Centaurus
31st Aug 2017, 14:19
While at my local library I came across that wonderful book by Macarthur ("Mac") Job published in 1994 called "The Old and the Bold". As Mac wrote in the Introduction "the experiences assembled in this book come from various sources. Most are from pilots who actually went through the ordeals they describe; a few are from accident records of the former Department of Civil Aviation; some are autobiographical.
On page 29 is "Cutting Corners" about an airline pilot who in the early 1980's returned to general aviation to fly freight runs in a Beech Baron.
Cutting Corners
After my sudden retrenchment from an overseas airline I returned home to Australia unemployed. Being in my middle fifties, I was offered no hope of a job with any of the domestic airlines. .
The curt, unfriendly manager of a major commuter airline was frank in his refusal even to interview me. He told he would not embarrass his young captains by having an “old man” in the co-pilot’s seat – and he doubted if I’d be able to carry the passengers’ luggage anyway!
Desperate to find something, I touted my considerable experience around various general aviation operators. Again, no one was interested. Ex-airline pilots were apparently not a good bet. The perceived wisdom was they would expect too much of aircraft serviceability, might not accept the commercial reality for the need to stretch the rules from time to time – and that flying light twins was too tough a job for them in any case.
But finally I was rewarded when the chief pilot of a charter company said he might be able to give me some casual work. So for a few weeks I flew Aero Commander and Beech Barons. Some of the trips were to regional country airports on scheduled freight services. Told that maintaining schedules was paramount to the success of this part of the business, I was quietly urged to speed up my cockpit checks, taxi faster, cut corners in the circuit and generally “ forget airline habits” (whatever that meant).
One evening, because of a delay in loading, I arrived back into a major airport ten minutes late, and despite valid explanations, was castigated by a newly promoted 27 year old senior pilot. My job was on the line, and being desperate to hold it until something better came along, I began to cut corners too.
A round trip I was flying from Melbourne required me to wait at a regional airport until evening, load more freight, then fly back to Essendon with a night landing.
The Beech Baron I happened to be flying in this instance was not owned by our company, but was one that had been cross-chartered from another operator. There were no snags in its maintenance release, and the outward flight from Melbourne was normal in every way. Landing at the regional airport, I refuelled, chocked and put in the control locks, and went off to wait. As I hadn’t flown this particular, I spent some time reading through its Flight Manual. When I saw who owned it, I vaguely recalled someone mentioning that this owner had experienced expensive troubles with repeated failure of the alternator warning lights. However, as the maintenance release contained no reference to such a problem, I gave it no further thought.
At 7pm I returned to the aircraft to await the freight. It arrived and was hurriedly loaded. I secured the cargo nets, and took off for my next port of call, landing there right on schedule just before dark. To my dismay the freight here was 10 minutes late arriving thanks to the delivery vehicle having a flat tyre, and I began to sweat about the future of my job. Some bulky but light cartons were finally forced into the Baron, but despite much pulling and cursing I was unable to lock down the freight nets again. I finally decided I would have to get going – and fast. So I just left the nets draped over as much of the freight as possible, did a “Battle of Britain scramble”, and set course for Essendon. As a safety precaution the nets were completely useless – and I knew it.
Some 25 minutes later, and 45 nautical miles from Essendon and flying in instrument conditions in the dark, I noticed that the instrument lighting becoming dim. Being in cloud, and feeling weary as well as tense at the thought of receiving another rocket for being late, I adjusted my glasses and put the problem down to imagination – and old age.
Soon afterwards the ADF needle began to wander aimlessly and the VOR flag became intermittent. The instrument lighting was getting worse and I suspected an electrical problem in the offing. This was puzzling, because both alternator warning lights were extinguished and both load meters showed an ever so slight charging rate.
When 35 DME Essendon, the DME itself gave up the ghost – leaving me in cloud at night with no radio aids. Fortunately, just a few moments previously, I had glimpsed the glow of Melbourne’s city lights in the distance before going back into solid IMC.
I called up Melbourne Control and advised them that I could lose radio contact because of an electrical malfunction. At the moment the controller answered , enquiring “Are your operations normal?” everything went dark. Happily for me, I had a small torch in my pocket, so continuing to fly with one hand, using torchlight to see the instruments. I checked what circuit breakers I could, but all were OK.
As I got nearer to Melbourne I aimed for the glow of the city , attempting to keep out of clouds as much as possible. Occasional glimpses of ground lights indicated a lot of low scud, base between 700 and 1,500 feet, and the rest of the cloud seemed to be about five eighths. Finally I spotted Essendon’s runway lights below me, but they quickly disappeared in a patch of cloud.
At least I now knew where I was so it was simply a case of flying the aircraft with one hand and trying not to drop the torch with the other. Calculating I could spiral down carefully below the main cloud base, I selected the undercarriage lever to `down. But of course nothing happened – the gear is electrically operated and I had no electrics!
As I digested this little problem, I suddenly found myself in a 60 degree bank – my torch beam having wandered off the artificial horizon as my concentration lapsed. I was thankful that I was experienced in night instrument – “black hole” approaches into small Pacific runways had kept my cross reference skills up to scratch.
I groped in the dark to find the emergency undercarriage crank. In the Baron it is situated in a damnably difficult position just aft of the pilot’s seat. To my consternation I now discovered that, because I had failed to tie the freight down, some of the packages had worked themselves forward over the handle assembly. Now I was really in strife. I needed three hands – one to fly, another to aim the torch at the artificial horizon, and one to shift the boxes!
Circling with only partial visual contact, (unaware that I was straying near the instrument approach path for Runway 27 at Tullamarine – and that Air Traffic Control, with two 747’s on their way in, were watching me like a hawk on radar), I finally succeeded in shifting the freight out of the way, and again reached blindly for the emergency undercarriage crank. It operated freely for only five or six rotations then gummed up. I knew it required 50 turns to wind the undercarriage right down, so what was wrong now? Again I found myself overbanking as I tried to look down and back at the emergency handle by torchlight.
I realized I’d better confirm exactly which way the damned handle should wind -clockwise or anti-clockwise- as it seemed to be jamming in both directions. Fortunately fuel endurance wasn’t a problem so provided I didn’t flatten the torch battery, or lose control in cloud, I should be able to sort out the problem.
Reaching across the cockpit, I scrabbled in the dark for the Flight Manual situated in the glove box over the far right side of the cockpit, and opened it on my lap. Now have you ever tried simultaneously flying an aircraft at night with one hand, watching the instruments, and trying to read the manual’s emergency index? All the while waving a torch between the instruments and the book on your knees? The book keeps sliding off your knees because you have to keep your legs apart to retain your feet on the rudder pedals. Wearing glasses is no help either!
Anyway, between much wing waggling and semi-visual navigation, I eventually found the right page and proceeded to read the small print – and I can tell you for someone of mature age in that situation, it is very small print indeed.
Following the instructions strictly I managed some 20-odd very difficult further turns of the handle. But after that it just jammed solid. I had lost a lot of skin from my right knuckles – thanks to the handle, pieces of broken plastic and sundry bits of fuselage all being in close proximity to each other –and bitterly cursed the gentleman who had cost me such a pleasant job - and was thus responsible for the present situation.
Forcing myself to stay calm, I faced the awful possibility that a wheels-up landing might be the only way out. I was angry with myself for being such an idiot. Not tying down the freight was not only a clear breach of the regulations; worse still, it was very poor airmanship. I vowed that never again would I be pressured into potentially dangerous situations by fears of job security.
All this drama over Melbourne had occupied about 20 minutes. Now, as an afterthought, I turned on the aircraft’s master switch again. (I had previously turned it off to conserve what battery power might remain). The VHF selector glowed green and I quickly dialled the transponder to 7700 and transmitted that I was unable to lower the undercarriage. No sooner had I done so then everything went dead again. At this stage I was orbiting Essendon, which I could see 2,000 feet below me, and was fairly confident I could stay close in, despite frequent cloud penetration. I did not want to descend further until I was ready for an approach, because I needed the altitude for my attempts to get the undercarriage down.
I had a few more goes at trying to free the now completely jammed crank, but eventually gave up in despair; I was getting tired and irritable and my flying was becoming sloppy. I resigned myself to the fact that I would have to belly land within the next 10 minutes – I was worried that the torch battery would go went flat – and that torch was absolutely vital!
The idea of a wheels-up landing did not worry me too much in itself; but the thought of being crucified by the Department for not tying down the freight weighed heavily. I had enjoyed a reasonably trouble free career as an airline pilot – but I’d certainly stuffed it now!
After a few minutes of thinking through the proposed belly landing technique, I switched on the battery for one final call to Essendon Tower to warn them I was coming in – ready or not. Again, a faint glimmer of green on the VHF. Then for a reason I cannot explain I suddenly had an idea. Pushing in the undercarriage circuit breaker (previously pulled as part of the emergency lowering drill), I re-selected the undercarriage lever to “down”. Within seconds I heard a reassuring thump below that was music to my ears. At the same instant the green down lights glowed momentarily then went out. Next there was total darkness as I flew into a thick patch of cloud.
It was good enough. I had seen the greens before the battery finally died. Using my one handed- torch technique, I descended in and out of low cloud into the circuit and got myself on to final approach. I had no flaps or landing lights - and no certainty that all three wheels were locked down – but the touchdown was fine. With a vast feeling of relief, I taxied to the terminal. The waiting van driver grumbled about my late arrival, unloaded the freight quickly, and drove off. I put the aircraft to bed, installed the control locks and wrote in the Maintenance Release: “Total electrical failure also emergency gear handle jammed in operation.”
After a kiss and a “Did you have a nice flight, dear” from my ever loving spouse, when I arrived home I phoned Melbourne Air Traffic Control and apologized for disorganizing their flow control, then rang the duty Departmental Air Safety Investigator to explain things. When I returned to the aircraft next morning with the maintenance engineer to investigate my “snag” in the Maintenance Release he could find nothing wrong with the Baron’s electrics. But he did find a circuit breaker popped, one that was part of the alternator control system. Although I thought I had checked all the circuit breakers when the electrical system had failed, this particular one on this aircraft was situated out of sight under the instrument panel, with no label to identify it.
I wondered why the invisible circuit breaker had popped – and why no alternator warning lights. The latter was easily answered. There were no bulbs in the alternator lamp module, only the transparent red covers! The earlier repeated problems with the warning lights had proved too expensive for the owner, so he simply removed the alternator warning lamp bulbs and replaced the red covers. No entry had been made in the Maintenance Release to this effect.
So what about the circuit breaker? In the Beech Baron, the aileron and elevator control lock consists of a large metal pin which fits into matching holes drilled in the axis of the master control column. Attached to this pin by a length of retaining wire is a metal bar, designed to be placed in between the rudder pedals, so forming a rudder lock.
On this particular Baron, the wire was very taut with locks in place and it took a lot of fiddling under the instrument panel to fit the rudder lock properly. When so fitted, the retaining wire ran very close to the hidden circuit breaker. Apparently, when I removed the control locks before taking off for Melbourne the wire jagged the collar of the circuit breaker, pulling it out.
Unwittingly, I then flew two sectors, including two engine starts and night flying, on battery only. With the absence of alternator warning lights appearing to indicate all was well, I did not monitor the load meters closely. And when the battery gave up the ghost the load meters showed a slightly positive needle position only because it was their electrical zero. Murphy’s Law!
Oh yes – I almost forgot to add that the reason for the jamming of the emergency undercarriage crank was damage to the mechanism, in all probability caused by heavy freight resting on the assembly…
The lesson of this sorry tale? Don’t allow commercial or personal pressures to influence your professional airmanship decisions –in other words, don’t cut corners. And at night always carry a fully charged torch – preferably two.
On page 29 is "Cutting Corners" about an airline pilot who in the early 1980's returned to general aviation to fly freight runs in a Beech Baron.
Cutting Corners
After my sudden retrenchment from an overseas airline I returned home to Australia unemployed. Being in my middle fifties, I was offered no hope of a job with any of the domestic airlines. .
The curt, unfriendly manager of a major commuter airline was frank in his refusal even to interview me. He told he would not embarrass his young captains by having an “old man” in the co-pilot’s seat – and he doubted if I’d be able to carry the passengers’ luggage anyway!
Desperate to find something, I touted my considerable experience around various general aviation operators. Again, no one was interested. Ex-airline pilots were apparently not a good bet. The perceived wisdom was they would expect too much of aircraft serviceability, might not accept the commercial reality for the need to stretch the rules from time to time – and that flying light twins was too tough a job for them in any case.
But finally I was rewarded when the chief pilot of a charter company said he might be able to give me some casual work. So for a few weeks I flew Aero Commander and Beech Barons. Some of the trips were to regional country airports on scheduled freight services. Told that maintaining schedules was paramount to the success of this part of the business, I was quietly urged to speed up my cockpit checks, taxi faster, cut corners in the circuit and generally “ forget airline habits” (whatever that meant).
One evening, because of a delay in loading, I arrived back into a major airport ten minutes late, and despite valid explanations, was castigated by a newly promoted 27 year old senior pilot. My job was on the line, and being desperate to hold it until something better came along, I began to cut corners too.
A round trip I was flying from Melbourne required me to wait at a regional airport until evening, load more freight, then fly back to Essendon with a night landing.
The Beech Baron I happened to be flying in this instance was not owned by our company, but was one that had been cross-chartered from another operator. There were no snags in its maintenance release, and the outward flight from Melbourne was normal in every way. Landing at the regional airport, I refuelled, chocked and put in the control locks, and went off to wait. As I hadn’t flown this particular, I spent some time reading through its Flight Manual. When I saw who owned it, I vaguely recalled someone mentioning that this owner had experienced expensive troubles with repeated failure of the alternator warning lights. However, as the maintenance release contained no reference to such a problem, I gave it no further thought.
At 7pm I returned to the aircraft to await the freight. It arrived and was hurriedly loaded. I secured the cargo nets, and took off for my next port of call, landing there right on schedule just before dark. To my dismay the freight here was 10 minutes late arriving thanks to the delivery vehicle having a flat tyre, and I began to sweat about the future of my job. Some bulky but light cartons were finally forced into the Baron, but despite much pulling and cursing I was unable to lock down the freight nets again. I finally decided I would have to get going – and fast. So I just left the nets draped over as much of the freight as possible, did a “Battle of Britain scramble”, and set course for Essendon. As a safety precaution the nets were completely useless – and I knew it.
Some 25 minutes later, and 45 nautical miles from Essendon and flying in instrument conditions in the dark, I noticed that the instrument lighting becoming dim. Being in cloud, and feeling weary as well as tense at the thought of receiving another rocket for being late, I adjusted my glasses and put the problem down to imagination – and old age.
Soon afterwards the ADF needle began to wander aimlessly and the VOR flag became intermittent. The instrument lighting was getting worse and I suspected an electrical problem in the offing. This was puzzling, because both alternator warning lights were extinguished and both load meters showed an ever so slight charging rate.
When 35 DME Essendon, the DME itself gave up the ghost – leaving me in cloud at night with no radio aids. Fortunately, just a few moments previously, I had glimpsed the glow of Melbourne’s city lights in the distance before going back into solid IMC.
I called up Melbourne Control and advised them that I could lose radio contact because of an electrical malfunction. At the moment the controller answered , enquiring “Are your operations normal?” everything went dark. Happily for me, I had a small torch in my pocket, so continuing to fly with one hand, using torchlight to see the instruments. I checked what circuit breakers I could, but all were OK.
As I got nearer to Melbourne I aimed for the glow of the city , attempting to keep out of clouds as much as possible. Occasional glimpses of ground lights indicated a lot of low scud, base between 700 and 1,500 feet, and the rest of the cloud seemed to be about five eighths. Finally I spotted Essendon’s runway lights below me, but they quickly disappeared in a patch of cloud.
At least I now knew where I was so it was simply a case of flying the aircraft with one hand and trying not to drop the torch with the other. Calculating I could spiral down carefully below the main cloud base, I selected the undercarriage lever to `down. But of course nothing happened – the gear is electrically operated and I had no electrics!
As I digested this little problem, I suddenly found myself in a 60 degree bank – my torch beam having wandered off the artificial horizon as my concentration lapsed. I was thankful that I was experienced in night instrument – “black hole” approaches into small Pacific runways had kept my cross reference skills up to scratch.
I groped in the dark to find the emergency undercarriage crank. In the Baron it is situated in a damnably difficult position just aft of the pilot’s seat. To my consternation I now discovered that, because I had failed to tie the freight down, some of the packages had worked themselves forward over the handle assembly. Now I was really in strife. I needed three hands – one to fly, another to aim the torch at the artificial horizon, and one to shift the boxes!
Circling with only partial visual contact, (unaware that I was straying near the instrument approach path for Runway 27 at Tullamarine – and that Air Traffic Control, with two 747’s on their way in, were watching me like a hawk on radar), I finally succeeded in shifting the freight out of the way, and again reached blindly for the emergency undercarriage crank. It operated freely for only five or six rotations then gummed up. I knew it required 50 turns to wind the undercarriage right down, so what was wrong now? Again I found myself overbanking as I tried to look down and back at the emergency handle by torchlight.
I realized I’d better confirm exactly which way the damned handle should wind -clockwise or anti-clockwise- as it seemed to be jamming in both directions. Fortunately fuel endurance wasn’t a problem so provided I didn’t flatten the torch battery, or lose control in cloud, I should be able to sort out the problem.
Reaching across the cockpit, I scrabbled in the dark for the Flight Manual situated in the glove box over the far right side of the cockpit, and opened it on my lap. Now have you ever tried simultaneously flying an aircraft at night with one hand, watching the instruments, and trying to read the manual’s emergency index? All the while waving a torch between the instruments and the book on your knees? The book keeps sliding off your knees because you have to keep your legs apart to retain your feet on the rudder pedals. Wearing glasses is no help either!
Anyway, between much wing waggling and semi-visual navigation, I eventually found the right page and proceeded to read the small print – and I can tell you for someone of mature age in that situation, it is very small print indeed.
Following the instructions strictly I managed some 20-odd very difficult further turns of the handle. But after that it just jammed solid. I had lost a lot of skin from my right knuckles – thanks to the handle, pieces of broken plastic and sundry bits of fuselage all being in close proximity to each other –and bitterly cursed the gentleman who had cost me such a pleasant job - and was thus responsible for the present situation.
Forcing myself to stay calm, I faced the awful possibility that a wheels-up landing might be the only way out. I was angry with myself for being such an idiot. Not tying down the freight was not only a clear breach of the regulations; worse still, it was very poor airmanship. I vowed that never again would I be pressured into potentially dangerous situations by fears of job security.
All this drama over Melbourne had occupied about 20 minutes. Now, as an afterthought, I turned on the aircraft’s master switch again. (I had previously turned it off to conserve what battery power might remain). The VHF selector glowed green and I quickly dialled the transponder to 7700 and transmitted that I was unable to lower the undercarriage. No sooner had I done so then everything went dead again. At this stage I was orbiting Essendon, which I could see 2,000 feet below me, and was fairly confident I could stay close in, despite frequent cloud penetration. I did not want to descend further until I was ready for an approach, because I needed the altitude for my attempts to get the undercarriage down.
I had a few more goes at trying to free the now completely jammed crank, but eventually gave up in despair; I was getting tired and irritable and my flying was becoming sloppy. I resigned myself to the fact that I would have to belly land within the next 10 minutes – I was worried that the torch battery would go went flat – and that torch was absolutely vital!
The idea of a wheels-up landing did not worry me too much in itself; but the thought of being crucified by the Department for not tying down the freight weighed heavily. I had enjoyed a reasonably trouble free career as an airline pilot – but I’d certainly stuffed it now!
After a few minutes of thinking through the proposed belly landing technique, I switched on the battery for one final call to Essendon Tower to warn them I was coming in – ready or not. Again, a faint glimmer of green on the VHF. Then for a reason I cannot explain I suddenly had an idea. Pushing in the undercarriage circuit breaker (previously pulled as part of the emergency lowering drill), I re-selected the undercarriage lever to “down”. Within seconds I heard a reassuring thump below that was music to my ears. At the same instant the green down lights glowed momentarily then went out. Next there was total darkness as I flew into a thick patch of cloud.
It was good enough. I had seen the greens before the battery finally died. Using my one handed- torch technique, I descended in and out of low cloud into the circuit and got myself on to final approach. I had no flaps or landing lights - and no certainty that all three wheels were locked down – but the touchdown was fine. With a vast feeling of relief, I taxied to the terminal. The waiting van driver grumbled about my late arrival, unloaded the freight quickly, and drove off. I put the aircraft to bed, installed the control locks and wrote in the Maintenance Release: “Total electrical failure also emergency gear handle jammed in operation.”
After a kiss and a “Did you have a nice flight, dear” from my ever loving spouse, when I arrived home I phoned Melbourne Air Traffic Control and apologized for disorganizing their flow control, then rang the duty Departmental Air Safety Investigator to explain things. When I returned to the aircraft next morning with the maintenance engineer to investigate my “snag” in the Maintenance Release he could find nothing wrong with the Baron’s electrics. But he did find a circuit breaker popped, one that was part of the alternator control system. Although I thought I had checked all the circuit breakers when the electrical system had failed, this particular one on this aircraft was situated out of sight under the instrument panel, with no label to identify it.
I wondered why the invisible circuit breaker had popped – and why no alternator warning lights. The latter was easily answered. There were no bulbs in the alternator lamp module, only the transparent red covers! The earlier repeated problems with the warning lights had proved too expensive for the owner, so he simply removed the alternator warning lamp bulbs and replaced the red covers. No entry had been made in the Maintenance Release to this effect.
So what about the circuit breaker? In the Beech Baron, the aileron and elevator control lock consists of a large metal pin which fits into matching holes drilled in the axis of the master control column. Attached to this pin by a length of retaining wire is a metal bar, designed to be placed in between the rudder pedals, so forming a rudder lock.
On this particular Baron, the wire was very taut with locks in place and it took a lot of fiddling under the instrument panel to fit the rudder lock properly. When so fitted, the retaining wire ran very close to the hidden circuit breaker. Apparently, when I removed the control locks before taking off for Melbourne the wire jagged the collar of the circuit breaker, pulling it out.
Unwittingly, I then flew two sectors, including two engine starts and night flying, on battery only. With the absence of alternator warning lights appearing to indicate all was well, I did not monitor the load meters closely. And when the battery gave up the ghost the load meters showed a slightly positive needle position only because it was their electrical zero. Murphy’s Law!
Oh yes – I almost forgot to add that the reason for the jamming of the emergency undercarriage crank was damage to the mechanism, in all probability caused by heavy freight resting on the assembly…
The lesson of this sorry tale? Don’t allow commercial or personal pressures to influence your professional airmanship decisions –in other words, don’t cut corners. And at night always carry a fully charged torch – preferably two.