Hi Rob,

Here's a link to an episode of WIngs Over Canada where they land on beach and talk about the dark sand vs. the light sand.

Hope it helps!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EWYyGgabLRI

I used to do search and rescue flying in a J3. Over the last 47 years, the majority of my landings have been on the sandbars and islands of the Mississippi River between Memphis and Vickburg, using stock 8.00x4 mains and a small tailwheel. What you read about seashore beach landings does NOT apply there. The wet sand may be quick and is usually very soft. The dry sand varies from firm to almost as soft as the wet. If not familiar with the bar, you land downriver rather than upwind because of the sawtooth shape of the dunes and ripples (landing upriver into the vertical face of the dunes/ripples can take your gear off). Buried snags can be a major problem. For safety on the Mississippi bars, I always land 3-point. Doing an upriver wheelie test would be extremely dangerous, so if you do em, do em downriver. When actually landing, be prepared to ski jump off dunes that can be several feet high (I always tried to avoid that). This post applies only to that portion of the Mississippi that I am familiar with.

Mission accomplished .

http://vimeo.com/39909981

Nice Rob! Congrats.

Beautiful job!!!!

Heck yeah! Way to go.

Nice work and nice video! Lake Superior looked beautiful.

Hey Rob, check your PM.

Joe

Nice one!

Another addict , nice job. I liked the sound track too. It seemed to go with the adventure.

Thanks everyone, my first off-airport landing felt great. Still can't smack the grin off my face . The bug has bit and I like it! Happy Easter to one & all!

....another attempt at applying what I learned here:

https://vimeo.com/43307749

That was nice . Where was that beach?

[quote="907Pilot"]
You can see the waves just off the beach. The shiny stuff is water-saturated sand. That is the place you want to be. The dark stuff to the right and above that is still hard, but losing it's water and becoming softer. The light stuff is where not to land. It is soft.
[/quote]
Landed a bunch of times on Egegik beach on Bristol Bay in a DC-3. We never landed in the really wet stuff and never landed in the fluffy dry stuff. Other than that, we pretty much landed the same way we did everywhere which means we wheellied it on every time. It's when you are moving around after the landing that really matters. Never spin on a wheel with it locked. You'll drill a hole and be stuck before you get it all the way around. Stay out of the fluff, think sort of like you are on ice with no sudden direction changes. Plan on wiping or rinsing the airplane as soon as you can after getting off the beach. I would never land somewhere where I have to put my landplane in salt water or salt water saturated sand like the photo unless I had a pretty good reason to. Too much corrosion there for just a recreational landing for me. The drier sand isn't so bad cuz you're not kicking up water. With big tires on a light airplane, I wouldn't think you would have much trouble.

Egigik and Nushagak don't count as beaches when the sockeye are running....more like international airports... DC-3s, C-46s, DC-4s, DC-6s, and at least one DC-7. Quite a show, actually. Those beaches are really solid, in any case.

That said, I pretty much agree with your points, except if you're going to wheel land on a place you haven't landed recently, do it tail low.

MTV

Recent river flying

A couple years ago I posted about a flight I made following the Yellowstone River in Montana up to it's confluence with the Missouri. Lots of gravel bar landings on the way of course, but the coolest one was right at the junction (nautical term?) of the two rivers. While I had planned to circle around over the junction I didn't expect to get to land, yeah, there was a bar right there, positioned just right for landing on and contemplating the meeting of these two great rivers. I probably took a leak also. It wasn't particularly challenging to land on, other then the usual unknown as to surface conditions, but it was PERFECTLY located

Another time and place, I had landed a small island, to get out the last nights pizza remnants for an in flight breakfast, and just as I was getting back in the plane something caught my eye on the otherwise deserted island, (I don't know why this was a small island and not a bar, but that's how I thought about it at the time) . As I walked closer to the object, I realized I was looking at a camera securely mounted to a steel post. It, as the small sign said, was part of a wildlife study for a local university doing a study on the mating habits of a certain critter. It was one of those motion activated types, but high dollar not a cheap one (government funding) , and now it had my mug looking straight into the lens on it's memory card, with the plane in the background and the N# clearly visible. I should mention that this was in a area with no flight restrictions, in the middle of no where, so pretty sure I had my butt covered but nonetheless I real casually walked away from the camera and blasted out of there. Taking the camera with me briefly entered my mind, but I'm no thief, didn't want to disrupt the study, felt I did no wrong knowingly, and lastly it was very securely attached. I never heard back from anyone about the incident, but for a few months I was kind of wondering about it all

"I should mention that this was in a area with no flight restrictions, in the middle of no where, so pretty sure I had my butt covered but nonetheless I real casually walked away from the camera and blasted out of there."

The problem is not limited to airspace restrictions. The problem is who or what agency owns/controls the land. Some of these wilderness designations aren't obvious when we're flying cross country looking for a nice place to land. All it takes is a nanny with her iPhone camera or a ranger with nothing better to do and there can be real problems. I am getting increasing stealth. It is almost impossible to know unless you figure it out before flying. Mike

pokette wrote:Recent river flying

That was a great video. Where was it filmed?

Always turn from the down hill side, up the hill. Be careful on gravel, if you run through some mud or water and then gravel, it will stick to the tires and sling rocks through your prop. That gets expensive fast.