Too fast.......too high!

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An awfully cavalier attitude for messing up so bad.

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Where'd he "mess up so bad"? Messing up bad is pressing a bad approach to touch down and ending up in a gas station off the end of the runway. This has happened more than once in commercial aviation with occasionally fatal results. Learning early in your career that there is no shame in a go-around or a 360 is putting you on the way to being a real professional pilot.

Some good lessons here:

1) The heavier you are loaded, the harder it is to get down. All that mass that was so hard to haul up there now works as stored energy, overcoming drag. Competition glider pilots know all about it, they actually carry water to help them cover distance fast (if the lift is good).

2) The best way to get down is to slow up and get the drag out. Always should be the first option over pushing the nose down and staying clean. Doing the latter means you won't come down as fast for the amount of ground you cover (which is the point in the first place) and you will set yourself up for violating speed limits and an unstable approach inside of 1,000' AGL.


So, good job! An old VFR route I used to fly had a nudist colony under it. Great for SA! Although after I started flying Europe and the Carribean it all seemed kind of pointless.
 
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Learning early in your career that there is no shame in a go-around or a 360 is putting you on the way to being a real professional pilot.

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We're not talking about a no-fault go around here, we are talking plain and simple poor judgment and execution. The type that shouldn't be happening at the 121 level. I place 100% blame on the Capt/Check airman. Not only did he fail to properly supervise an FOs learning experience, he waited until the last minute to "correct" the error. It was bad enough that he required a 360 to loose altitude....but he had to do it TWICE IN ONE WEEK?!?!?! This guy should go back to the right seat himself. If he can't get a turbo prop with two 13 foot diameter speed brakes (props) to loose altitude, he doesn't stand a chance in a jet.

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2) ...Doing the latter means you won't come down as fast for the amount of ground you cover (which is the point in the first place) and you will set yourself up for violating speed limits and an unstable approach inside of 1,000' AGL.

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No, the point is to plan your descent to arrive at the right point in space at the right speed. All while providing a comfortable ride to the passengers. Not turns on a point to loose altitude while dropping a few "extra" thousand fpm. Gotta go with 767 on this one.....very amateur.

Everyone blows it once in a while (several years apart), even the "Chuck Yeager" types. But to have a CA do 360s twice in a week is sub par.
 
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No, the point is to plan your descent to arrive at the right point in space at the right speed. All while providing a comfortable ride to the passengers. Not turns on a point to loose altitude while dropping a few "extra" thousand fpm. Gotta go with 767 on this one.....very amateur.

Everyone blows it once in a while (several years apart), even the "Chuck Yeager" types. But to have a CA do 360s twice in a week is sub par.

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Never thought of that! Never make the mistake in the first place! D'oh! My career would have been so much easier.
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I don't have a problem with the recovery from being out of position. Seems reasonable to me.

I most likely over-reacted to his post...but the "smack talk" description, from an airline pilot, always irks me. Maybe it's because I observe more of it lately. If they crash the airplane...the rest of the airline pilot community gets red faced when the CVR tape is released.

A cavalier cockpit is one that's in jeopardy of error...not one that's likely to mitigate it. I know...because I've been in that cockpit...it's when I've made the most mistakes. Maybe that cockpit was more disciplined than I gleaned from his post...but then again...they were out of position twice. Flying with a friend excaserbates this...and many times makes it more difficult to maintain flight discipline.

I'll redact my earlier assumptions and now assume they were operating in a professional demeanor. In that case, good work.
 
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We're not talking about a no-fault go around here, we are talking plain and simple poor judgment and execution. The type that shouldn't be happening at the 121 level. I place 100% blame on the Capt/Check airman. Not only did he fail to properly supervise an FOs learning experience, he waited until the last minute to "correct" the error. It was bad enough that he required a 360 to loose altitude....but he had to do it TWICE IN ONE WEEK?!?!?! This guy should go back to the right seat himself. If he can't get a turbo prop with two 13 foot diameter speed brakes (props) to loose altitude, he doesn't stand a chance in a jet.

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This pretty much sums up my feelings upon reading the post in the first place.
 
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I'll redact my earlier assumptions and now assume they were operating in a professional demeanor. In that case, good work.

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I just wanted to make the point that go arounds are a good thing. Having started my career before the "stabilized approach" philosophy I got to see way too many approaches pressed to a landing that shouldn't have been. In fact my very first landing in the DC-8 as a new engineer they almost ran it off the runway. The Line Check engineer had to do the after landing flow over my shoulder then pry my fingers off the arm rests.

Later, as a captain, I noticed (on the rare occasions it happened) how hard it was to convince my partner to abandon an approach. Then I got into windshear training. Frustration at not being able to get crews to abandon approaches once they had started them (beflore they have to do an all-out recovery). It's a hard thing to do! You get conditioned to landing the airplane. Go around = failure.

So I always cheer when someone admits their mistake and does the go around. Well done to the LCA for making it seem like a non-event, it was. And everybody gets out of shape occasionally. Well almost everybody. There were two of us and I retired.
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Let's talk about today. Did a simple 4 leg local from PSP to LAX SBP LAX PSP. Going from LAX to SBP I elected to be extra cautious about my approach since last weeks embarassment. I was slowed down to a respectable approach speed about 20 miles out going into SBP. That approach requires us to use flaps 45 on landing which in turn requires a high torque setting. Feels a little weird. Anyways, the approach started to feel very weird at about 10 miles out, the trim didn't seem right no matter where I set it at. At about 4 miles out we were cleared to land and cessna was given instructions to go around. The airspeed flucuated about 10-15 knots or so on the approach(no big deal, well within limits of aircraft and personal limits as well). The whole time withint the 10 miles I just didn't feel right. Then it happend. At about 50' AGL the plane just started dropping right out from under me. It was at the point where you take your eyes off the airspeed and start looking for the flare so I couldn't glance at the speed to see if we had any wind shear. Since the field is only 5,000' or so there wasnt much room to mess around. I immediately applied a good amount of power and the plain hovered over the runway. This airport was no place to be salvaging a landing. I immediately called for missed approach, set power, flaps 15, positive rate, gear up. We went around. It was the weirdest gut feeling approaching that airport today and finally at the end it happend. We just went around in the pattern and landed safely a minute later.
 
Im asking this in ignorance, But in the kingair i used to fly, if you really pulled it back it would drop out of the sky, How can you plan that badly, that you wouldnt be able to get down. Just wondrin'. I have no E120 time, so it really could be something difficult or some good reason.
 
Hmm, I disagree with a lot of the thrust of this thread. As a LCA and Capt, I have oft let f/o's go further along then would work, knowing that part of the learning experience is learning how to dig themselves out of a hole. Now, it's one thing VMC, obviously in certain parts of the world or traffic conditions, you can't allow that, but to the airports he mentioned, I really don't see the big deal.

I think the check airman was trying to show off a bit on his approach, and it bit him, and I do think that he should not be doing that. Superior knowledge to avoid use of superior skill applies to that case, but I have no fault with the LCA letting the f/o go too far, nor do I find any fault with a g/a.

Way too much of "better than thou" in this thread, though. The laughing would sound bad on the tape, I do agree with that. I don't think I have ever laughed in that situation, but I have told the guys that I owed them a beer after we got in the chocks, which is the way we handle most of those types of goofs "that's a beer!". Too expensive to do that too often, esp if you get tagged for it in Japan or something!
 
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We just went around in the pattern and landed safely a minute later.

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No fault. Good decision
 
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...I have told the guys that I owed them a beer after we got in the chocks, which is the way we handle most of those types of goofs "that's a beer!".

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You can't buy (some of) these guys BEER!!!! There not even 21 yet
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21? Mr Ed, Iain, and I are heading to Vegas tommorrow to buy Ed his first legal beer and gamble for the first time.


BTW- I do see what you guys are talking about with the CVR. Specially in a day like today. Everythings a learning experience. Also, I think theres some misunderstanding. The CA didn't go around. I did. He just over shot final so bad that we did a 360 and came back around.

That idea of once the chocks are on is a pretty good one. I think I'll stick to that from now on.
 
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