Three Green, Please

The mission was to transport myself and my wife from the Northeast U.S. to Florida for the holidays. My chosen platform was a well-worn Piper Arrow II rented from a local flying club. This particular airplane wasnt my first choice, but it beat walking or taking the airlines. After a long week of work and travel planning, we launched late in the afternoon on a Friday and I put the heading indicator on S.

Editorial Staff

Wednesday, December 20, 2017 at 12:00 AM ET

Verified

Key Takeaways:

During a flight, the pilot of a Piper Arrow II experienced a failure of the landing gear indicator lights, creating uncertainty about the gear's deployed status.
Despite attempting several troubleshooting steps, including recycling and manually extending the gear, the lights remained off, but the pilot decided to land based on auditory cues.
The landing was successful with the gear down, but the pilot later acknowledged taking an unnecessary risk by landing without positive light indications.
The experience taught the pilot the importance of seeking external verification, such as a control tower fly-by, or conducting more thorough troubleshooting in similar future situations.

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The mission was to transport myself and my wife from the Northeast U.S. to Florida for the holidays. My chosen platform was a well-worn Piper Arrow II rented from a local flying club. This particular airplane wasn’t my first choice, but it beat walking or taking the airlines. After a long week of work and travel planning, we launched late in the afternoon on a Friday and I put the heading indicator on “S.”

As I maneuvered to land at our planned fuel stop, I placed the landing gear handle in the down position at the appropriate time. As part of my pre-landing routine, I completed the cockpit flow and ran through the items on the instrument panel’s printed checklist. All was well until I got to the part about checking for three green lights on the landing gear. I had none.