Short Field Landings...

[aviator's_anonymous]

Hey there, i was reading someone else's post and they were talking about how they failed one of their flight tests because of a short field landing... this brought up a past memory of mine by one of my past instructors who really thought short field landings really shouldn't be taught even tho he taught it to us. Because if u teach a student to land on a field which is just barely big enough to land on.... technically, the field wouldn't be big enough to take off on? That got me thinking that take-off usually does take a little big longer than landings... just thought i'd like to hear you guy's opinion on the issue about short field landings and stuff...because i know we've all been through the agony of trying to set up a perfect approach for those short field landings with the low airspeed that u know if u encountered just the slightest windshear, your plane would literally drop out of the sky =)

[High Wing Drifter]

Landing downhill can take much more room than taking off in the same direction. Especially on slippery wet grass.

I think the slowest approach speed for short field should still be Vs * 1.3 which would give you about 10-15kts of windshere protection at 1G on the average spamcan.

[shortstripper]

The thing with shortfield landings is to take the prevailing weather conditions into account. No wind = loads of power but back of drag curve + slowest speed possible. Gusty conditions = add speed for safety, but then the headwind will help reduce landing run. TO is secondary to landing in an emergency, but in a planned arrival at a known strip, calculate for take off ... easy really:p

SS

[justin_case]

When I teach short fields t/o and landings, I make sure to use the performance charts for the aircraft. Then state that you might make it in but you might not make it out. I also teach to add a safety margin onto those by the book numbers as I am usually teaching on a 30 year old aircraft, the numbers dont really reflect reality. So, once you practice the shorts, you can add a little onto the airspeed for windshear, because you should never actaully be using a strip the same length the performance charts said you could get into. The variables change to easy, temp, weight and wind especially.

[dann1405]

I think it's very important for short field landings to be taught as they give people good handling skills and also teaches people to be precise. Like you say, you're unlikely to ever use a full-on short field approach and landing but I think the point is more the skills it gives you which you wouldn't necessarily get if you were training at a school situated at an airfield with a honking great runway. It reminds me of a certain well-known cadet scheme who said 'we're not really bothered about PFLs because you're never going to land a 737 in a field...............' No s**t sherlock but what about the decision-making ability and other skills which it gives you? Chow for now,

Dan

[dann1405]

That could almost have been taken straight out of a training manual.... good to see that the previously mentioned quote appears to be unfounded though. No offence meant to certain scheme but that quote was straight from the horse's mouth, as it were. If true I'm sure you would agree it would be a slightly worrying mentality

[dynamite dean]

make sure you don't land too short that runway looks too far to walk from the wrong field you've landed in! :E

[Mosspigs]

Interesting thread.

Is not one of the main reasons to teach short field landings techniques to allow a pilot to land in one in an emergency?

If so the taking off again is very secondary. There are always ways and means to recover an aircraft.

I would value a grown up's opinion on this.

[highflyer27]

What is the confusion here?

Refer to my previous post.

Short field landings are taught in order to allow you to deal with precautionary landings and/or a forced landing. One is a MAYDAY and one is a PAN PAN. So yes taking off is a secondary consideration :ok:

[Dick Whittingham]

I recall two short field landings (not mine) that were interesting. One was a Hunter landing at Weston Supermare and the other a 707 that missed Kai Tak, went over Lion Rock and landed at Sha Tin. Bet you didn't know there was a field at Sha Tin, but there was one, a tiny strip. Both aircraft were dismantled and trucked out.

Dick W

[Genghis the Engineer]

Valid point there, the world is full of little airstrips that are technically too short for whatever you happen to be flying at the time - but in certain circumstances they might still be the best place to be.

G

[Piltdown Man]

Are we not talking of a maximum performance landing here? Your approach speed is generally Vs x 1.3 (ie, you adjust your approach speed so that is corresponds with your actual weight!) and you use the technique as set out in your aircraft's manual.

PFL's are different. With these we are learning how to live and as long as we walk away it from one. If the plane can be used again, we have done brilliantly!

:ok:

[Irish Steve]

Ahhhhh why not:O

Long time ago, when research in sims was still possible (Pre 9/11), we had a few minutes spare at the end of a slot, so we tried putting a very light 747-400 into Chicago Meigs, ( Of Flight simulator fame) with no special wind to make it simple.

It was tight, but it fitted. What was even more "interesting" was getting it out again.;)

I can't recall now if the fuel load was legal, but it got out, and we got it around the corner back to a more civilised size strip, but it for sure was a bit of fun.

Seriously, short field training does help refine the technique, if there's a couple of miles of tarmac ahead, it's all to easy to have a "somewhere down there" attitude, and that doesn't help when it has to be fitted somewhere small without the option.

A friend of mine sent me some very impressive pics a while back of a South African 747 being retired to a small strip, so they planned it very carefully, and made it fit there too, and very pretty it looked as well. Rand Airport, South Africa elevation 5568 feet with 4898 long x 50 feet wide runway !

The gear width on a 747 is 43 Ft :eek:

[aviator's_anonymous]

Funny you should mention that 747 landing on the small strip....
I actually have those pictures and was looking at them just before i read
your reply....hehe.... =)
You can see on the landing, the outter wheels of the 747 are literally on the edge of the runway... impressive picture.... if anyone wants them, they can msg me and i can send it to them if they want...

[Vladd_tI]

Just a couple of small points:

Some aircraft have a shorter take off roll than landing roll. The cessna 185 is a good example of this.

Also, sometimes if you fly into a strip with a full load, unload and take off empty, again you need a shorter take off roll.

The organisation I'm with most commonly utilises short rough strips which do meet the legal minimums, but only just. Our company policy is to consider every landing to be a short field landing, and thereby maintain a high level of profficiency.

Short field performance flying is fine and safe when operations are done according to the numbers and published techniques, such as keeping your airspeed at 1.3 Vs until below 50". People only really start having problems when they improvise on proven techniques. And of course, suitable margins should be built into "P" chart calculations if you're unfamiliar with an airstrip or aircraft.

[Blinkz]

does anyone know where I can download the 747 at rand? Google didn't find anything :eek:

[Tinstaafl]

More pragmatically, short field technique i.a.w. the POH is taught because that's the technique the manufacturer specifies to achieve the figures in their graphs. If you use any other technique you no longer have any guarantee that the aircraft will be able to achieve the specified performance.

There are ways to achieve better performance but then you lose some of the protections built in to the certification performance requirements.

[FlyingForFun]

Some aircraft have a shorter take off roll than landing roll. The cessna 185 is a good example of this.
I was wondering how long it would take someone to say that. My Europa also has a shorter take-off than landing. When I was preparing to take it into a short field, I spent months (literally) practicing short-field landings at my home field. When I arrived at my short field, I stopped comfortably with almost half the length of the field in front of me. (Actually, I was planning on landing on an even shorter field than this, but had to scrap that flight because the shortest short field had had a fence put in the middle of it, making it too short for me no matter how much I practiced!)

FFF
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Nb - there are no performance figures for my home-built aircraft, so part of my practice involved figuring out just how short a field I could safely handle.