The water takeoff that wasn't.

[WillowRunVortex]

Was not this Gibson the one who was a 727 captain for one of the majors. In trying to climb higher they devised this concept of starting the slats and flaps out but pulling the circuit breaker to give them the lift to get a couple of thousand feet. Well something went wrong and the aircraft spirled down 15000 or so and bent the wings.

The story I was told was that the slat circuit breaker was pulled to allow just the trailing edge flaps to deploy. The crew would deploy the flaps just 2 or 3 degrees,,,without the slats deploying. This gave the 727 a little extra lift to give it a greater "coffin corner" margin at altitude.

The engineer returned from the lav and inadvertently pushed the "popped" circuit breaker back in. The slats fully deployed and promptly departed the aircraft,,,sort-of. One side stayed attached to the wing but the slat sections on that side trailed back across the wing like long ropes flapping in the wind. The airplane did several un-commanded rolls and went into a steep dive before recovering after getting into thicker air and loosing roughly 15,000 ft.

This is not a testament to "Hoots'" flying ability as much as it is a testament to Boeing building brick-sh1t-houses for aircraft to compensate for stupidity.

 

[Say Again Over]

Edited, didn't see the WillowRunVortex post.

 

[WRENCH]

That vid sucks! A cool plane is no mas!

 

[mcjohn]

Take the water away and it almost looks just like me trying to get my tailwheel endorsement the other day!

 

[CASA212pilot]

Hoot was really a smart guy

Careless handling of the lives sitting behind you destroys any other redeeming qualities you may have.

You would think that the TWA Hoot would have learned a valuable lesson after his first brush with death.

I remember when "Endless Summer II" first came out in the early ninties. Always thought that seen was just an unfortuneate accident. Sad to hear is was the Hoot I always heard stories about in ground school just being a cowboy.

 

[pilotyip]

To continue vortex's urban legend, Hoot then flew around for a 1/2 hour to erase the voice recorder

 

[SkyWestCRJPilot]

There was another movie I saw once on TV that had a C-310 ditching into the Caribbean. A smooth water landing. They got out and I think one of them got eaten by a shark. Does anyone remember the movie or have a clip of it?

 

[Huggyu2]

I think every pilot I've met with the last name of "Gibson" goes by "Hoot". And, yes, there is an astronaut/Reno Racer/SWA pilot named Hoot Gibson.

 

[urflyingme?!]

I think the movie was Jaws, and they did it to get on a boat, IDIOTS!

 

[C601]

PC800, correct, the miraculous recovery of a TWA 727 in 1979, and he is still very much alive.

along with the 727

http://www.airliners.net/open.file?...QRFP&photo_nr=5&prev_id=476237&next_id=361974