Landings...

[AHPilot]

Wondering if yall (yeah I'm a Texan) would care to share some of your best/toughest...or roughest (whoops..!) landing or one that sticks out in your mind...


LT

 

[RichardFitzwell]

Ouch!

AHPilot,

I landed (if you want to call it that) a 737-800 in Denver so hard that after the PAX were off, the lead F/A walked up to me with her panty hose around her ankles and said, "can I guess who landed that one?" Hey - That hurts.

Another time I landed a 727 in GTF and pranged it on real good. The last thing I heard the captain say before we hit was, "OH" and the O2 mask fell and hit me on the back of the head. Talk about adding insult to injury.

What was it they say about aircraft performance and high altitude airports?

 

[bobbysamd]

Landings

I landed 172s in something like 30-kt crosswinds a couple of times. Carry something like 70-75 kts and no flaps with power all the way down to touchdown and it works fine. A long runway helps, too.

Yes, there are advantages to learning how to fly in Oklahoma.

Don't tell Mr. Cessna and Mr. FAA I busted the demonstrated x-wind component, though.

 

[Sheik_Yer_Booty]

Well, of course I’ve never botched a landing, but that’s beside the point…

I will tell ya about a DC-8 we saw land at LAX a couple years back one evening.

We had been standing around at general aviation near the south pad waiting on our trip to show and this straight 8 comes roaring in for 25R and side steps over to 25L, bobbles a good bit then stabilizes, crosses the numbers and begins to float (I guess). Well just before taxi way golf you hear this bird get awful quiet, sink rate, sink rate, sink rate then BLAM!!!!!!!!

She hit so hard I swear the wings wobbled and flexed for the entire roll out!

The impact was so audiable that a couple of the line guys came out of the hanger to see what had happened.

No company names of course.

ABEX!!!

Hey! I didn’t say anything bout callsigns…

 

[bigD]

My worst landing ever happened during a spot landing on my Commercial checkride in a 172RG. Ouch! Of all the places to have a bad landing - that would be it. Dropped the thing in from what seemed like a mile above the runway (maybe just 3 feet, but it seemed a LOT higher). Hit my spot, though! Passed the checkride too. DE didn't say anything about it. Maybe his jaw was locked shut.

That's gotta be the worst - the sinking feeling when you're nose high in the flare and realize you're still a ways above the runway and are about to drop like a ton of bricks.

 

[AHPilot]

I neglected to share mine...


My CFI gave me my first simulated engine failure in the pattern...got real low on final, too low, pulled the nose up in an effort to go up, but I learned thats not the case... by the time he had reacted and shoved the throttle forward the PA-38 bounced 5 ft short of the runway, over the app. lights, then back on to the runway....I was sweating bullets....

Don't tell Mr. Piper or Mr. FAA about that one....

After that I learned don't fly a "normal" approach when you don't have an engine, just go for the **CENSORED****CENSORED****CENSORED****CENSORED** concrete...

 

[OtterFO]

Bobbysamd,

The demonstrated crosswind component of an airplane is not a limitation. It just represents how much crosswind the test pilots had during the certification process.

 

[newmei]

I like bobby have landed in a 30 kt x-wind but in a 150. That was very interesting. I was trying to get home and I had to pick up my mom (she was sick). The winds were'nt bad when I left but go exponentially worse on the return, she was forewarned. The landing was pretty good. You can do it if you approach at a high speed and no flaps, and the end of the roll I ran out of rudder and had to get on the brakes to keep it from going off the side. On taxi the stall warning was going off because the wind was going over it backwards. LOL The worst part of the flight was the turbulence that actually hurt me when my lap belt clinched to keep me in.

 

[bigD]

The worst landing I've ever personally felt was coming into Auckland on a Continental 747 back in 1990. Pretty old 747 too if I remember correctly. Dunno if the PF was an ex-carrier pilot or what, but he didn't flare at all. The three point impact was followed by large amounts of screaming in the cabin, and as we taxiied in quite a few women were sobbing. Unbelievable. I'm surprised the plane held together. They can take a lot of abuse, that's for sure.

 

[Sheik_Yer_Booty]

BigD,


That reminded me…

If you want to see some truly extraordinary landings, punishment of earth-shattering magnitude upon man, machine and asphalt just go and check out the day’s activities at any Naval Air Station when the carrier jockeys are flocking home planting Goodyear to terra firma for the first time in six months.

Now those are some landings! If you dare call’em that…

 

[RichardFitzwell]

Sheik_Yer_Booty...that's a great handle. And they say Frank Zappa is dead.

 

[hobbsmeter]

In a Cessna 150...

Winds were right down the runway steady at 35kts, very little gusts to worry about. I had originally planned to do a no flap landing, but while I was hanging on final for what seemed an eternity I decided to mix things up a bit and have some fun, so I put down all 40 degrees. It was like being in a helicopter! I touched down and rolled forward maybe 3 feet before I was stopped! That was definitely the most interesting landing I've had

 

[capt_zman]

I have to go see a dentist every time I fly with an ex-navy guy Routinely fly ce550's with an old A4 pilot, 5000 ft runway and we're taxiing off on Taxiway Alpha or Bravo. Ouch, that hurt.

 

[AWACoff]

Going into Casper, WY one night. Hadn't landed at night in a while... Winds were basically calm, no turbulence. Sitting there fat dumb and happy... And then I notice how fast the runway is rushing up. I simply pulled and quietly said "oh *poopy*". I've never hit that hard in an airplane before that I was flying and the even sadder fact was that we didn't even have enough energy left to bounce. I checked the tires to see if we blew any out. I tell ya, Brakillyas can take a beating!
The hardest landing I've ever been along for was when I was just 2 months off of IOE at Lakes. The fill in captain was a senior IOE check airman. He apparently was trying to impress me with a flaps 45 carrier landing on the short runway in Lansing. We impacted hard with my sphincter the size of a pinhead. Then we bounced...HIGH...he actually added power to reland the airplane. I let him make the PA announcement on that one thank you very much. Isn't it nice that most of the traveling public thinks the captain does every landing anyways?

 

[CaptBuzzard]

I was giving my student instruction in his apache last summer and he landed so hard that the impact broke the generator bracket on the right engine. My back didn't feel too good. That is what happens when you try to land a twin like a 172. He reduced power way to early and by the time I pushed the throttles forward we hit.