Interesting story. I want to believe in his place I would have used the throttle to influence pitch instead of killing the engine, but who knows what goes through your mind in such a situation.
This was a strange story. It’s similar to what might happen if you lose a canopy – disruption to airflow on the tail.
Main thing is to keep flying, and if you don’t need to change anything, don’t. Any changes should be extremely careful and gradual.
The Sean Tucker story about a broken elevator pushrod where he finally had to abandon the aircraft was very interesting – if someone like him would struggle to land with no elevator, not sure how mere mortals could do it. Since I don’t fly with a chute, I’d certainly try really hard to get down safely using power, trim, and flaps.
I watched the first few seconds of the video, several different crashed planes (all of which could not be the story), and “we thought we’d lost him…”. I’m sure that there were some interesting facts in there somewhere, but otherwise that was enough of that.
Depending upon being a certified plane or not, and its vintage (Pre 1960’s may not), it is a certification requirement that GA planes demonstrate during test that they can be landed without elevator control, and if necessary, a procedure be presented in the flight manual for doing it. I’ve practiced the Cessna procedure a few times. I could make it work, but it’s messy, and would require a longer landing run than normal. You should at least be aware of there is a procedure for the type you fly.
An elevator failure could be one cable break, leaving the other cable available, and you can fly nearly normal with the plane trimmed well out of trim, opposing the force the whole time. It’s tiring, but doable. I had to do it once in a Cessna 206 for other reasons. If you’ve had a failure which results in excess nose up effect, you can enter a steep turn, and balance out the effect, while you make your plan (or take a rest!).
I did watch the whole thing and found it interesting. But the build up and the what actually happened were different stories.
Starting with the fact that this guy is an aircraft mechanic. Although there technically was a loss of elevator control the cause was nothing to do with the elevator mechanism. And the majority of the video was the decision to make an off field landing, which perhaps was unnecessary in the first place.
Pilot_DAR wrote:
I watched the first few seconds of the video, several different crashed planes (all of which could not be the story), and “we thought we’d lost him…”.
The video is part of a series “Real pilot stories”. 0:18-0:46 is the intro of that series. A bit annoying but at all unusual.
gallois wrote:
I did watch the whole thing and found it interesting. But the build up and the what actually happened were different stories.
Starting with the fact that this guy is an aircraft mechanic. Although there technically was a loss of elevator control the cause was nothing to do with the elevator mechanism. And the majority of the video was the decision to make an off field landing, which perhaps was unnecessary in the first place.
As usual in these kinds of videos, all the important information could be conveyed in a few minutes. The rest is just drama. That’s why I generally don’t like watching videos. Waste of time. (I did watch this one to the end as I was on a bus and had nothing better to do.)
As usual in these kinds of videos, all the important information could be conveyed in a few minutes. The rest is just drama. That’s why I generally don’t like watching videos
Agreed 100%.
I watched it all. Shutting down the engine made no sense. He was very lucky with the landing. Going for a long runway with the engine running would have made sense.
Shutting down the engine was like the US airline FO who shut down all 4 engines when a toilet fire alarm went off, climbing, westbound, over the Pacific.
I’ve had wing strips come loose, and once a strip put on the windshield top. No control effect, but a bang and continuing buzz noise.
Someone had a complete wing panel come off a Jodel. Landed safely. Factory new, cotton, and had lasted only about 50 years.
Maoraigh wrote:
Shutting down the engine was like the US airline FO who shut down all 4 engines when a toilet fire alarm went off, climbing, westbound, over the Pacific.
That’s some story! Do you have a reference? (Flight number?)
