Gear up landing possible prevention

[lownslow]

I have a crazy idea: teach students to check the gear FROM DAY 1. It may seem silly to teach this in a fixed gear trainer, but remember primacy? It gets them thinking about it and it's ingrained when they progress to a more complex aircraft.

Super easy to get it into your head that the check isn't important if you're checking something that is always going to be OK.

[Chuck Ellsworth]

Again it comes down to judgement, painting things black and white is almost always a fail.

You are saying going around after a gear up airplane and prop strike is a decision you make by seeing how it fly's after the ground contact?

[Chuck Ellsworth]

the phrase "gear down to go down" was hammered in my head since day one.

Training to do things by rote can kill you.

You fly each aircraft based on the aircraft you are flying at the time.

If you are trained to perform a task by rote and you " gear down go down " in an amphibian when landing on the water it well be your last landing...ever.

PERFORM ALL CHECKS BASED ON THE AIRCRAFT YOU ARE FLYING.

[SuperchargedRS]

Again it comes down to judgement, painting things black and white is almost always a fail.

You are saying going around after a gear up airplane and prop strike is a decision you make by seeing how it fly's after the ground contact?

I'm saying it's a quick decision, and both options have advantages and disadvantages.

Sometimes going around is a better option.

Other times sliding into home is a better option.

[Shiny Side Up]

Most pilots would go around after hitting the runway with the gear up?

Really?

I'd suspect most would in the moment, make this decision. We spend hours hammering into pilots the idea if a landing doesn't go good, go around. So somewhere in their mammal brain, something ain't right and the snap decision is made. Willfully crashing a plane is something (even though technically they've already done the damage) many pilots would have an easy time doing. Then there's that whole risk/reward thing working in their brains. I ain't saying it's right, but one can see why it happens.

I have a crazy idea: teach students to check the gear FROM DAY 1. It may seem silly to teach this in a fixed gear trainer, but remember primacy? It gets them thinking about it and it's ingrained when they progress to a more complex aircraft.

I'd disagree with this, if only because it leads to a lot of false ideas about training new pilots. It's where the whole flying Cessnas like airliners thing shows up. When it comes to primacy, one should remember you can always add more in later, and the principle of relationship also applies.

Personally i'm a fan of negative reinforcement in this regard. I think it was one of my instructors who said "you'll probably live through a gear up landing, but you'll never live it down." The idea that "humiliations galore" await those who make this mistake is a powerful motivator not to screw it up.

[Chuck Ellsworth]

Sometimes going around is a better option.

I have been flying for sixty two years of which fifty two was as a working pilot and that is the first time I was ever made aware of such an option being available and safe.

Who taught you that and what exactly was the process for deciding to go around with a damaged airplane?

[5x5]

+1 with .. I'm not trying to pile-on, but I would also be interested in the scenario where going around would be a better choice.

I've never done it mind you, but if you add power and the thing shakes like crazy or something, power out and down you go, takes the power and you're 3 min or less around the patch, were not talking about flying across the country after this.

I also can't understand this example - you're basically on the ground, over a hard surface where you will slide along quite safely and unlikely incur any significant, person threatening damage. By adding power you now remove yourself from the proximity of the nice smooth runway and by the time you notice the damage induced shaking you are higher from the ground, past the runway and now are landing/crashing in who knows what type of terrain or conditions. How is that better?

[Chuck Ellsworth]

This discussion is getting real scarey for me, I am having trouble coming to grips with trying to figure out how aviation has progressed downwards rather than upwards in the decision making process.

The best reason I can think of is someone somewhere decided that their idea was better than all those before them and they trained others to think their way.

Scarey...real scarey.

[Chuck Finley]

I've never done it mind you, but if you add power and the thing shakes like crazy or something, power out and down you go, takes the power and you're 3 min or less around the patch, were not talking about flying across the country after this.

So tell me. In those short 3 minutes, what happens if while you're in downwind and the engine mounts let go because of damage that happened when the props were scraping the ground and the engine takes a dive? How will your c. of g. react? What will the controllability of the ac be like? Seriously, except for saving face ( which is too late ) and limiting damage to your boss's AC ( also too late ) there is no reason to take additional risk.


esp803 : I agree with you that @#$! ups happen. What I will never agree with is taking the bird back up in the air after ground contact.

[J31]

You fly each aircraft based on the aircraft you are flying at the time.

If you are trained to perform a task by rote and you " gear down go down " in an amphibian when landing on the water it well be your last landing...ever.

PERFORM ALL CHECKS BASED ON THE AIRCRAFT YOU ARE FLYING.

This is very good advice. There are many flying machines and you need to know the procedures for each one. Yes many things are common but others are not.

[Illya Kuryakin]

Again it comes down to judgement, painting things black and white is almost always a fail.

You are saying going around after a gear up airplane and prop strike is a decision you make by seeing how it fly's after the ground contact?

I'm saying it's a quick decision, and both options have advantages and disadvantages.

Sometimes going around is a better option.

Other times sliding into home is a better option.

Bad enough there are pilots out there that are poor enough at their jobs that they forget to lower the gear in the first place.....but these guys are rocket scientists compared to any dim witted individual who would advocate doing a gear up "touch and go"! Stupidity reaches a new low.
Illya

[Big Pistons Forever]

This discussion is getting real scarey for me, I am having trouble coming to grips with trying to figure out how aviation has progressed downwards rather than upwards in the decision making process.

:

Yah right Nobody "back in the day" ever went around when they should have just closed the throttles and taken their lumps The only possible explanation is that all of aviation has

progressed downwards rather than upwards in the decision making process.

I have personally NEVER HEARD an instructor, any instructor, tell his or her student that they should go around after a prop strike due to a gear up landing attempt.

Really does every idea have to result in a flame fest. A poster offered an opinion witch represents an unorthodox approach. Why can't the merits of this be discussed in a dispassionate manner ?

My 02 cents

Advantages to going around after the props and/or other parts of the aircraft have hit:

1) Potentially eliminate the further damage to the aircraft that would occur if the landing was continued to a belly flop

2) Maintain control of the aircraft. If you carry on to the belly flop you have less control on where it ends up over returning to a normal landing.

Disadvantages:

A) There is little to no chance to evaluate how much damage the aircraft has sustained until the aircraft is high enough and going fast enough that a loss of power or loss of control has high potential to be catastrophic

B) Belly slides virtually never result in injuries let alone fatalities so giving up this option, gives up an almost sure thing no injury outcome

C) A prop strike means a new prop and an engine tear down so the aircraft is already going to need expensive repairs if you go around. Saving the added belly/flap damage of a belly slide is not, IMO, a significant enough gain

Personally I think the disadvantages very much out weigh the advantages so my opnion is that a go around after the props or any other part of the aircraft has hit the ground should not be done under any circumstances.

To the folks that are out there actually giving flying instruction to real people:

When the crusty X Military instructor did my Multi Rating in1986, he beat into me a final approach verbal gear down check. At wings level on final or 500 feet AGL which ever is later, He wanted me to look at the gear handle and gear lights and say out loud, "Gear down 3 green"

For the next 22 years every time I was on final I looked at the gear handle and gear lights and mental verbalized " Gear down 3 green" and the gear was down and there were 3 green lights ....until the day I was single pilot and rolled wings level on very short final after a carved in rushed flat approach, looked down and the gear handle was not down and the lights were not on .

That habit saved me from a probable gear up landing. It is a habit I highly recommend you inculcate in your students.

[esp803]

I agree with you that @#$! ups happen. What I will never agree with is taking the bird back up in the air after ground contact.

I concur.

E

[Shiny Side Up]

I have personally NEVER HEARD an instructor, any instructor, tell his or her student that they should go around after a prop strike due to a gear up landing attempt.

In truth though, as an instructor, I've never said specifically not to go around either. By the nature of the world you can't teach every eventuality, many common ones, but not every possibility. One should also say that statistically, though again stressing that I don't condone it, airplanes that have kissed the ground in such a fashion and went around have for the most part made it back around - and in some cases I've known - flown a long ways in a substantially damaged state. One might say that gambling wise, you got a good chance to bring it back around and do right. Or at least that's how one's mind might perceive it. Its understandable not wanting to "take one's lumps". If anything, I've always learned that one should keep flying the damn thing until it won't, in other words "fly all the way through the crash" as it were.

That habit saved me from a probable gear up landing. It is a habit I highly recommend you inculcate in your students.

I do similar and was taught very similarly. If there's green lights, I make a habit of calling them out, or in Cessnas, if I can see the wheels "two wheels, one in the mirror".

[Chuck Ellsworth]

Training your mind to always look for green gear down lights on short final is great in a land only airplane.

However it does not work all that well in an amphibian when landing on the water.

What does work real well is identifying what you are flying and where you are landing and confirming the gear is in the correct position for the surface you are about to land on.

It is called thinking about what you are about to do.

[Shiny Side Up]

Training your mind to always look for green gear down lights on short final is great in a land only airplane.

sure. You got to be able to change stuff up when you need to. "Calling out" should be modified with the thought in mind what you should see. For example, one the water its "four blue" or in another case "4 wires" and its more to yourself. Do what you gotta do to remember where they should be. Its not really rocket science, but its just one of those things where priorities is always something pilots are bad at.

[SuperchargedRS]

Sometimes going around is a better option.

I have been flying for sixty two years of which fifty two was as a working pilot and that is the first time I was ever made aware of such an option being available and safe.

Who taught you that and what exactly was the process for deciding to go around with a damaged airplane?

It was taught to me by what I have seen.

Comanche doing touch and goes, every time just fine, guy comes around for another and no gear... Nice smooth round out one spark and within a fraction of a second he's powered up and climbing, from the ground I wasn't even 100% sure he hit.

Comes around lands and taxis in, shuts down and sure enough the very end of the prop tips were hit and slightly bent back, I had to get within 4 feet or so to tell.

They use the same shop as I did at the time, all in he got new blades, engine was fine, airframe fine, didn't even scratch the paint.

If he would have kept the power off he would have been sliding down a hard runway sparking up the bottom of a Comanche with with that nice lower fuel sump, older airframe, maybe a fire? Maybe it skids and hits something else? Ether way the plane is toast, the pilots might get hurt.

In this case

Skin : uneventful landing, the two guys looked totally fine, minus heavy trauma to their egos
Tin : minus the blades the thing was fine
Ticket : no plane stuck on a runway, no closed runway, nothing came of it.

Your method

Skin: zero damage, all the way to fire or blunt force trauma possible
Tin : you're in write off territories now
Ticket : have to close the runway, phone calls would have had to be made, enforcement actions likely.

Again in your half century of flying you're smart enough to know this ain't paint by numbers, no two situation will always have the same answer or outcome, could the engine have come off and fallen on a nun taking orphans to church, sure, could the pilot have also gotten hit by a bus the next day sure, overall it's about calculating risks. NEITHER option had a 100% safe possible outcome.

In the case of the piper, the FACTS would show he made a good choice, and had a better outcome, this is not a matter of which one can argue.

It's not paint by numbers

[Chuck Ellsworth]

From your description it is more likely he made the decision to go around before the prop tips hit the runway.

I can not imagine hitting the prop tips and then starting the go around without doing more damage.

[Donald]

Ticket : have to close the runway, phone calls would have had to be made, enforcement actions likely.

I find it unlikely that a gear up landing would result in an enforcement action.

Maybe if it was intentional, then 602.01, otherwise...?

[PilotDAR]

I've have some training and mentoring in RG's but mostly, it's been "there it is, go fly it" for me. Going from type to type as a real risk in forgetting something important. 'Could be the gear. I really want to avoid that for reasons of liking planes to be airworthy, and my pride in piloting as intact as I can manage. I admit, it's purely selfish reasons for not wanting an "event" - I just could not find a way to explain my stupidity, if I landed with the gear in the wrong position. All I can hope for is effective prevention.

It is called thinking about what you are about to do.

So, I have chosen "Configuration Assurance". I choose to take a moment before each landing, to assure the configuration of the aircraft is correct. For the wheels, I say their positions, and the landing surface aloud two times. So it's a bit OCD, I'll live with that. When I say it first, I look for indications which confirm my statement. When I say it second, I touch the selector, confirming it's position, and indication lights.

My passengers look at me a little odd, but I can live with that. My 11 year old daughter now says it along with me....

[AuxBatOn]

Most pilots would go around after hitting the runway with the gear up?

Really?

Just a matter of discretion and individual circumstance.

Yes, yes they would.

Q tipping two props and maybe a little scratched paint beats a full blown pancake.

I've seen it done before, small single engine, just ended up being new prop blades, engine was checked out, all to spec, didn't even scratch the paint. Option B wouldn't have been quite a pretty or as cheap.
.

After "Q tipping the props and maybe a little scratched paint....", how do you know your aircraft isn't mortally wounded? You're qualified to make that call? To continue back into the air, over houses, schools and who knows what? I'm not. Neither are you.
Give your head a shake.
Illya

How do you know your props hit the ground?

[SuperchargedRS]

From your description it is more likely he made the decision to go around before the prop tips hit the runway.

I can not imagine hitting the prop tips and then starting the go around without doing more damage.

But from what I hear on this topic, the second he heard/felt/whatever his prop hit, you would have preferred that the pilot had pulled the power and put her back down, sending him skidding, sliding and sparking down a runway?

[Chuck Ellsworth]

But from what I hear on this topic, the second he heard/felt/whatever his prop hit, you would have preferred that the pilot had pulled the power and put her back down, sending him skidding, sliding and sparking down a runway?

We all have our opinions on what to do if we contact a runway with the gear up, one thing we know for sure the prop /s will be the first thing to contact the runway.

I would rather slide down the runway and live rather than take the chance the airplane will have a catastrophic failure in flight and I die.

You of course are free to make your own decision.

[Chuck Ellsworth]

"Configuration Assurance"

Much the same as my gear configuration check PilotDar.

Mine is " Where am I landing and where is my gear "

We both fly a lot of amphibious aircraft and that check is critical.

It has worked for me for many decades and saved me from a wrong gear position twice.

[Illya Kuryakin]

Ticket : have to close the runway, phone calls would have had to be made, enforcement actions likely.

I find it unlikely that a gear up landing would result in an enforcement action.

Maybe if it was intentional, then 602.01, otherwise...?

I don't think you can take enforcement action against the stupid, otherwise some/most of us would be in the crowbar hotel.
Personally, I refuse to be in this position. Pretty sure Donald won't be, as most of us will avoid the situation. Hopefully SuperchargedRS will never have to make his no gear go around, and BPF and . will actually agree on something.
And The Leafs will win the Stanley Cup before we're all in diapers and using walkers. Maybe not.
Check Three Green.
Illya