Mid-Air in SFO Bay Area...
- Thread starter GypsyPilot
- Start date
Hacker15e
Who am I? Where are my pants?
I don't have any information on this specific decision by the pilot of Dreadnought, but I'll add this into the discussion.
Following a midair, or any other event where a high performance aircraft receives structural damage but is still flying and there is not another immediate need to land as soon as possible (ergo, fire, engine flameout, etc), it is normal procedure to perform a "controllability check" prior to attempting to land. This consists of configuring gear and flaps for approach, and then incrementally slowing to see what the slowest speed is where the aircraft can maintain control. The idea is that if you can safely get down to a logical landing speed and still have enough control surface deflection to maneuver the aircraft, then you go ahead and attempt the landing. If you can't get slow enough to make a good landing, then you keep your speed, climb up to a safe altitude and location, and bail out.
These checks take a bit of time and distance to accomplish, so you can either circle over one location and do them, or do the checks in a straight line (while you are pointing toward the home 'drome); the time in the air and distance flown is going to happen either way. 70 miles is not all that far to cover while doing this stuff, and the "home field advantage" has the benefit of people and equipment that know your aircraft type, and the pilot probably knows the runway and area better. Getting a good radio line of sight to the home field would be helpful for anyone you are talking to while doing a controllability check, as well as depending on the flight time, they could launch another aircraft to form up on you, visually assess the damage, and act as safety chase.
Given that reports say the vertical and horizontal stabs on Dreadnought were "substantially damaged" as I posted previously, it would make sense that the pilot might spend considerable time doing controllability checks prior to landing. There may have even been other damage they had to work through, like the gear not coming down, or something like that. If this was the case, he was probably on the radio to the rest of the Sanders folks at Ione during the process, too, while they broke out the Flight Manual and read him any relevant checklists or other data (since expanded flight manuals aren't usually carried in single-seat fighters or 2-seat trainers).
So, again, I can't comment on this specifically, but the fact that they kept flying reportedly for an hour post-collision and to their home airfield rather than landing immediately does not surprise me.
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GypsyPilot
Mohawk Town
Hacker,
We monitored him through several different NorCal freqs that they passed him through after his transmission on guard. You are absolutely correct, he was assessing his damage and performing controllability checks.
The guy I was flying with was pissed at the guy for not immediately heading to the nearest airport, citing the Alaska MD 80 crash as a reason why. I could see his point, but I also think that was a very unusual circumstance.
I've always been told that it's best to use your method to assess damage and handling/configuration characteristics at altitude, as you don't want to come hauling ass into an airport with no idea how your aircraft will perform. I absolutely would have done the same (imagine what would have happened if Al Haynes and crew attempted an emergency descent and nearest landing?).
We monitored him through several different NorCal freqs that they passed him through after his transmission on guard. You are absolutely correct, he was assessing his damage and performing controllability checks.
The guy I was flying with was pissed at the guy for not immediately heading to the nearest airport, citing the Alaska MD 80 crash as a reason why. I could see his point, but I also think that was a very unusual circumstance.
I've always been told that it's best to use your method to assess damage and handling/configuration characteristics at altitude, as you don't want to come hauling ass into an airport with no idea how your aircraft will perform. I absolutely would have done the same (imagine what would have happened if Al Haynes and crew attempted an emergency descent and nearest landing?).
Agree with the above. Only caveat I'd add is that I hope the pilots route of flight kept it clear of urban or populated rural areas to the max extent possible, as taking an aircraft with unknown structural damage and unknown handling characteristics over populated areas, coming from an ocean area, while doing said controllability checks in order to head to a home field, is taking a fairly huge gamble with lives on the ground. Bad enough if you lose control of the bird and you can't get out; worse if you lose control and can get out, and the plane goes into a neighborhood as you parachute down. You don't want to be the next IND Ramada Inn episode.
inigo88
Composite-lover
Thanks for explaining @Hacker15e . I'd never heard of that type of control check before, but it makes a ton of sense in that context. As for bailing out over an unpopulated area, that route would have taken him over the most unpopulated areas between the major metropolitan areas of San Francisco and Sacramento. Sounds like a good call, I guess limping battle-damaged aircraft back to base just isn't an emergency procedure many civilian pilots have much experience with (I certainly hadn't considered it!).
It's not something normally considered at all. I mean, I easily see bypassing landing fields in order exit enemy territory with battle damage. I try not to keep a sick aircraft airborne for purposes of maintenance convenience or personal convenience (not saying that was here, just talking in general).
Autothrust Blue
Welcome aboard the Washington State Ferries
The Qantas 32 guys did one. Captain was RAAF.
Our QRH procedure for structural damage says to evaluate the aircraft's controlability in the landing configuration too. It seems like a good idea, although I've received positively no training about it.
GypsyPilot
Mohawk Town
Pretty much every article or piece on info I've ever read recommends assessing your aircraft capabilities and performance after a structural issue. It seems like common sense quite honestly... Why figure out your aircraft is uncontrollable at slow speed when you're out of altitude attempting to land?
Autothrust Blue
Welcome aboard the Washington State Ferries
Quite so. Although, like I said, the only training that I've had about that sort of thing was a part of EMT (I think). I haven't heard much, if anything, about it at the airlines.
You have to do it in landing configuration, for if the plane isn't controllable in a landing config (even with higher speeds), you aren't landing in any controlled state, and are either bailing out, or something else worse if you don't possess that capability.
Just like Hacker15e mentioned, all it entails is essentially configuring the aircraft at altitude for approach/landing, and slowing back to your computed final approach speed (or whatever you can get to) while still being able to maintain aircraft control. If you can do that, you can likely land safely.
Problem is, with a structural damaged aircraft, the controllability check is designed to show you what you have right here, right now, to deal with. Keeping the aircraft airborne beyond what's needed to safely get to an practical airfield risks shedding parts or other problems with airframe deformity that now changes whether or not the plane can stay airborne and also possibly invalidates the controllability check in landing config that you had just accomplished. Meaning that the controllability check you do now, may or may not be valid 10/20/50/etc miles from now. A plane that was workable to land now, may get worse (or even better, in some cases) as time passes. Either way, you've just become an instant test pilot.
Just something to consider highly. Since keeping a damaged airplane airborne beyond what's operationally necessary for the emergency in peacetime, is far different than keeping it airborne over enemy territory to try to avoid becoming a POW.
Again...just food for thought.
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D
Deleted member 21509
Guest
As someone who has never been in a situation like that, why wouldn't someone just circle over somewhere like OAK while performing those checks? At least there you have multiple runways and a lot of space if the **** hits the fan. It may take the same amount of time to run the checks as to fly to Ione, but if the situation goes from, "we have time to assess the damage" to "we need to get on the ground NOW" wouldn't it make a lot of sense to be over the top of an airport?
etflies
Keeping calm, Chiving on.
Dallen said:
If the surrounding area is full of people and I'm not sure how much control I'll have then I'm sure as hell not going to test it out over the heads of the public.
In the bay area I suppose you can try and stay over the water but even then it seems to me I'd be putting a lot of folks at risk who don't need to be.
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Nothing says you can't do that. It's one technique. So long as its a useable aircraft for your needs, this is perfectly viable. Keeping in mind what it is you're flying over, of course, and as mentioned previously.
PositionAndHold
Well-Known Member
Heading east out of the Bay Area gets less and less populated quickly. Circling over OAK puts you either over water or city. If he had to bail the only place to point the aircraft (if he can get it pointed that way for a controlled bail out) is towards the water. Which means he's likely to go swimming as well. If I had a choice to bail over land or water, all things being equal, I'm picking land. If your knocked out/injured during the bail out you don't have to worry about swimming or drowning because your not conscious. All speculation of course since I've never been confronted with the decision.
Hacker15e
Who am I? Where are my pants?
As I posted earlier, the home field presents a number of important advantages that Oakland wouldn't.
- Your own people on VHF who know your rare aircraft, have the technical data for your rare aircraft, and can be your "virtual wingman" by helping talk you through the process of handling the emergency, reading checklists, giving other ideas and information, etc
- The potential to have a similar aircraft (the Sanders folks have several Sea Furies) launch and be your chase aircraft -- to give you a visual once-over and help assess the damage, as well as perform all of the other roles a wingman does during an emergency (basically someone to monitor the big picture while you focus on the stick-and-rudder small picture of handing the emergency).
We're getting pretty far into technique here. The important take-away is that not all emergencies are "land as soon as possible" -- some are "land as soon as conditions permit", and this very well may have been one of those times that, having not been in the cockpit and without knowing a lot of other details, we are not really in a position to second-guess the judgment used or decision made.
Hacker15e
Who am I? Where are my pants?
If that's the case, then this is one of those situations that, IMHO, as a professional pilot you should spend some dedicated time chair-flying through. It isn't something that you can really think out on-the-fly while the airplane is broken and you have both hands and most of your brain bytes full just handling. Pulling out the QRH/checklist/whatever isn't going to be much of a roadmap, either, so you're going to have to think about it and rehearse it yourself beforehand.
In general terms, here's the methodology; the objective is to slow down incrementally to find the slowest speed (above or at your calculated approach speed) where the airplane is still deliberately controllable. In the USAF fast-jet community, we defined that as being 3/4 of control deflection in any one direction -- if the controls are all the way at the stops just to stay straight and level, it really isn't controllable, per se. If at ANY time you get to a point where you can no longer deliberately control the airplane, then stop whatever you changed, back up a step, and the last speed where you had control is your approach speed/configuration that you will use.
- Climb to a safe altitude and airspeed. In a higher performance airplane, it would be above 10K IMO, but it depends on the performance of your airplane. Have enough altitude that you can depart controlled flight, regain airspeed, and regain control if you go too slow while trying to figure out the correct approach speed.
- Calculate your Vref/landing speed based on current weights. Based on your chosen landing field, calculate the fastest you can land and still stop in the available distance. Now you have a bracket to shoot for when doing your check.
- Slow to just below Vfe and Vle, and prepare to configure
-- Start with the flaps, and apply them one notch at a time, paying careful attention to how control changes as flap setting changes. It may be that no flaps are acceptable
-- Once you are happy with the flaps, time to drop the gear. Be ready to put the handle back up if you lose control during the gear extension cycle -- remember, there are a lot of doors and parts that dangle into the wind during retraction and extension, and you don't know how the structural damage may have damaged the gear, doors, the sequencing, etc.
- Once you are in the landing configuration you desire, start slowing down toward your computed approach speed in 10-knot increments. Pause at each increment, and make gentle turns/climbs/descents to assess controllability. Again, if you start to lose control, go back to the speed/configuration that last worked, and stick with it (even if you burn down more gas between now and landing and the weight change will change your approach speed).
Remember, these emergencies also don't take place in a vacuum -- how would it be different in VMC vs IMC; what if there were other emergencies along with the structural damage like a fire or abnormal gear configuration, or something like smoke in the cockpit or a partial panel? Would you want to orbit the nearest field, or go to a field further away that is better equipped to get you on the ground or help you out when you get there? How are you going to crew coordinate (in a multi-pilot crew) who is doing what, looking at what, and saying what while you do all of this configuring and speed changing?
The USAF's methodology for teaching and practicing emergency procedures relies heavily on being on the ground, and methodically talking your way through these type of scenarios. Being in a group of other pilots who can add in things you may not be thinking about (especially since it sounds like the manufacturer or your company don't provide much guidance here).
There's are a LOT more aircraft-specific, situation-specific, and location-specific things to consider here that I don't know about, so take the time to seek out those details and work them in to your specific training.
D
Deleted member 27505
Guest
I like the blended model myself... Do the checks over the open fields of the valley, then land at a big-ass runway like Stockton, or better, the old BUFF base at Castle. Seems to capture all desirable elements except, perhaps, the local mechanic, reinstallation of potentially missing paperwork, flat-bed ride to home base, and cold beers waiting upon landing.
Hacker15e
Who am I? Where are my pants?
IMHO, without knowing what happened and what the condition of the airplane was -- or any of the other dozens of real world factors that were being dealt with real time -- that is way too specific of an armchair quarterback play for this incident. Maybe in 6 months when we're reading the NTSB summary such a thing could be suggested with some validity.
Inverted
mmmmmm wine
There is the rational of looking for the longest, most suitableist, bestist airport ever. There is also a calculated, experienced based decision-making process by overly qualified pilots that comes into play. Ione might not have the longest or widest runway, but if the airplane is flyable through controllability checks, whats the harm in going to home base? You can always be more safe, but it is too soon to tell what actually happened to the plane, and the rational for doing so. I can tell you what, once Cory declared, and stated his destination, emergency services were there ready to go.