glacier wrote:Another very nicely done video. One way to help read bars is to look upstream and see if the channels and currents that formed the bar would have cross cut it at higher water levels. This can also show how various sized gravel and rocks are distributed across the bar. Sometimes it is just hard to tell no matter what, and even dragging the surface with a lightly touching touch and go can be a bad idea if the undulations are big enough and spaced just right to induce oscillations.

Ocean beaches can be hard to read this way too, what might just be patterns of different colored sand on a perfectly flat beach can look exactly the same as rhythmic undulations big enough and spaced just right to put a plane on its back.

Mauleguy wrote:One of the best ways to know how smooth or how rough a spot is, is to drag it. When you have a place that you can go around the safest way to make a decision about the condition is to first run your tires down it with the intention of going around. Never ever drag a strip and then decide to land it while you are dragging it.

You would have found that wash out without being so slow as to sink back into it. You also have better over the nose visibility because you are not dragging a spot behind the power curve, most likely you would have saw it before your tires hit it. Just my opinion from thousand of off airport landings.