment, it’s usually on, and doing its thing so we can concentrate on the scenery. It’s also useful in other flight modes, of course, especially in the clag. Letting George do it frees our mental bandwidth for chart folding, communicating with ATC and planning the upcoming approach to minimums. TAA Training It’s no great secret that nearly all new-production aircraft now have glass cockpits and advanced devices such as weather data link. Even technologies such as synthetic vision have become the new norm. In a way, the term technically advanced aircraft (TAA) has become a misnomer but it is still widely recognized as a tag line for a variety of related issues—including TAA training. Follow The Yellow-Brick Road Before we can get to the runway—or the FBO—we have to taxi. It’s easy to conceive of the taxi portion of our flight operations to be akin to driving a car, but the only things they have in common is their two-dimensional nature. Instead, taxiing is an operation requiring a skill and experience level similar to landings. Especially since we’re often closer to other objects than at any other time. How to taxi depends on several variables, including time of day, visibility, aircraft type, the pavement (or lack of it) and its condition, plus surface traffic, among others. But if we focus on a few elements of the taxi operation and pay attention, we should be fine. Botched Bounce When it comes to botched landings, I’ve certainly had my share. In perhaps my worst one, I vividly remember plonking a 182 down on a paved, beachside runway many moons ago. About halfway through a series of six or so times the airplane’s nosewheel contacted the runway, I managed to inform my passengers, "This is the worst landing I’ve ever made." Lucky them. Still, we survived the ordeal, and were able to fly the airplane home later that day. | |
About Us / Contact Us / Privacy Policy / Site Map | Copyright Belvoir Media Group, LLC. All rights reserved. | ||||||||
