gliding back to your departure airport

David Megginson wrote:
Confirm this with someone who knows better, but from what I've heard,
you need only about 20 ft of deceleration to have a chance of
surviving a landing in a Cherokee/172/Musketeer-class aircraft. That
suggests that setting down in a developed area (an unoccupied part,
preferably) might be survivable.

Tom Pappano wrote:
I would think, in a "172" or similar class airplane, if you have your
seatbelts and shoulder harnesses on, flaps down, minimum controllable
airspeed, and *maintain control*, you should be able to land on (or
into) almost anything and survive with minor injury. I know of two
landings on top of houses that were both "walk aways".

I've heard this too. And it makes sense to me. And I would shoot for
trees if that were the best option and I had time and altitude to pick
the spot. The problem with the area surrounding PDK is that it is so
densely developed one would be hard pressed, especially in a low
altitude emergency situation, to pick an appropriate and unoccupied place.

I personally would not deliberatly shoot for a house; can't tell who's
inside.

The biggest issue for me around PDK is powerlines. There are multiple
multilane roads on three sides of PDK, but even if they weren't *always*
occupied by heavy traffic, they are criss-crossed with power lines every
few hundred feet. Snag a powerline, and you've lost control, at the
very least.

Take a look at www.terraserver.com; search for Lat: 33.873596938 and
Lon: -84.30184815. All the trees you see surrounding the airport are in
someone's (tiny) yard, except for a stretch just off the end of 27 (the
least used runway). There's a golf course off west, but if you can
glide to that, you're high enough to get back to the airport; plus it's
at 90 degrees to the main runways anyway.

Like I said, I figure in this particular place, the best way to increase
my chances of survival is get as much altitude within the shortest
distance as possible.

--
David Hill
david at hillREMOVETHISfamily.org
Sautee-Nacoochee, GA, USA

filters, they're not just for coffee anymore
The following needn't bother to reply, you are filtered:
Juan E Jimenez, Barnyard BOb, Larry Smith, John Nada

There was a good article by Barry Schiff last year in AOPA Pilot about
this. I went out and tried it in my 182. I had originally thought that
you would need a healthy shove forward on the controls to keep from
stalling. This is not the case, the plane will simply nose down to
maintain the trimmed airspeed. I need 200 feet to complete a 180 and
another 150 feet to get back to the departure runway. That is only
using a 45 degree bank, the article shows that 60 degrees is optimal.



Roger Tracy wrote:

This is a good thing to test at altitude and know ahead of time. There's
going to be a certain height AGL that you just can't get turned around.
You should know what that is for your plane.


"Harold" wrote in message
...

If a small single engine plane can out-climb its engine-out glide ratio

from

take off through the top of climb point, wouldn't it follow that it can
always theoretically make it back to the departure airport in the event of
engine failure ? Assuming straight out departure, no wind, and the

altitude

loss in the 180 turnback is offset by the runway portion you didn't use.

If

my best glide is 85 KTAS and it loses 700 fpm at that speed, shouldn't I

be

guaranteed I can make it back if I climb at 84 KTAS and 701 fpm ?

Larry Dighera wrote:



The mathematics of turning back to the airport have been thoroughly
discussed in the newsgroup a while back. I suggest you do a
www.deja.com search for articles authored by John Lowry on the
subject.

Yeah he's a genius. That's why he keeps wrecking aircraft.

If by your statement above, you mean that the runway is long enough
that if you can't turn back, you can land straight ahead, then of
course your statement is trivially true. If not, how can you turn back
from 10'?


Do it the way the Space Shuttle does it (theoretically). If they have an
abort between liftoff and 4 min 20 sec (I think), they are supposed to
execute an RTLS abort (Return to Launch Site). Problem is that no matter
what the situation is, they can't do squat until the SRB's are off the
stack. Once those puppies are lit, your in for a 2 minute ride whether you
want one or not.

After the SRB's seperate, the shuttle is supposed to fly around with just
the External Tank attached for long enough to burn up fuel and then they cut
the engines (if there are any burning) and drop the tank, then glide safely
home (again...theoretically). After the 4:20, I guess they file a missed
approach and are diverted.....to SPAIN!!!!

I truly hope that it is never required, but I've always wondered if this
thing would actually work. We all know that the Shuttle has a glide ratio
somewhere between my Ford Ranger and a brick 0, so it would be interesting
to see how this thing would actually play out.

I don't think this procedure is ever going to make it into our C150 POH's.
But who knows. 100 years ago, we weren't supposed to be able to fly either.
Hrmmm. "Introducing the all new 2067 Model Cessna 150, complete with your
choice of Wheel Pants or JATO packs....."


Jeff

wow...sorry, way off topic........More on RTLS if you ca

http://makeashorterlink.com/?G2B044B46

Not unless you are planning to glide straight ahead. You will lose a lot of
altitude in the turn.

Mike
MU-2


"Harold" wrote in message
...
If a small single engine plane can out-climb its engine-out glide ratio
from
take off through the top of climb point, wouldn't it follow that it can
always theoretically make it back to the departure airport in the event of
engine failure ? Assuming straight out departure, no wind, and the
altitude
loss in the 180 turnback is offset by the runway portion you didn't use.
If
my best glide is 85 KTAS and it loses 700 fpm at that speed, shouldn't I
be
guaranteed I can make it back if I climb at 84 KTAS and 701 fpm ?

BTIZ wrote:

George.. where do you get all these neat quotes for your sig line

This particular one comes from "To War in a Stringbag", by Commander Lamb, RN.
IIRC, he was relating an incident early in the war in which he was scud-running
in Scotland.

When I run into something in my reading that I like, I change my sig file for
a while. When I get tired of it, I'll change it to one of my favorites, such
as this one.

George Patterson
To a pilot, altitude is like money - it is possible that having too much
could prove embarassing, but having too little is always fatal.

"Newps" schrieb im Newsbeitrag
news:qnnlb.838361$YN5.947383@sccrnsc01...
There was a good article by Barry Schiff last year in AOPA Pilot about
this. I went out and tried it in my 182. [schnipp]

i'd be interested in the article - any link to that?

regards from loww, vie, vienna, austria
wolfgang

"Harold" wrote in message ...

Well obviously, but I'm not talking about in the pattern area like the
Impossible Turn is. I'm talking about 10 minutes after departure at 7k feet
where the departure airport, if you can make it, is the best landing option.
Then for all intents and purposes its a 180 degree turn.


Absolutely. As long as you have continued climbing at a higher rate
than the descent will be.

About 2 years ago I got to practice this. On an early morning
takeoff for a 300 mile cross-country flight, the OAT was cool and the
plane was light, so I climbed out at 900 ft./min. to reach my cruising
altitude quickly. At around 9K ft. the engine got real loud and I
realized I had broken something in the exhaust. I shut down the
engine so as not to catch the cowl on fire. I was 6 miles away from
the airport and knew I had climbed at much better than the 750 ft./min
descent rate, so the return glide was really a no-stress event. When
I got back to the pattern, I actually had about 1K ft. too much
altitude and had to circle to lose it before deadsticking on to the
same runway I had departed.

John Galban=====N4BQ (PA28-180)

"Harold" wrote in message
...
Well obviously, but I'm not talking about in the pattern area like the
Impossible Turn is. I'm talking about 10 minutes after departure at 7k
feet
where the departure airport, if you can make it, is the best landing
option.
Then for all intents and purposes its a 180 degree turn.


In that case you might want to use ft/nm as a better measurement.

jerry

"Harold" wrote in message .. .
If a small single engine plane can out-climb its engine-out glide ratio from
take off through the top of climb point, wouldn't it follow that it can
always theoretically make it back to the departure airport in the event of
engine failure ? Assuming straight out departure, no wind, and the altitude
loss in the 180 turnback is offset by the runway portion you didn't use. If
my best glide is 85 KTAS and it loses 700 fpm at that speed, shouldn't I be
guaranteed I can make it back if I climb at 84 KTAS and 701 fpm ?

I have a close friend who was an experienced pilot (IFR rating - 6
years of flying - owned his own plane) and had engine failure on
takeoff and did not make it back to the airport. He was practicing a
short field take off which probably didn't help the situation but
impacted terrain about 1/4 mile short of the runway (he hit power
lines that were right next to this airport). Anyway, he died of
injuries from the crash. The wing sheared during the impact dumping
fuel into the cockpit and started a bad fire but fortunately death
occurred upon impact.

Reports placed him at about 700 ft of altitude when engine failure
occurred but it could have been lower than this value.