what_next wrote:
That would be my very last concern when having to do a forced landing. To hell with the aeroplane, after all the bloody thing got you into that situation in the first place…
“The least risk of serious injury” is what I would be aiming for. Unless the POH states otherwise, using the extended gear to dissipate energy by being ripped to pieces will most proably be in favor of the occupants. So: POH first, common sense next, minimum damage to the aircraft last.
Exactly. That is what insurance is for.
Landing flaps up makes no sense to me in that case. You want the least energy possible which means low rate of descent and lowest airspeed you can still control.
And remember to take your thumbs off the yoke, the elevator may hit the ground and certainly the water if you do things about right, and that will push the yoke back towards your sternum very violently. Much harder getting out of the plane with both thumbs broken 
On the energy, Jason is right of course; you want as little as is consistent with not stalling and you want to dissipate it as slowly as possible. I remember reading (maybe here) than in a slowish aircraft, dissipating over 10 metres was enough to allow survival. If you think about it, all an airbag does is increase your dissipation distance by half a meter, and we know the massive impact they have on survivability of head on collisions.
Once you are on the track to a forced landing, it is not your plane any more…
Ownership just changed to the insurance company
That is often stated but reality is often different especially if it is your plane
To take this line literally, with your own plane, is saying you would happily destroy your plane upon any engine failure, which is simply wrong.
A renter can just destroy the plane without much concern…
Peter wrote:
is saying you would happily destroy your plane upon any engine failure, which is simply wrong.
Would you rather destroy your wife and kid(s) by landing 20kt faster than necessary (= almost twice the kinetic energy in a light plane!) in order to save the flaps from being damaged?
Read my post again 
“Ownership just changed to the insurance company” is a slogan worthy of a Tom Peters book, who took management by slogan about as far as it would go.
Peter wrote:
…management by slogan…
In general, management by slogan is not my thing either. But in this case I think the slogan " hits the nail on it’s head " as we say. I couldn’t care less whether it’s my plane or yours or the insurers. All I want in that situation is save myself (and the other people on board, but I guess one forgets about them the very moment things start to get dificult). Of course I would not deliberately crash an aircraft when I can safely reach a place where a safe forced landing can be made leaving aircraft and passengers unhurt. After all, we all want to among the skygods who can achieve that
Peter wrote:
That is often stated but reality is often different especially if it is your plane
It was my plane and I had (limited) options and went for the safest for ME (fortunately, just me – enough, though).
A “slogan” is a memorable message – and that is IMHO good in situations where clear thinking is great, but often limited.
Most slogans are not useful. They might be funny, and FIs tend to love them, but the crucial stuff is in the detail.
Telling people that your insurer owns the plane when the engine stops is like telling them that there are old pilots and bold pilots but no old and bold pilots, and not teaching them about how to plan a flight and do it safely.
Look at this (boring) video and tell me what % of the time you think you could not land gear down in some field:
A TB20 needs about 300m on grass, BTW.
Peter wrote:
To take this line literally, with your own plane, is saying you would happily destroy your plane upon any engine failure, which is simply wrong.
Afterthought – why does it mean that I would destroy the plane ? Do you break anything that is not yours ? This is not about being dumb, just emotional detaching yourself to make the right choice. I am aware that this comment is facetious – but so is yours.
Also – in the unlikely event that there is a risk-free way of getting down which destroys the plane and a more risky way saving the plane, then yes, I would opt for staying safe myself. And MY insurance would not take issue.
I consider this also to be in line with the Cirrus approach
Peter wrote:
Look at this (boring) video and tell me what % of the time you think you could not land gear down in some field:
But that one is simple because there are plenty of large fields in range all the time and almost no standing crops left. At some point I might have considered ditching close to the shore instead of landing on a field close to the water, which could be very wet and soft.
