Forced landing choice, water or timber?

[Super Cecil]

As the title says, if you have a choice, what are you going for? Those that have done Huet courses and have a better idea than the rest of us, what's your experience.

[Mach E Avelli]

Depends. Fixed or retractable gear? Pod mounted or tail mounted engines? Low or high wing?
Given a sheltered bay, river or lake, I would go into the water unless the beach was suitable.
Open, rough sea is very dangerous, but if you are ‘out there’ you probably don’t have a choice anyway.
Smacking into two metre waves at even a relatively low speed will break up most airframes. Smacking into trees may be survivable if you don’t burn or a branch does not impale you.

[Ascend Charlie]

Dang, beaten by Mach!

This needs a bit more clarification:
Open sea, or enclosed lake?
Deep or shallow?
Retractable gear or fixed?
Dense softwood like a pine plantation, or irregular tall hardwood, like Oz areas?
Tall or short trees?
Chopper or fixed wing?
Are you on fire?

Lay down a few criteria and we can give you some answers.

[Super Cecil]

Should have known better

[Ixixly]

Let me ask an equally excellent question: "How long is a piece of string?"

[Capt Fathom]

Water or Wood. People have survived and died doing either. But water seems to appear softer!

Some pilots can’t land safely on a runway!

[Super Cecil]

Ixixly, Arsend Charlie and Mach, how did you go doing the Huet course, did it change your perceptions? Peoples reactions can go from sheer terror to controlled panic, did your reactions surprise you? Did it make you think about your options should you have choice of timber or water?

[Ex FSO GRIFFO]

I can thoroughly recommend looking for a banana plantation..........

Cheeerrrsss.....

[grizzled]

Mach and AC have both covered the gist of what I was going to say.

In essence, if the OP means this to be a general question, there is no correct answer (meaning no clear "best choice"). Even if there are two seemingly equal choices available at the time a forced landing is apparent, or decision made (picture water ahead at 11 o'clock and flat land at 1 o'clock, same distance away, within gliding range) then several factors will affect the likelihood of a successful outcome -- as well as the degree of "success". First: the aircraft type (as mentioned by both posters above). Second, what is the nature and condition of each surface? Is the water wind swept, with high waves? What type and size of trees in that (seemingly) flat forested area? Third, is the PIC aware of tendencies / history of this type, with respect to impact characteristics, egress issues, etc. (He / she certainly should be… )

On the other hand, if the OP is asking the question: You are going to force land and you have no choice of land or water, what would you prefer to have in front of you as the place you are going to end this flight?

Answer: Water – if it’s a fixed wing, low wing, retractable, and the water is flat calm and is not open ocean. Otherwise, forest (regardless of whether high-wing, low wing, or rotary wing). And yes, my answer re rotary-wing (and fixed wing, high wing) is based at least partly on HUET.

Most importantly, in either case the stats show it’s a coin flip.

[Mach E Avelli]

I did the HUET a very long time ago - before it was called that. Though I am confident in the water and at the time was an occasional SCUBA diver, it was scary enough.
But I thought more applicable to a helicopter going into the drink than what I would expect for a fixed wing ditching.
I did a couple of deliveries with a ferry pilot who had ditched several times. As I recall, one was a high wing Cessna which went nose down and stayed semi submerged supported by the wing for a while. The problem was, that as he exited from the door (which he had the good sense to have cracked open before impact), he got trapped by the fully extended flap and had to dive down and back to get clear. He was not too far offshore so the US Coastguard got to him in a helicopter.
Another was a Chieftain which (lucky for him) had the optional crew hatch on the left side of the cockpit. He went in under full control and said the touch down was gentle enough. He had time to open the hatch, grab the small liferaft stowed on the co-pilot seat and get clear. By the time he got in the raft the aircraft had disappeared. From memory he was rescued by a Russian ship and ended up in Vladivostok.
What nearly did for him was a BN Islander. The sea was calm enough and touchdown very slow. But because the fixed nosewheel dug in to the water, the nose section crumpled backwards and smashed his legs. When I last saw him he was still using walking sticks.

[splat72]

I had the choice a long time back with an engine failure after take off from a strip in the gulf province in PNG. It was either until this very slow moving deep brown river with God knows what in it or take my luck with the canopy, I chose the canopy and survived to tell the story. Not an enjoyable experience. It all depends on the situation and all the other factors involved.

[Super Cecil]

Righto, for you fence sitters. You want a type of aircraft? Say a Kodiak and you just took of from Sentani. Your choice is very steep mostly denuded hills or the lake, there is a road that wraps around the edge at times but none of the straight sections are much more than a couple of hundred metres and usually has a lot of traffic.

[Slieve League Storm]

Night or Day?
I had Night...!
it is not a fun premise....
lucky to make it to a Aerodrome...
Could not even start the APU on arrival...
Low Fuel.!!!

[D'pirate]

unconscious in water, you drown, on land if no fire? just a thought.

[Cloudee]

I had the choice a long time back with an engine failure after take off from a strip in the golf province in PNG. It was either until this very slow moving deep brown river with God knows what in it or take my luck with the canopy, I chose the canopy and survived to tell the story. Not an enjoyable experience. It all depends on the situation and all the other factors involved.
Surely in this case you should have landed on the nearest golf course? 😂

[0ttoL]

I saw this AVweb video just recently.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0LwGYBBhTss

[buzzz.lightyear]

Righto, for you fence sitters. You want a type of aircraft? Say a Kodiak and you just took of from Sentani. Your choice is very steep mostly denuded hills or the lake, there is a road that wraps around the edge at times but none of the straight sections are much more than a couple of hundred metres and usually has a lot of traffic.


That's the recent MAF one...

[etrang]

Let me ask an equally excellent question: "How long is a piece of string?"

Let me give you an excellent answer. A piece of string is as long as the distance from one end to the other when the string is fully extended lengthways. You're welcome.

[Capt Fathom]

unconscious in water, you drown.

Yep, but are you going to hit the water that hard? Sully did ok!

With a high wing, you just got to make sure all the exits are unlocked before the cabin goes under.
Biggest issue is getting your safety equipment out once you’re in the water.

[Capt Quentin McHale]

Ixixly,

Let me ask an equally excellent question: "How long is a piece of string?"

Let me give you an equally excellent answer......... Twice the length from the centre to the end !!!

Rgds McHale.

[Ascend Charlie]

Ixixly, Arsend Charlie and Mach, how did you go doing the Huet course, did it change your perceptions?

Super, I used to conduct HUET courses, and from the comments of the participants, they were a lot happier to be in the water WITH the knowledge than without. However, it wouldn't affect their choice between water or wood.

You say a sparsely timbered hilltop. Tops of hills are better, as the trees are smaller, not having to compete in height for the sunlight. Bottoms of valleys have taller trees, much further to fall when your energy gets dissipated in the treetops. And in PNG, you would not want to be in a valley, as the walls are steep (splat, roll, die) and the rivers run deep and fast, many with a bunch of puk-puk ready to chew on you for lunch. Wouldn't want to Gumi down the Busu in the wreckage of a Cessna. Top of hill any day, maybe easier to find.

[non_state_actor]

Here is the footage of a C208 forced landing into the water in Hawaii https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=knJ54JNtcJc

[TWOTBAGS]

To follow on what AC has to say...... I used to do the HUET with him as I had the experience I never wanted.

When you experience watching the aircraft disintegrate about you, you have different perspective.

We chose water over wood, fixed gear, light aircraft.

The deceleration was spectacular but from that point it was surreal. A tumble dryer of shredded aluminum. Surprisingly we all got out relatively unscathed if not wet sore and cold.

Was it the right decision, at the time yes and I'm not going to second guess it. there are way too many decision inputs to simply say wood or wet. We missed the chance of a off site landing and the trees were very big and the water was very flat.

[Parson]

Reminds me of a story I was told about someone hour building in Florida. On the checkout (SE) he was told that if he had an engine failure, there were two choices - sharks or alligators. Take your pick...

(probably made up)

[Big Pistons Forever]

A fellow I know was flying an Air Tractor 802 on a fire bombing mission in Colorado. The pilot light in the engine went out just as he was coming off a bombing run, He scraped over the ridge ahead and it dropped down to a valley with a river at the bottom. He plopped it into the river which turned out to be quite shallow and so the stop was very abrupt. He was initially stunned by the impact and when a few seconds later he came to his senses and turned his head he saw a very attractive girl in a skimpy bikini, standing on the wing looking in the side window.

" I have died and gone to Heaven ! " was his first thought ......until he realized he was fine and his airplane stopped next to a beach with a bunch of girls sunbathing.....

[twinboom]

Yup. and I came-to in a hospital bed all plugged-in to an intravenous warm drip with a gorgeous nurse swimming into my field of view. 'Where am I?' quoth I before I could stop myself uttering that cliche. Clearly heaven, perhaps Valhalla, she was a classic nordic blonde; Self having plopped into the -1.5deg.C Baltic Sea. Thank you 722Sqn Royal Danish Air Force. I was at night, would not have fancied Trees!

[lucille]

To have the choice of timber or water - there must also be shoreline. In that case, shoreline might, just might be the best option. It offers you the opportunity of not making that decision until the very last few seconds.

In the end the better choice is best summed up by Dirty Harry: "Do you feel lucky?"

[ManInJapan]

Here is the footage of a C208 forced landing into the water in Hawaii
Interesting video.
It looks like a very high speed ditching. 70 knots stated.

[D'pirate]

I'm no Sully!

[jmmoric]

If there's no flat area, I would personally go for the water.

Land close to the shoreline, and keeping my thumbs away from holding "around" the yoke... Seen quite a few broken thumbs after "quick stops".

Only forests in the area.... that wouldn't be fun. But I did read a swedish article about the subject at one point, and their recommendation is keep flying the aircraft as you normally would an approach, aim between the trees (ofcourse) and aim to pull up the nose when close to the ground, as you normally would. Never ever pull the nose over the trees, it may end in a stall, and nose down into the ground.

I have no experience in forestlandings, but it sounded reasonable :)

I do fly in rough, non-forrested terrain (Greenland), and there I would choose quite rocky ground over water at any occasion possible..... water is cold as hell.... as a cold hell I suppose. Not pointing towards rocks, and just take a "I can walk away alive"-landing as the primary goal.

[Bodie1]

I've done HUET.

I'm a scuba diver.

HUET is scary **** if you think about the real scenario. Getting out of the aircraft is the first thing, then you've got to get a heavy bundle (raft) out of the aircraft if you haven't been smacked in the head, then you've got to get it inflated and into it before you freeze to death. mmmm. Should have taken that Macca's internship.

[Ascend Charlie]

Never ever pull the nose over the trees, it may end in a stall, and nose down into the ground.

Bit different for a chopper. Built like a racing tadpole, the rotors will flip off and the fuselage will start slipping down through the trees. If you entered level, then the horizontal stabilizer will probably snag on some branches, the nose swings down, the weight comes on those branches, they break off, and the tadpole is headed nose-first for the ground 100' away. And there is little protection in a fibreglass nose and perspex window for the unlucky pax.

Better to enter the trees very nose-high, and hopefully fall in the same way. The tailboom, which is disposable, might take a lot of the energy of the crash, and landing backwards gives a bit of protection with the seat, instead of hanging face-first from a seatbelt.

[CharlotteAnderson]

So can I do the Legally Blonde thing here and say neither? I'd prefer to land on a runway ;)

For me it really would depend on the terrain and what the body of water was. The idea of a water landing gives me the heebie jeebies though! :yuk:

[poteroo]

As close to the shoreline as you can plonk it.

If over land - pasture rather than crop, grassland rather than forest. Partially cleared land ok if you can dodge stumps. If steep slope - keep speed up so you don't stall in the roundout

If forest - between the biggest tree trunks. If no gaps - stall it into the lowest looking bushes - maybe secondary forest regrowth.

If in tropics - into the canegrass along the riverbanks, or the kunai patches on hillsides. Secondary jungle growth much more forgiving, (and less height to fall) than primary jungle. Much sooner take my chances with the odd croc than disintegrate the airframe against some hard vegetation.

[RENURPP]

Can you swim?