Emergency Landings
I guess what it took was an emergency, but I landed yesterday! We concentrated on emergency procedures (there were no actual emergencies) yesterday -- pretty horrifying stuff, but it's all part of the deal.
First, we had a long ground lesson on different types of emergencies. What to do if there's an electrical fire (master off, the engine will keep running, power everything off, turn the master on, hope there's no smoke, power on one radio, hope there's no smoke, find an airport and land), what to do if there's an engine fire (is it oil or fuel? Actually I don't remember all the steps, but definitely cut the fuel mixture, shut the fuel flow off and stop the engine), and mostly, how to land in the event of an engine failure.
The steps are:
Water is, as it turns out, an extremely bad idea. On landing, the plane wants to flip over forward; in water, it will. You can't open the doors until the pressure's equalized, meaning the cabin is full of water. And since you're upside down, the first part of you to be in the water is your head. How long can you hold your breath? How about right after a crash landing? Not good -- landing in water is essentially committing to a slow, painful death. I wonder if this is true of commercial jets -- they always show the water landing in the safety video. Will the plane actually flip over? I doubt it; the shape of the jet is so different, plus, the cabin's sealed and pressurized.
Attempting restart is basically the idiot check. Is the fuel set to receive from both tanks? Is the mixture full rich, and is the throttle in? Is this due to icing on the carburetor (i.e. does turning on the carb heat make any difference)? Does turning to either the L or R mags make any difference? Did the priming pump pop out, is it locked in position? This takes about 4 seconds to check. Failing that, you declare emergency -- if you're in range of the airport you last talked to and are already on that frequency, say "mayday! mayday! mayday! Cessna 6521J over Sunol, experiencing engine failure, 2 souls on board, attempting emergency landing." Else, use frequency 121.5. Set the transponder to 7700, which will light you up on any nearby board and sound sirens and stuff. Better hope it's a real emergency at this point!
Shutting down is preparing for the landing. Cut the mixture, turn the fuel off, shut the mags off. Cessnas have electric flaps, so you leave the master electrical switch on, so that you can extend the flaps. Unlatch the doors -- this actually means OPEN the door and close the latch, so that the door can't close. You want the door to be blown off its hinges upon impact, since the frame will probably bend and keep the door from opening otherwise. Since the plane will likely be on fire, you don't want the doors keeping you from running like a madman.
Setting up the landing pattern over the field is basically so you don't get too far from it. You head downwind as you get into the 1500-1000 ft elevation range, extend as needed to lose altitude, and then turn and approach. As soon as the approach looks right (or acceptable, I guess), hit the flaps all the way full.
So we practiced all of this yesterday, simulating engine failure by reducing the power to idle. We did not actually land in any fields (how would we take off again? And the owner of the field would be pretty ticked off), but we did everything up to that point. One field we practiced over was this one in Sunol; another was somewhere in here. When we came back to Palo Alto, as I got into the traffic pattern, Kevin simulated an engine failure, and I landed on the runway with no (idle) power. And the landing itself went great!!
Even though this is a lot of material, it all makes perfect sense. In fact I wrote this whole thing from memory, except for the shutdown part (we didn't actually do the shutdown so it's not quite as burned into my brain). It is good to know that at least in theory, I'm equipped to handle at least one emergency situation. Of course, in an emergency situation, you can't think -- that's what training is for, to make it all automatic. Hopefully it will be!
As you can see in my log book, I'm up to almost 16 hours of flying time. Probably within another 5-10 hours I'll be soloing, which is exciting! Probably I'll be very nervous the first time. And the second time. But it'll be good, I'm sure I'll learn a lot without having my instructor to fall back on. Today I fly in a commercial flight to Tennessee, and the next lesson is on September 12. I can't wait!
First, we had a long ground lesson on different types of emergencies. What to do if there's an electrical fire (master off, the engine will keep running, power everything off, turn the master on, hope there's no smoke, power on one radio, hope there's no smoke, find an airport and land), what to do if there's an engine fire (is it oil or fuel? Actually I don't remember all the steps, but definitely cut the fuel mixture, shut the fuel flow off and stop the engine), and mostly, how to land in the event of an engine failure.
The steps are:
- Establish best glide at 70-73 knots
- Find a field to land in, head for it, and circle over it
- Attempt restart
- Failing that, declare emergency
- Shut down
- Set up landing pattern over field
- Land
Water is, as it turns out, an extremely bad idea. On landing, the plane wants to flip over forward; in water, it will. You can't open the doors until the pressure's equalized, meaning the cabin is full of water. And since you're upside down, the first part of you to be in the water is your head. How long can you hold your breath? How about right after a crash landing? Not good -- landing in water is essentially committing to a slow, painful death. I wonder if this is true of commercial jets -- they always show the water landing in the safety video. Will the plane actually flip over? I doubt it; the shape of the jet is so different, plus, the cabin's sealed and pressurized.
Attempting restart is basically the idiot check. Is the fuel set to receive from both tanks? Is the mixture full rich, and is the throttle in? Is this due to icing on the carburetor (i.e. does turning on the carb heat make any difference)? Does turning to either the L or R mags make any difference? Did the priming pump pop out, is it locked in position? This takes about 4 seconds to check. Failing that, you declare emergency -- if you're in range of the airport you last talked to and are already on that frequency, say "mayday! mayday! mayday! Cessna 6521J over Sunol, experiencing engine failure, 2 souls on board, attempting emergency landing." Else, use frequency 121.5. Set the transponder to 7700, which will light you up on any nearby board and sound sirens and stuff. Better hope it's a real emergency at this point!
Shutting down is preparing for the landing. Cut the mixture, turn the fuel off, shut the mags off. Cessnas have electric flaps, so you leave the master electrical switch on, so that you can extend the flaps. Unlatch the doors -- this actually means OPEN the door and close the latch, so that the door can't close. You want the door to be blown off its hinges upon impact, since the frame will probably bend and keep the door from opening otherwise. Since the plane will likely be on fire, you don't want the doors keeping you from running like a madman.
Setting up the landing pattern over the field is basically so you don't get too far from it. You head downwind as you get into the 1500-1000 ft elevation range, extend as needed to lose altitude, and then turn and approach. As soon as the approach looks right (or acceptable, I guess), hit the flaps all the way full.
So we practiced all of this yesterday, simulating engine failure by reducing the power to idle. We did not actually land in any fields (how would we take off again? And the owner of the field would be pretty ticked off), but we did everything up to that point. One field we practiced over was this one in Sunol; another was somewhere in here. When we came back to Palo Alto, as I got into the traffic pattern, Kevin simulated an engine failure, and I landed on the runway with no (idle) power. And the landing itself went great!!
Even though this is a lot of material, it all makes perfect sense. In fact I wrote this whole thing from memory, except for the shutdown part (we didn't actually do the shutdown so it's not quite as burned into my brain). It is good to know that at least in theory, I'm equipped to handle at least one emergency situation. Of course, in an emergency situation, you can't think -- that's what training is for, to make it all automatic. Hopefully it will be!
As you can see in my log book, I'm up to almost 16 hours of flying time. Probably within another 5-10 hours I'll be soloing, which is exciting! Probably I'll be very nervous the first time. And the second time. But it'll be good, I'm sure I'll learn a lot without having my instructor to fall back on. Today I fly in a commercial flight to Tennessee, and the next lesson is on September 12. I can't wait!
posted by MKT at 7:52 AM
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