Originally Posted by
Ascend Charlie
"Up until gear retraction, we will land and take the barrier.
From gear up until 180kt, it is an ejection, I call Eject! Eject! Eject!
Above 180 kt we can consider a turnback."
And after I call for ejection, if you say "What?" all you will hear is an echo.
While the example you quote is presumably for the current aircraft you fly, I presume it is jet powered hence your reference to an ejection. After a fatal turn back crash of a dual Vampire at the RAAF Central Flying School at East Sale in Victoria, Australia, many years ago, test pilots from the Aircraft Research and Development Unit (ARDU) were tasked to carry out turn back tests in the dual Vampire Mk 35. In short they recommended a minimum airspeed of 220 knots before a turn back was contemplated. . That depended on what type of engine failure. If the failure was because of engine seizure then because of the considerable drag caused by a seized engine no safe figure could be given simply because it wasn't possible to simulate a seizure.
In the case of the fatal accident, the engine had seized and a forced landing straight ahead in any one of obstacle free grass fields would have very likely been successful. Instead the Vampire crashed well short of the reciprocal runway during the course of the attempted turn back.
At the time of the accident there was no CFS policy for an emergency brief before take off and no minimum airspeed to be briefed either. The reason for this was that an engine could fail at any point from on the runway.to climb out and the decision to eject or land straight ahead could could vary with every second of flight. . .