... and more mechanically reliable, too!
Crosswind Landing
- Thread starter Rustic23
- Start date
Yep, the B-52 could do this, and I'm told it was really handy. But remember that their nose and main gear were all on the centerline (like a bicycle), with small wheels on the retractable struts near the wingtips.
The C-5A had a more conventional gear arrangement (no wingtip wheels), but it also had mains that could caster to align them with the runway during a crosswind landing. It looked good on the drawing board, but it was one of the things that made the C-5 landing gear legendary as a maintenance nightmare. The only thing that broke more often on the C-5A was the MADAR--the automatic system that was supposed to keep track of what was broken!
SecondCor521
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Koolau
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Yeah, It's called an aircraft carrier.
Thanks, but I'll do it the old fashioned way - on the ground, even if it is a cross wind.
Koolau
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I know it's not nearly this bad in San Diego - but it feels like it from inside the aircraft. Once you drop over the mountains, you descend between the high rises on either side. The car rentals used to be at the bottom of the mountain (may still be), just across a field from the numbers. After renting a car there one time, I walked out the door and nearly hit the deck as a plane seemed to come out of nowhere right overhead. Should have known because I'm sure our plane scared someone in the same parking lot an hour before.
Back to cross-wind landings, no matter how scary they look in the videos - they are worse from inside the cockpit. Going sideways down the runway, knowing that you have to touch down and end up going straight (all while carrying quite a bit of power to keep from being blown sideways off the runway) is a lot to handle. I can't imagine doing it in a jet powered aircraft because the lag time between throttle and power is significant, unlike in a piston powered aircraft.
OP
OP
Rustic23
Thinks s/he gets paid by the post
Koolau,
While jets take longer to spool up, they spool down much faster. i.e. when you pull the throttles back the thrust is gone. Now on some turbo props there is another potential problem. One I flew took the pitch out of the prop when you pushed the throttles forward, when the rpm came up to speed it put the pitch back in. The results was a loss of thrust when you pushed the throttles forward. There was a lever to set rpm at 98 to 100% on landing and that prevented it close to the ground.
While jets take longer to spool up, they spool down much faster. i.e. when you pull the throttles back the thrust is gone. Now on some turbo props there is another potential problem. One I flew took the pitch out of the prop when you pushed the throttles forward, when the rpm came up to speed it put the pitch back in. The results was a loss of thrust when you pushed the throttles forward. There was a lever to set rpm at 98 to 100% on landing and that prevented it close to the ground.
Koolau
Give me a museum and I'll fill it. (Picasso) Give me a forum ...
Pucker time if you ever forget to set it and then need the power!
Kind of like the time I was going to shoot a touch and go into a much shorter field than I was used to - with trees at the end. Went in with 40 deg flaps - then forgot to put 'em back up to 20 for climb out. "What the heqq is wrong with this thing? Here come the trees and I'm 10 feet off the ground and can't climb!" Figured it out in the time it takes to tell it, but couldn't try it again that day. Knees were too watery to work the rudder pedals correctly. The site picture of those trees coming up is still with me 40 years later. Can you spell "checklist" Koolau?
Some lessons are hard.For those who want to get (too) close to a jumbo jet going about 180 mph, of course there is world-renowned Maho Beach in Saint Maarten:
Duck and cover:
YouTube - 747 Landing - St.Maarten
YouTube - Air France A340 landing Princess Juliana Int. st Maarten
YouTube - 747 Landing a Little Too Close
Sandblasting action:
YouTube - Jumbo Jet vs People on the Beach
Duck and cover:
YouTube - 747 Landing - St.Maarten
YouTube - Air France A340 landing Princess Juliana Int. st Maarten
YouTube - 747 Landing a Little Too Close
Sandblasting action:
YouTube - Jumbo Jet vs People on the Beach
FUEGO
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What's even scarier is watching an aircraft being pushed off of final to the runway, so they end up more or less lined up with a parallel taxiway. I'd imagine it's probably even more disconcerting for the pilots taxiing out on that same taxiway.
Is that fence between the beach and the runway frangible?
First time I saw a video of Maho beach, I thought how odd it was that they did not put one of those blast deflecting walls at the end of the runway to protect the people on the beach from being blasted away. But after seeing how aircraft on final barely clear fence, I better understand the reluctance to put a concrete wall there.
This is a pretty short runway for heavies, so they have no choice but to put it down as close to the end of the runway as possible.It is now!Is that fence between the beach and the runway frangible?
I bet the maintenance crew gets tired of picking barbed wire out of the tire treads.
I guess that's why aircraft carriers have jet-blast deflectors... the safety nets around the flight deck only catch you if you're falling down, not blasted straight out over them.
While we're on the subject of flying objects, what's the aviation significance of a "dirty roll"? Is it simply dangerous because it's so close to the ground with so little recovery time, or is it considered impressive because of the high angle of attack before the roll?
This Military.com video of a Canadian F-18 calls it "insane", and I certainly agree with that, but I think they're using the adjective a little differently than I would...
Videos and Photos of Army Special Ops, Navy SEALs, Air Force, Marines, Coast Guard in Action - Shock and Awe - Military.com
This Military.com video of a Canadian F-18 calls it "insane", and I certainly agree with that, but I think they're using the adjective a little differently than I would...
Videos and Photos of Army Special Ops, Navy SEALs, Air Force, Marines, Coast Guard in Action - Shock and Awe - Military.com
cantlogin
Full time employment: Posting here.
The aircraft in that clip is considered to be aerodynamically "dirty" because of the extended landing gear and flaps.
Pucker time if you ever forget to set it and then need the power!
Ahh, I had one of those, too - instead of trees it was the skeet range in front of me! Finally realized the flaps were down and was amazed at the lift without them
Dad flew jets and said he never fully throttled down because the spool-up time could mean splat time. One thing about the prop jobs is less lag between the controls and response. Of course, they don't fly as fast As far as cross wind landings - yes, what fun - just hoping you can right the plane and/or not tip a wing too far down to ensure you are lined up properly on the runway for your landing - real sporting - AND, really focuses the mind.
In the early days of flying they didn't use runways. They used a "flying field" big flat field. They always landed into the wind. Would be nice now.
ziggy29
Moderator Emeritus
Makes sense. Flying into the wind allows you to come in at a slower speed relative to the ground and thus requires less "runway" space to complete the landing.
For example, when I was flying a Cessna 150 I'd usually be touching down right near the stall speed -- at an airspeed of roughly 50 knots, IIRC. If I were to land into a 10 knot headwind, my speed at landing relative to the ground was only 40 knots as a result. In contrast, landing with a 10 knot tailwind has you touching down at 60, meaning more risk if something goes wrong in the landing *and* a need for more runway.
Koolau
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In the early days of flying they didn't use runways. They used a "flying field" big flat field. They always landed into the wind. Would be nice now. (quote)
There is such a field (in concrete, no less) at Converse IN. Never been there and I see from the satellite that they've put some designated runways on it now. Converse's field used to be a recurring subject of our FBO coffee corner - back in the day. See -
Converse, Indiana IN Community Profile / Miami County, IN Data
There is such a field (in concrete, no less) at Converse IN. Never been there and I see from the satellite that they've put some designated runways on it now. Converse's field used to be a recurring subject of our FBO coffee corner - back in the day. See -
Converse, Indiana IN Community Profile / Miami County, IN Data
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Ever try to land with a tail wind? I tried once experimentally in a Cessna 172. Could not get it on the ground at all on the 3500 ft runway! Just kept floating.
Saw a guy take off downwind once. He made it over the trees, barely.
Saw a guy take off downwind once. He made it over the trees, barely.
Wow! Wonder what that is all about? There are some hangers in the way though. Must have been some Government project.
ziggy29
Moderator Emeritus
Once, during some confusion at the airstrip. The main runways were 9 and 27, and on this day the winds were such that when I took off, the winds dictated using 9 though it was almost a pure crosswind of maybe 5-6 knots. While I was up, they shifted such that landing on 9 had a decent tailwind. This runway was also about 3500' long and yeah, I didn't get it down until almost halfway down the strip. I was really close to initiating a go-around because of running out of runway when I finally got it down. And this was as a student pilot on my third-ever solo.
A few minutes later when I got the plane back to the FBO, they switched the active to 27...
Koolau
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One of my flight instructors had flown for (I think) the Airforce. He told the story of taking off with a slight tailwind at (I think - 40+ years, etc.) Albuquerque. Apparently, he would have had to taxi the length of the runway to get to headwind conditions and decided he could take off downwind. He was flying a fighter or fighter bomber at the time. The field was 13K, but it was at 5K elevation. 500 feet from the end, facing fences or buildings, he was still on the ground. His last hope was to dump fuel - which would probably have led to a court marshal. He made it over the obstacles with just feet to spare - his finger still on the unused fuel-dump button. His take away message was never to take short cuts. The cost of failure is too high.
REWahoo
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Taking off heavy on a hot day at a high-altitude airfield, even with a 2+ mile-long runway was a challenge in the KC-135 before they replaced the old J-57 water injection engines. I can remember looking at all the pre-flight planning calculations saying we were "good to go" yet seeing very little in front of us but the overrun before the old sow finally got airborne.
Then when the water ran out the loss of thrust was like losing an engine.*
Yeah, it's time....
YouTube - Monty Python - Four Yorkshiremen
* From Wikipedia: "All KC-135s were originally equipped with Pratt & Whitney J-57-P-59W turbojet engines which produced 10,000 lbf of thrust dry, and approximately 13,000 lbf of thrust wet. Wet thrust is achieved through the use of water injection on takeoff. 670 gallons of water are injected into the engines over the course of two and a half minutes. This water allows a second set of fuel injectors to activate without melting the turbine buckets. The water turns to steam and is ejected out the rear of the engine, increasing the mass through the engine and increasing thrust. The engine runs a little hotter, with more engine noise."
Then when the water ran out the loss of thrust was like losing an engine.*
Yeah, it's time....
YouTube - Monty Python - Four Yorkshiremen
* From Wikipedia: "All KC-135s were originally equipped with Pratt & Whitney J-57-P-59W turbojet engines which produced 10,000 lbf of thrust dry, and approximately 13,000 lbf of thrust wet. Wet thrust is achieved through the use of water injection on takeoff. 670 gallons of water are injected into the engines over the course of two and a half minutes. This water allows a second set of fuel injectors to activate without melting the turbine buckets. The water turns to steam and is ejected out the rear of the engine, increasing the mass through the engine and increasing thrust. The engine runs a little hotter, with more engine noise."
IIRC, I was told you guys were the only crews in the USAF who took off in situations in which your critical engine failure speed was higher than refusal speed. This meant there was a point during the takeoff roll when, if you lost an engine, you could neither take off in the remaining runway nor stop in the remaining runway.
That's high adventure. "Prepare to engage localizer antenna." I'm sure it wasn't done all the time, but when the klaxon sounds . . .
It's time . . .
IL-76 in Australia (turn on the sound)
