Hello haughtney1
I am not assuming anything. As I have said I have personally transfered the technique from a C152 to a B737 to a B767. I have used it when a B737-800 weighed 66 tons, and I have used it when it weighed 50 tons.
If you don't have 500ft/1000ft markers, you use something else such as counting the centreline markings (30m long with 30m spacing).
Of course you use what ever landing aids are available to you, but my point is if the rad alt callouts are MEL'd, that shouldn't have any affect on your ability to land an aeroplane. I'm sure on the day the guy/girl would find a way of putting it down but there might be an unnecessary increase in stress levels.
I'll leave it at that. I'm not wanting to pontificate and I acknowledge that there are many ways of flying an aeroplane, it's just that I get a little annoyed when people dismiss this technique when I KNOW it works. It has allowed me to never doubt myself below 50 ft. I have heard of people's careers in airlines be destroyed because they had a problem in the last 50 ft for whatever reason and it simply does not have to be that way.
It is simply a template to work from when you are low in experience, and it is something to fall back on when the conditions are tough where most of the other visual cue's are either missing or misleading. It has "saved" me numerous times when landing on 30 metre wide runways (rather than the usual 45 m) where you feel like you are higher than you think. When I see the point on the runway pass underneath the glareshield, I think for a split second "well it sure doesn't feel like I should be flaring yet, but geometry doesn't lie." I start the flare manoeuvre and sure enough it goes on nicely just beyond the 1000 ft markers.
I'm not saying I'm a sh#t hot pilot or anything, I'm just saying it works for me time and time again and it should not be dismissed by people who demonstrate to me they don't understand what it is about and just how adaptable and flexible it is. It is not a "one size fit's all" because it is not one size to begin with. It fits C152's and it fits B737's and B747's.
OK that's all I will say. Thank you. I hope ALL the contributions on this thread helped the people who asked for it.
