Two Motor-Gliders(?) Landing at Once

Jpax

Jpax

Well-Known Member
Hey Folks,

Captured this sight today while holding for release. These two motor-gliders/ultralights/traffic-holder-uppers were following directly behind each other. This was at a towered airport, and they ended up landing within 10-15 seconds of each other. Both were on the runway at the same time and ended up with a ground separation that didn't seem to be anymore than 500 feet max.

I don't know squat about motor-gliders or ultralight rules, so what is the deal with landing so close to each other, and having a landing roll out at the same time?

See photo attached. And-- anyone know what these are? :confused:

Thanks,

Jpax
 

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Cool.

Those are "Lambada" touring LSA motor-gliders.

http://www.urbanairusa.com/lambada.php

I don't know about doing this at a towered airport. But during a contest arrival, you might have 60 sailplanes (not necessarliy motor-gliders) landing at an un-controlled field in 10 minutes.

So if these pilots have some contest experience, they are used to having 4 or 5 aircraft on each leg of the pattern at once.

It gets exciting at times, but we all just follow each other, and its usually a big 400 foot wide grass runway, with 3 landing lanes, you pick the least busy one, and just roll-out (3 wide) behind the guy in front of you.
 
tlewis95 said:
Cool.

Those are "Lambada" touring LSA motor-gliders.

http://www.urbanairusa.com/lambada.php

I don't know about doing this at a towered airport. But during a contest arrival, you might have 60 sailplanes (not necessarliy motor-gliders) landing at an un-controlled field in 10 minutes.

.......
Click to expand...

Excellent, thanks for the info. Nifty little planes, with a possible 49ft wingspan, impressive!

Off to bed, I guess I'll find out my answer tomorrow :)
 
I would assume no. Formation flight? What IF the first plane stopped quickly and the second had a longer roll out? I know nothing about gliders so who knows.
 
Its common that they arrange that the first airplane lands long and rolls to the end of the runway, the next will land short and stop quickly... I flew a glider once, and the guy behind me asked me over the radio to land long...and I replied I would. And then things happened, I got busy, and I simply forgot to land long... the other pilot was less than pleased!!! Anyway, perfectly safe as long as they're not forgetful as me.
 
They've been doing flights of 2 and 3 here a lot a MLB over the past few months. Ive been meaning to go over there and take a ride in one. Looks pretty cool.
 
Re: Two Motor-Gliders(?) Landnce

That is a pretty bad ass airplane! "Usefull load of over 600lbs allows for two 200lbs pilots, 100lbs of luggage and full fuel in both wing tanks of 26 gallons to fly over 800miles!" 1600fpm climb? I am impressed, very cool.
 
Were they operating as a formation? We do wing landings, where the two airplanes land right next to each other on either side of the runway centerline...

Of course, we're military. We have exceptions to pretty much every rule out there... so I don't know if the same thing would be legal on the civilian side.
 
I believe they were in formation, if I recall correctly, there was only one radio call for the two of them? Didn't pay much attention to it until I realized that the spacing seemed wayyy closer than it should be.

And Sidious, any more info on these guys? Rates?
 
I'm sure it's in the FARs somewhere, but is it a big deal to touch down well behind an airplane that's still on the runway, but is at that moment starting to turn off onto a taxiway? Say this is a towered field and you were #2 to land.
 
It is legal. I have seen it a few times at KGEU (class D). First aircraft makes/answers radio calls that are a command/clearance/requests for both aircraft.
 
Back in the old days, they would let us pipeline guys do a formation take off at TUL. (we was special):D

As I recall, they would allow folks they knew to land long and short because they had to keep 3000 feet between aircraft. Regulars that they knew who could and would do what they said they would, a lot of times were shoehorned in with the other 5 PM traffic.

Of course at Oshkosh, Sun-N-Fun and similar, they cut things a lot closer but generally if you fly from the same field every day and they know what you can do and you never miss or cause a problem and you go visit the tower and radar room and be polite and give rides and in general be a real brown nose you will find your life much easier. :D
 
Jpax said:
And Sidious, any more info on these guys? Rates?
Click to expand...


Tell you the truth I dont know to much other than they were looking for some instructors to give glider instruction a few months back. They were trying to have them under the airplane and glider category. I haven't heard much since...

You should go over and talk to them, then let me know the rates :)
 
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