Airmanship

Just because the vast majority of the airplanes most of us fly have their little wheel mounted on the nose instead of the tail doesn’t mean the nosewheel is immune to abuse. Nor does it mean we can ignore the nosewheel’s peculiarities, even if an airplane with one is much easier to handle on the ground.

By the time student pilots near the practical exam, they’ve usually got a pretty good idea of how and why to calculate density altitude (DA). If they’re lucky, they’ve even done some high-altitude takeoffs with an instructor, or at least simulated DA’s effects by using much-less-than-full power settings on a few takeoffs. Those tables and graphs overlook an important characteristic of the air in which we’re trying to fly: its humidity. Two classic concerns with mountain flying are density altitude and pressure altitude. Actual altitude doesn’t affect aerodynamic performance. Most of us plan our high-elevation arrivals and departures as early in the day as practical, and are extra attentive on warmer days when seated behind a normally aspirated engine. While reduced horsepower is certainly one reason to be wary of high-DA situations, the thinner air also means higher true airspeeds—and lower indicated ones—resulting in the airplane “thinking” it’s higher than it really is. The impact is felt through mushier controls, since there are fewer air molecules flowing over them. There’s also an impact on propeller efficiency, since its blades are airfoils. The net effect, of course, translates into longer, faster takeoff rolls.

Thunderstorms are a perennial topic whenever pilots get together to discuss weather, especially in summertime. Often, the conversation drifts from detection and avoidance to penetration and how to keep the shiny side up once we’re inside one. War stories inevitably are told, always followed by some version of the “don’t try this at home” admonition.

Several years ago, I bought my husband a ride in a glider as a gift, and I latched on to the idea of learning to soar. I had read and heard about how flying gliders could add to the safety of flying an airplane, not only as a result of the skills and judgment learned but also by improving basic stick and rudder work. I was of the opinion whatever basic skills I had were continually being eroded by flying the same airplane the same way year after year. I fly a Piper Comanche, a fantastic airplane, but I felt raw power and Buick-like flight characteristics were covering my flaws. I wanted something to shake things up a bit and get me back into sensing more of what the airplane was doing and how I was influencing it.

You wouldn’t think that two common landing-phase accidents at opposite ends of the runway would have same root cause and the same corrective technique. Landing short (impacting terrain or obstacles just prior to the runway) and landing long (touching down at a point where the aircraft cannot be stopped before running off the end of the runway) account for six percent of all landing accidents, according to AOPA’s Air Safety Institute. Remove loss of directional control on the runway from the picture, plus touchdowns prior to the runway, and those extending beyond the far end of the landing surface account for almost one-fifth of the remaining reports.

On October 12, 1997, popular musician John Denver flew his new-to-him LongEZ into the Pacific Ocean off Monterey, Calif. He died on impact with the water. According to the NTSB, “witnesses saw the airplane in straight and level flight about 350 to 500 feet over a residential area, then they heard a reduction of engine noise. The airplane was seen to pitch slightly nose up; then it banked sharply to the right [and] descended nose first into the ocean.” The probable cause statement included, “…the pilot’s diversion of attention from the operation of the airplane and his inadvertent application of right rudder that resulted in the loss of airplane control while attempting to manipulate the fuel selector handle.” The distraction of reaching and repositioning the airplane’s fuel selector led to the distraction.

Twice in a lifetime is two times too many; two times when the operator of a moving machine stared a hole right through me and rendered me invisible. In both cases perfect conditions prevailed—nothing obstructed the view, yet our machines converged at a good clip. My first experience came at the hands of the driver of a 1977 Cadillac. My solution was to lay down a vintage motorcycle. It wasn’t my preferred choice, but obstacle and traffic conflicts made lateral maneuvering unwise. The second time came courtesy of two pilots in a Skyhawk during a VFR arrival to a non-towered airport in Florida’s panhandle.

Radio silence: that’s what most pilots say got their attention and made them realize they had encountered an in-flight electrical failure. Too bad, because by the time the radios no longer worked, odds are that your electrical system had sucked all the life out of your primary back-up device, your main battery. Many modern personal airplanes come with back-up electrical systems from the factory. But if you fly an airplane equipped as if was the standard just a few years ago, you had better hope you were in day VFR conditions if you found yourself in this pickle. Otherwise, it was going to be a mighty tough night and/or IFR flight without navigation equipment or communication radios (or lights, or power for flaps or landing gear). From my experience, electrical systems have to be an Achilles heel of any light piston aircraft. That said and even among modern aircraft, aircraft designers, in their infinite wisdom, have done anything but standardize the systems.

The reports, preliminary and final, too often contain this fateful 10-word sentence: “The pilot did not obtain a weather briefing before departing.” It runs right up there with the tried-and-failed “continued VFR into IMC.” How and why any pilot would fly without a weather briefing almost defies logic these days. Accurate weather information has never before been more plentiful or accessible. The FAA even recognizes a pilot can fulfill all legal requirements of a pre-flight briefing without dialing a Flight Service Station on 1-800-Wx-Brief. Thanks to the wonders of technology, even flight-critical information—Notams, TFRs and the like—can be accessed independently.

In a perfect world, all flight instructors would be smiling, retired airline captains who would patiently and benevolently impart the benefit of thousands of hours of safe aircraft operation to the eager minds of the less experienced. Unfortunately, ours is not a perfect world. Most Aviation Safety readers are already certificated pilots, but we all need a CFI for recurrent training and required flight reviews.