The school solution to engine failures is that the more altitude we have the better. Gravity thrust is good stuff. Some funny situations come up, however, in both the low level forced landing and the very end of the high level forced landing. We can arrive with zoom reserve in the form of altitude and zoom reserve in the form of airspeed. We want neither of these on short final. 75% of forced landings touch down in the very center of the landing zone because they arrived at the desired touchdown point with zoom reserve in the form of both altitude and airspeed. Any reserve here is too much. Ground effect to get the desired touchdown point can be used where there are no obstructions. Brakes, on the other end going fast, are far inferior to low and slow on this end. Brakes do not work in ground effect. Forcing it onto the surface breaks things and often results in a sudden stop.

When the engine quits low, where touchdown will be in six seconds or less, we value enough kinetic energy of pressure airspeed to maneuver. The right LZ will be obvious because there are so few we can see. No distractions. If we have given up this zoom reserve in the form of airspeed by climbing too fast, to say 200,' it is tough to trade that potential gravity thrust of altitude for kinetic energy of pressure airspeed to maneuver without stalling. In any significant turn, we will have to allow the nose to fall through. We have to dive at things we want to miss. Coming out of the field or off the runway (in low ground effect) is not a problem. We trade the airspeed for altitude while maneuvering to a good hole (get the turn done sooner, not later) and getting rid of both airspeed and altitude (slip/flaps/both.) We will want the wing level going over wires and/or trees. We will want to be low enough that we need to get the wing level.

contactflying wrote:Brakes do not work in ground effect.

Well phrased.

Regarding too much zoom-- it's usually better to go into the trees (or whatever) at the end of your LZ at low speed, than to come up short & go into the same trees at flying speed short of the LZ . Kinda like Goldilocks, we're looking for "just right"- which is not always obtainable due to circumstances beyond our control.

In the accident statistics, the fatality rate on the far end far exceeds the fatality rate on the near end. What you say is correct, but pilots seem to have more zoom reserve in altitude and airspeed problems than stall spin on approach problems. Human nature causes us to avoid the problem. We feel safer high and fast. We need to, in some way, address the problem of landing in the space available. The problem is that we are going to land down there somewhere. The sooner we face it, the better we do. In the low altitude forced landing (had nine) we have six seconds to both face it and get it done.

We also need to face the problem of already having messed up and of trucking down the LZ in ground effect. Here your technique is perfect. Put yourself between two trees and let the wings absorb the shock.

But, I think Rob wants to save his airplane, if possible.

Good Story Bro!

I question your statistics, please show your original source material

I've never had a forced landing in a powered aircraft, but every landing in my hang glider is forced. I usually approach the LZ I've picked out a bit high. Hang gliders don't penetrate headwinds well. If the headwinds don't materialize, I do s- turns on my final approach to use up excess altitude. Although I've never had a powered plane that maneuvered as well as a hang glider, I don't see why the approach wouldn't work...

"How To Fly Airplanes," by Robert Reser is where I got the 75% touching down in the center of the LZ. My own experience was different (first part of LZ on all ten, one of which was from high altitude) but I believe him. His book is much more scientific than mine.

For my chapter on the low ground effect takeoff, I went through the AOPA Air Safety Institute's accident database. I read through a lot of takeoff and fewer landing accidents. I did not do a scientific analysis. For the chapter on the low level forced landing I was looking for those, which were mostly takeoff forced landings. Most of the high altitude forced landings that resulted in fatalities were either stall in the last half of the LZ or hitting things at the end. I wasn't looking for high altitude forced landings, so I didn't try to find all of them.

Do any of you have statistics, or know about forced landings with fatalities from hitting something near the beginning of the LZ? I just didn't find those. When conducting flight reviews, I found that most pilots were very high and fast at about five hundred feet. We agreed that they were not going to make the beginning of the LZ.

I will try to use fewer statistics in future posts and rely on my own past experiences.

My 1 and only departure engine out was in a 182 amphib a couple years ago, I was climbing as fast as I could in this airplane out of a 2700' strip, 2000' elevation, at about 200' altitude the engine went to idle.
If I had been climbing slowly and picking up speed I would have ended up in town in some houses or in the hospital, or the power lines, which are just off the end of the strip??
As it was I hit the ground with authority and ended up about 35' from the end of the runway still on it, but it ends in a bluff that falls away to a set of power lines and then hospital and houses.
Just lucky that day as was climbing as hard as I was.
Did not really think about what I did after the power left, but sure did do a lot of things right!
FIRST THING WAS SHOVE THE NOSE DOWN!!
Ruined a really nice aircraft, but walked away!!
There are times to climb and there are times to stay low and pick up speed, as in everything in aviation 1 way does not fit all.
Also Someone looks out for Fools, Kids, and some Stoopid people!! of which I are one.
GT

I read a report or story, don't remember which, years ago that said there are more overruns than short landings, both normal and emergency.

The act of pushing the nose down when you're close to the ground is difficult at best, mainly because adrenaline is pumping and everything in your survival subconscious is screaming" Pull up!". What can ingrain the law of primacy (what you learn first, you'll resort to under stress) into your reactions when the prop stops? Glider practice!

I'm not talking about going out, and entrenching yourself in the soaring culture, or even getting a license. I'm suggesting just going and getting 10-15 flights in an old, fabric covered, draggy trainer like a Schweizer 2-22 or 2-33. With 2 on board, they fly remarkably similar to a J-3, or Super Cub without an engine. Ask me how I know it flies like an engine-less Cub...

I think soaring is pretty cool, but I got my SGU 2-22 simply to train my boys (at least) solo because the muscle memory and the instinct to point the nose down, and estimate sink rate vs forward motion is an invaluable skill. Of course, every plane flies different without power, but the principles learned in a few hours of gliding can apply to whatever you fly. A square wing glider like the 2-22 is where you can really practice the much debated "engine out return to the runway scenario". If you can't make it in a glider from 500', you can be pretty sure you can't do it in your Cessna, Piper, etc. Practice tow rope breaks are routine syllabus skills in soaring. A training glider has relatively benign flying and stall characteristics, yet the consequences for landing short or mis-judging your sink rate are very real. Think what that can do for your experience base?

Remember, at the moment of truth, you aren't going to miraculously develop some Jedi Knight skill that you haven't practiced, you're going to rise to the level that you have trained for. Or, as my loving Dad used to say, "Son...if you want to make sure you can pull a rabbit out of a hat...it's best to stuff a rabbit in the hat the night before.."

Mike-

We had someone around here pay the ultimate price for coming up short on a forced landing about a year ago. He was apparently shooting for a farm field on the top of a bluff above a beach. Made his approach over the water & was about 50 feet too low. Crashed & burned, lterally. I believe he was over land when the problem developed, but for some reason he chose to fly downwind out over the water before turning. There was a couple miles of field available to land on- turning a base right at the bluff would have been the way to go.

I can't make heads or tails out of anything here. I don't have a clue what 'zoom reserve' is, let alone what "...we value enough kinetic energy of pressure airspeed to maneuver" means.

lesuther wrote:I can't make heads or tails out of anything here. I don't have a clue what 'zoom reserve' is, let alone what "...we value enough kinetic energy of pressure airspeed to maneuver" means.

I'm guessing Contact is referring to the energy (airspeed) you save up (reserve) when you point the nose down in order to trade that energy (airspeed) for altitude at the bottom of the landing sequence to clear an obstacle using a "zoom" maneuver. That's an educated guess, I just like saying "Zoom.."

Mike-

Recommended advanced study of aerodynamics:
http://www.faa.gov/regulations_policies ... 80T-80.pdf

contactflying wrote:But, I think Rob wants to save his airplane, if possible.

I think the meager T/O failures I have had (one prop, one engine) would suggest different but they worked out fine as I am still here In my case both were catastrophic failures immediately after a typical ag departure.

In the prop failure I had almost enough reserve to effect a 180 back. That airport was on a mesa, and landing anywhere on the mesa was going to be a better outcome than trying to put it in straight ahead, as immediately straight ahead was the steep valley leading to a treed town. That would have led to a television news appearance for sure.. As it worked out, between the reserve energy left and a timely loss of the load I was able to make the strip. Visibility was essentially nil during the course reversal as one blade had completely feathered and the engine was doing it's best to depart the airframe.

The flame out was on a flat ground airport with rangeland ahead. It occurred earlier in the departure sequence and an attempt at a course reversal would have led to a starring on the 5o'clock news... Landing in the pasture was a no brainerd. Returning the aircraft to service, and the airport were far more stressful than the forced landing.

Neither of these scenarios could have been completed at a steep climb out as they were both being operated at loads that would preclude flying out of ground effect until a large reserve of energy was established.

I think GT is spot on... there are very few single minded approaches to this flying stuff, and the box of tools you need gets broader, not tighter, as the matters become more urgent. I doubt contact meant gaining speed in ground effect and then climbing is the single answer to all departures. Although IMHO in the vast majority of cases, it is probably a safer bet than wallowing away and hoping things keep on ticking. I think the most important thing that worked in GT's case, and surely in mine was that he was proficient in what he had to do to keep things flowing.

I also have no doubt that overshot landings occur far more frequently than coming up short, but either one will ruin your day, so why not just focus on hitting the mark instead of avoiding one or the other?

Take care, Rob

I had an engine failure at Ag Flight with a student in a PA-18-135. He was pulling up from a swath run when the engine quit. In the field at 3' AGL, we had effective ground effect and full power for the pull up. This meant we had the maximum kinetic energy of pressure airspeed on the wing for that density altitude. I took the controls and traded this airspeed for altitude in a zoom up. Like Vx, a zoom climb with or without power is temporary. Coming up over the trees, I immediately spotted an adjoining field that would allow landing without damage. I immediately turned at a very large angle of bank while allowing the nose to fall through (I released all back pressure on the stick.) I added full flaps and pushed full rudder away from the turn to get back down into the beginning of that field. I was now using gravity thrust to make up for the lift lost in the steep turn. I landed in the beginning of the field and no damage was done to the airplane or to us.

Rob is right about the tactical situation always being fluid. The other pilot made a good point about not rising to the occasion like a superhero. We will do what we have done (practiced) enough that it is imprinted on our brain. It tough situations we react based on our beliefs. As instructors, we have to be careful about instilling poor beliefs. Greg Simler, manager/mechanic at Underwood Aerial Patrol used to say, "Jim Dulin doesn't believe an airplane will climb." I don't. I've been in too many situations where they wouldn't.

I ran a Cardinal out of fuel on a TEPPCO pipeline between Wichita Falls and Gainesville, Texas. It happened in a ninety degree turn in the pipeline that put me on a perfect left base to a fairly nice eighty acre pasture the long way (1/2 mile.) Two hundred feet up is a world of vertical space so I had time to try the boost pump. In the back of my mind I was wondering why do they have a boost pump on a high wing airplane? God was telling me, "Don't touch that switch." Anyway, the engine ran long enough to mess up my fine approach. When it quit again, I made a hard left followed by a hard right with a full slip and got it into the next forty acre field beyond the end of the eighty. Cut a gash in the stabilator on a steel fence post at the beginning of the forty (1/4 mile.)

I leased a Pawnee, for my spray business in the Mesilla Valley at Las Cruces, NM. The O-540 was heating and the owner/mechanic never got to the bottom of it. When an engine gets overheated, the plugs start firing incorrectly and little or no power is developed. The first time it quit in the field and I zoomed up turned sharply while letting the nose fall through and slipped to get onto an empty paved road prior to a busy intersection. Going long would have been a problem. The second time, struggling to get back, I landed on the Rio Grande levy. The third time I made it to final before it cut out. The fourth time was in the field again. I went straight ahead and turned it over in a plowed cotton field. I told you I flew junk.