VIDEO: AV-8B No Nosewheel VL BATAAN

[SpazSinbad]

AV-8B no gear landing on USS Bataan ['140609 M VU249 001 Lower third and Outro'] old title of since deleted video (no wonder)
Published on Jun 11, 2014 Commander, U.S. Naval Forces Europe-Africa/U.S. 6th Fleet·141 videos
“U.S. Marine Corps Capt. William Mahoney, Marine Medium Tiltrotor Squadron (VMM) 263 (Reinforced), 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit (MEU), AV-8B Harrier aircraft pilot, talks about his experience during a controlled landing after his front landing gear malfunctioned on the aircraft aboard the USS Bataan, at sea, June 7, 2014. Elements of the 22nd MEU, embarked aboard Bataan, are operating in the U.S. 6th Fleet area of operations to augment U.S. Crisis Response forces in the region. (U.S. Marine Corps video by Sgt. Alisa J. Helin/Released)”

http://i98.photobucket.com/albums/l261/SpazSinbad/NewerAlbum/AV-8BnoNoseWheelLandingBATAAN.jpg~original (http://s98.photobucket.com/user/SpazSinbad/media/NewerAlbum/AV-8BnoNoseWheelLandingBATAAN.jpg.html)

Thanks to 'garyscott' below for the NEW URL to the Video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x9tvdjDAr1U

[garyscott]

Nicely done. Beats a stack of matresses! :}

[AutoBit]

Very nice.

[RAFEngO74to09]

Very well done - particularly when he couldn't see the stool from the cockpit and had to rely on guidance over the radio. It must have been disconcerting when the nose dropped and bounced (watch the video if you haven't).

[500N]

That is very impressive.

[tartare]

By all accounts the Harrier is tricky enough to land with everything functioning correctly... that's impressive flying.

[Joker's Wild]

A solid video demonstrating why one does certain things the same way each time, every time.

Well done that man. :ok:

[AtomKraft]

Nice job. :ok:

[Basil]

YT vid now removed but I get the idea from the still. Big pat on the back I'd hope :ok:

[garyscott]

Basil, here's another UT users vid of the same . .

AV-8B no gear landing on USS Bataan - YouTube

Mighty fine handling. :ok:

[SpazSinbad]

As 'garyscott' mentions I guess this is the reason for the STOOL invention. [STOOL for STOVL?]

A new meaning to 'hit the mattresses' (old MOB expression for da Bronx Boysh)

From an e-mail:
"Ya just gotta weep: This is what happens when your superiors don't understand the rules. What to do when your landing gear won't come down explanation below. To quote the guy who showed the pics:

"Basically, the nose gear wouldn't come done. The Harrier has a backup system with a nitrogen bottle to blow the gear down in this event. Well, someone significantly outranking the pilot ordered him not to blow the gear down (which is the specified emergency procedure) because by his 'superior' reasoning, if the nose gear didn't come down, he was afraid the jet would break its back by having all that weight on the long nose of the T-bird. With that, he elected to gather mattresses and strap them down to support the extended nose, and you have the obvious result.

'Normally' a Harrier that can't get it's gear to come down will suck up the gear and do a vertical landing on the strakes/gun pack, they'll jack the bird up, fix the gear, and it's back to flying rather quickly. In this case, the motor was hilariously trashed with mattress springs protruding out and everything. This has since become a legendary event in the Harrier community (rather small community) and is laughed about often. The best part was, when they jacked the plane up in the hangar and pulled the gear handle to blow them down, all 4 came down and locked in place."

http://i98.photobucket.com/albums/l261/SpazSinbad/NewerAlbum/USMCharrierTrainerMattressLandingBOTHforum.jpg~original (http://s98.photobucket.com/user/SpazSinbad/media/NewerAlbum/USMCharrierTrainerMattressLandingBOTHforum.jpg.html)

[sitigeltfel]

Good flying, but I was surprised at the pilots comment that he was unaware of the stools existence.

[Background Noise]

He doesn't say he is unaware of it - he knows it is there, he just can't see it. I think that is the case landing on a pad (or a spot) - you can't see the pad, just the markers to line you up.

Some Harrier bod will hopefully confirm but isn't part of the problem that you can't actually 'fly' it all the way to the ground, because of re-ingestion(?), so at some point you have to close the throttle and fall. I seem to remember that there was a special grid, over a hole in the ground, at Bedford for this sort of thing where the aircraft could be flown all the way to touchdown.

[Al R]

"Basically, the nose gear wouldn't come done. The Harrier has a backup system with a nitrogen bottle to blow the gear down in this event. Well, someone significantly outranking the pilot ordered him not to blow the gear down (which is the specified emergency procedure) because by his 'superior' reasoning, if the nose gear didn't come down, he was afraid the jet would break its back by having all that weight on the long nose of the T-bird."

I'm sure that that would have been factored in when working out the SOP. Surely, the pilot could have ignored the advice or simply made squelching noises on transmit.. "I'm sorry, I can't hear you.. hello, can you hear me.? For a minute back there what with all the bad comms I thought you were asking if it was a good idea to land on a bed but that can't be right so I'm going to blow the nose wheel..".

Nice flying from Capt Mahoney, and I like his honesty after landing.. his brain had forgotten how to close the thing down.

[BOAC]

Some Harrier bod will hopefully confirm - very much out-of-date now, but I understand the new Harrier has much better characteristics in the hover regarding 'the cobbles' and re-circ - we need JF here!

Mind you, even the 'old' Harrier could be 'flown' onto the ground (without the grid) - you just did not 'linger' - although you might have thought some of my VLs were 'falling to the ground'..............:)

[cargosales]

Very, very impressive flying indeed :ok:

That trestle / STOOL is a great idea but it does seem rather narrow. I wonder what would have happened if there had been rough seas (it was virtually flat calm on the video) and with variable winds?

Why not make the trestle a good bit wider, or at least with a deeper U shape / more angled-out sides to catch the nose if gets blown a couple of feet sideways during the last 20' when it seems the pilot has very little ability to influence events...

CS

[Basil]

Nobody was on the flightdeck in case anything went wrong
NSS!


I love success by people who've worked hard; whether it's a Harrier pilot or a Bushman who's run down a Gazelle. Lovely video :ok:

[ian16th]

Do the Americans have a suitable decoration for such examples of 'devotion to duty whilst flying'?

Can TTN advise?

[John Farley]

Well done on having the stool and using it effectively. Some ignorance on display on this thread about difficulty of handling in the hovering/reingestion and so on. People prod without looking at the drogue and people VL without seeing what is underneath them by using cues to the side and ahead that determiine their position. A ship's spots are marked this way for just that reason.

The usual way to land without a nosewheel is to hover using the braking stop (18.5deg nose down) which allows the front of the nose cone to be within inches of the ground when the main wheels touch and so no slap down.

The last time I had one stick up (at Edwards in 1982) was great fun. I was in an AV-8B with an AV-8A chase. I had a nose red after takeoff so I selected down before another up selection. Chase said no nose wheel showing with nose doors shut and all other wheels down.

1.5 hours fuel to enjoy a bit of local area VFR with all the usual g/inversion/various speeds etc. being tried to no effect. MacAir and I were not bothered but the base got very excited. Photo ship and medic chopper etc etc all enjoying themselves. The fact that it was a Brit civilian flying a USMC aircraft on a Navy programme at the USAF flight test centre out of the MacAir hangar probably helped.

Then the wind got up to 45kt with lots of sand so the airfield shut and that left me and the chase on our own which simplifies ATC. I asked the Macair blokes to sweep a bit of concrete near our hanger on Taxiway Delta Agreed that I would use the blow down before going to the braking stop (the blow dumped the hyd 1 fluid so you did not want to hang about after using it) the blow lowered the nose leg so we landed, shut it down, locks in and tractor on. Total non event if you can hover.

[Al R]

John,

One of my back seat rides on 1(F) involved same. As I recall, after we lifted there was a curious grunt from the front and I was asked to 'bash' the buttons (by my left knee?) after the reds remained and nothing happened. So we rolled about a bit and got as much fuel out of the tanks as possible (looking in the mirror and seeing it stream out under negative G was quite cool). Hovering near the tower, seeing all these people looking at me with binos and hearing that the 'little red trucks' were waiting and being asked to make sure I had stowed my pens soon bought me back to earth with a bump.

The reality was far gentler, we settled like a feather. The next T-bird ride I was offered, I was bumped from at the almost last minute and it ended up going head to head with a goose near Hull.

[John Farley]

Al R

You were obviously living right!

The Harrier has been in service around the world for 45 years so not surprisingly there have been many u/c incidents and also a few where people did VLs having forgotten to lower the wheels. None produced the sort of damage that stopped the thing flying the next day. Probably just the same in the chopper world.

[SpazSinbad]

Marine pilot uses stool to land safely after malfunction
June 28, 2014 By Kate Wiltrout The Virginian-Pilot © June 28, 2014
"...The landing signal officer talked him in, making sure the Harrier was properly aligned before clearing him to land.
He idled the engine. The working landing gear hit the deck. He felt the nose drop.
“It dropped more than I expected,” he said. “But at that point, I was along for the ride.”
Mahoney had landed squarely on the middle of the stool. The nose bounced once and came to rest.
Adrenaline rushing, hands quivering, it took him a moment to remember how to shut off the jet.
“It was a pretty big relief,” he said in the video. “I didn’t realize how much I was shaking until I got out of the aircraft.”
Marine pilot uses stool to land safely after malfunction - Association of Naval Aviation in Virginia Beach, Virginia - Hampton Roads Squadron (http://hrana.org/news/2014/06/marine-pilot-uses-stool-to-land-safely-after-malfunction/)

[Boudreaux Bob]

Do the Americans have a suitable decoration for such examples of 'devotion to duty whilst flying'?

Of course they do.

It is a really huge gaudy thing as typical of them.

:=

[BEagle]

But is such a VL strictly 'flying'.....??

In the words of Toy Story's 'Woody':

?v=DwN6efmhp7E

Damn fine job though, Capt. Mahoney!