PPRuNe Forums - View Single Post - 4th June 2010 B737-800 rejected takeoff after V1 Report is out
Old 5th Jul 2011, 13:36
  #131 (permalink)  
The Ancient Geek
 
Join Date: May 2010
Location: UK
Age: 79
Posts: 1,086
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes on 0 Posts
Aborting after V1 has a terrible record.
There are good reasons for this.

Most late aborts happen because something has gone very wrong which was not detectable (or sometimes not noticed) until after rotation. Nasty surprises with little or no time to make a proper analysis of the problem. In many cases the aircraft is simply unflyable and an incident is inevitable.

Reduced power takeoffs are fashionable nowadays but IMHO are daft. The runway behind you is always useless. Safety compromised to save a few bucks.

Incorrect flap settings are a recurrent cause, this should not happen, unflyable as configured.

Unexpected control responses can have many causes, recent cases include improper or no de-icing, incorrect weight&balance, overloading, and maintenance issues such as several cases of incorrect rigging of B1900 controls. Most of these are either unflyable or dangerous to fly.

Multiple engine failures are rare after v1, usually caused by bird strikes, but again the aircraft may or may not be flyable.

V1 is only appropriate to single engine failures, it is simply irrelevant in any of the above cases.

My survival guide is simple, always be prepared for the unexpected. Know your airfield, does it have a cliff, hotel or cabbage patch at the end of the runway ?. Have a plan ready, keep a running assessment of available stopping distance until safely airborne. The crash tenders are going to reach you a lot sooner in the cabbage patch than 5 miles after takeoff.

And just hope that when it happens to you you get lucky and have 4000 metres of runway left as I did.

Last edited by The Ancient Geek; 5th Jul 2011 at 15:44. Reason: I need a spil chucker
The Ancient Geek is offline