Question re. the Gimli Glider
I'm a writer doing a brief piece on the infamous Gimli Glider--the Air Canada 767-200 that ran out of fuel due in part to a liters/gallons mixup. I'm a pilot, but my experience only stretches as far as a Cessna Citation type rating, so my experience with RATs is nonexistent.
Question: Several of the accounts I've read of the incident say that the controls became more and more difficult to use as the airplane slowed to best-glide speed because the ram-air turbine didn't produce as much "hydraulic pressure" at low speeds as it did when extended into higher-speed airflow.
Is this possible? I should think a RAT produced electricity that either ran the hydraulic pumps or didn't. (They didn't have to power a whole lot of other stuff, as it was daytime and good weather.)