Recovering from a "bad landing"

Fly_Unity said:
I had a 1500 hour pilot who couldnt not do good landings in a new type... we tried and tried. Finally I said "Are you looking down the runway?" From then his landings were good. Who would have ever thought to tell a 1500 hour pilot to look down the runway? Its natual when trying to do a good job or nervous to bring your eyes close in.
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The last time someone told me to look down the runway I was a student pilot, 18,000 hours later I always look down the runway in case of somebody or something crossing it.
 
Go find a Luscombe if you can, but really any taildragger will suffice - get your endorsement, but have the instructor really work you on x-wind landings - like all the time. Land a taildragger in a stiff x-wind and master that and you'll never ever feel weird about landings again. Particularly in nosegear machines.
 
Sometimes, the airplane decides to prematurely cease its toil. Like yesterday in SF...I would call that an "arrival!"

But it was straight, and no drift and in the touchdown zone.

Don't worry, you'll see it again...
 
Sounds like you need time in the seat. Reading your post, you seem relatively low time. Not meant as a dig, just an observation.

Take every opportunity to go fly alone. Just you and the airplane. Work where you are weak. For me, flying airplanes really clicked when it was just me and the airplane. There wasn't anyone critiquing my profile, the approach, or the landing. You have enough experience that you know what the right profile looks like, the correct sight picture is on the approach and what you want out of a landing. Do that for awhile, and then go fly with someone that you respect and ask them if they see any fundamentals that you might need to bone up on.
 
GX said:
Sounds like you need time in the seat. Reading your post, you seem relatively low time. Not meant as a dig, just an observation.

Take every opportunity to go fly alone. Just you and the airplane. Work where you are weak. For me, flying airplanes really clicked when it was just me and the airplane. There wasn't anyone critiquing my profile, the approach, or the landing. You have enough experience that you know what the right profile looks like, the correct sight picture is on the approach and what you want out of a landing. Do that for awhile, and then go fly with someone that you respect and ask them if they see any fundamentals that you might need to bone up on.
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That is great advice. Thank you very much. I am pretty low time, and the experience column has a ways to go that is for sure. I did have a few good x-wind landings on my last trip though :)
 
My second time landing in the Falcon 50 was this week with my boss. 10 knots down the runway. He requested the cross wind runway and told me not to hit the slats. Good way to learn!

Also, my landings were consistently horrible when I went to the Challenger. Always bad. Then I flew with @mikecweb once in a contract trip. He gave me 2 pointers and they have been greasers since. Go fly with @mikecweb!
 
There's a lame old joke in this field "Any landing you can walk away from is a good one, and any landing where they can use the airplane again is a great one." To an extent, this is actually very true. I see a distressing amount of airline pilots trying to grease a landing while forfeiting hundreds of feet of runway.

I'm at that point professionally where I'd rather plant it in the touchdown zone and get razzed by the FAs than try to eek out some fleeting fantasy of a smooth landing.

Obviously experience will be your best teacher and the Caravan is nimble airplane. But my advice is to focus on improving your technique and don't let pride cloud your judgement.
 
If they have to issue a new 10-9 because of your landing, well, ..... Otherwise, if you walked away, it's all good.
 
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