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Old 20th Jul 2006, 20:59
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Speed Twelve
 
Join Date: Nov 1999
Location: 300 miles south of EDI
Age: 55
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Ok Blackie...

The Firefly will enter a flat-ish high-rotational spin mode if the normal spin recovery is mishandled even slightly. Us chaps are required to do a dual high-rot spin sortie annually in which this spin mode is deliberately induced and the instructor left to sort it out.

Delayed spin recovery is pretty straightforward, reapply pro-spin controls and recommence the normal recovery technique. In a high-rot spin the stick tends to go pretty much all the way to the forward stop. The aircraft snaps out of the spin pretty abruptly and if you aren't circumspect with centralising the control column then an outside loop tends to commence!

There are no other published spin recovery drills that we use. Prevention is quite good, and a lot of emphasis is placed on incipient spin recovery technique in the mil. Applying this promptly and correctly will sort things out no matter how wild the initial departure, as long as you are quick and accurate with the controls.

First item on the Immediate Action Drill for a full spin incidentally is 'check height'. If you are approaching your pre-calculated minimum abandonment height (transition level + height of ground) then you'd just throw the aircraft away. At minimum abandon (normally FL35-FL40) there's just enough time to get rid of the sunroof, unstrap, step outside, get clear the aircraft and pull the d-ring. Incidentally, the last time a mil crew had to throw away a Firefly in a spin the instructor had to physically crawl over the side of the cockpit against rotational 'g' before jumping clear AFAIK.

I wouldn't be keen to deliberately spin an aircraft without a parachute. Even C152s can bite. An ex-Perth CFI managed to recover (at 1500' agl IIRC) from a high-rot spin in one a few years back. I think a CAA test pilot became involved with that one.
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