Hazards of on-property airstrips

[anniehen]

G'day

Just wondering if anyone can tell me the hazards to aircraft of on-property airstrips, and surrounds eg. stock. Any stories are great too.

Thanks.

[Sheep Guts]

I had to dodge Roos quite often sometimes at the last minute. Worst time is landing right at dusk. The Sun and haze can obscure your periferal vision ( concetrating on the touch down point) ie. Roos running on at the last moment usually involves some dog leg landing rolls , once happened to me in a C402B.

At Oenpelli, the old Meatworks Strip, which was the back up to the Normal Strip before it was sealed, happened to have 30 to 40 Brahman Bulls in it, and sometimes Waterbuff. Same thing, last flight of the DAY in C206, had to buzz the cattle a couple of times. Funny enough they just stare at you without flinching. They also had powerlines at one end of that strip, quite trickey,( oh it wasnt licenced :D ).

I think I have missed the intent of your question, are you planning to fly in the outback? If so allways try and contact the Airstrip owner or operator, and perform your precautionary search Landing technique to inspect the strip for animals if required. BEWARE OF OBSTACLES AND ONLY ATTEMPT THIS IN VFR CONDITIONS.

Happy stump jumping!:D;)

[Boomerang]

Now I know you WILL ring up before using one to check condition, and the owner will normally reply that "The strips is fine".

Normally only a very narrow and short length of the strip is used by the owners or muster pilots. Hence, if you are planning an arrival in a large twin, or even a 172, ask the owner to drive down the strip and check for any debris, or largish vegetation. You don't know whats hiding amongst the longer grasses past the172 rotate point.

Our company has once had a piece of star picket flick up and puncture the flap, and I have once found a 1m length of fencing wire wrapped around a main gear door post landing. In both cases the strip was dry and fine for use. These items won't be seen from the air and hopefully the station owner will pick these up during a full length strip inspection, at your request.

[john_tullamarine]

... and if you are in a ragbag machine .. you wouldn't leave it out unprotected for the stock to munch on, now ..... would you ?

[RobertyRoberts]

Sheepish made a good point about dawn/dusk ie low light angle. Prior to your last departure before last light WASH the windscreen with the mild detergent and water you always carry so as to give yourself the best chance to see when you get to the destination.

Other considerations:

1. Optical illusions
- sloping ground to make you misjudge HEIGHT AGL; fly the circuit by ref to the altimeter height above the threshold.
- no space between runway and trees alongside so you think you are too wide on downwind; so use the elements of an instrument visual circling approach since that is designed to solve the problem of poor visual information.
- terrain around the strip or even a few km's away but enough to disrupt the horizon; fly the airspeed since attitude will be more difficult to determine. If this means a ASI/(VIS/ALTIM due slopes) scan you need to keep the lookout going.

2. No windsock - look at tree branches / water / dust.

3. People in vehicles crossing the strip - as part of your inspection run fly over nearby buildings so that people know you are around.

4. Remember; wires AND towers; towers can appear in very odd places when the owner thinks that all the local pilots will be aware of them.

5. LDR. Touching down at the 300m mark on a 1200m sealed strip is fine; but not on a 700m strip. Practice touching down 10m past the threshold.
Identify the threshold on your inspection run; it may not be the physical end of the runway if someone has built a nearly invisible star picket and 4 strand fence across it 200m in.
The Ag pilots usually use a 500m strip, so if you are going to one of these really make sure you know what you are doing.
Work out for yourself the lenght of the useable strip by the number of seconds it takes to do your inspection run between 2 points at the IAS you like to fly it; any wind do a run from each end. Pre plan what a circuit would look like after doing this.

And its not over until someone hits the fat lady with a star picket..

6. When you get there someone might want a lift into Broome etc and has the paycheck to prove it; fine, but is that what you really set out to do in the first place, and how will it affect your available time ?

7. A lot of tie down pickets are ABOVE ground by 10 cm ie just enough to spear a tire.

8. Roads and tracks are often rutted and will drop the nose wheel just enough to strike the prop on the far egde of the rut. The best thing is cross ruts at an angle to clear the strip then shut down and inspect the rest of the "taxiway/apron" on foot before you go any further.
If the strip is really crook just shut down ON it and walk around for a look; the ag drivers will only say "f***ing useless PPL ******" but so what, its your prop not theirs.

9. Refueling from drums means using a hand pump. Unless the strip has aircraft operating out of it and has a AVGAS only pump to go with the drumstock, you should hire your own plus make/bring your own filter and inspection jar. Once needed to borrow a pump; "yeah no worries mate we got one" :) - it was laying on the workshop floor full of deisel engine oil and sand; ie much siphoning into buckets subsequently occured....

10. Before takeoff WALK the strip and look for things you don't like, like the star picket mentioned above. Add this to the turnaround time. If you are in and out of a strip all the time you may not need this if you know who else uses it.
Make your own airfield diagram as you go.

11. Don't let everything go against you; weight, wx, time, fuel, VB, and pax can turn into pressures. When pax are planning things that need you and your aircraft to be flying, tell them the no go factors involving the above so they don't get put out too much when things can't happen.


No its not always like this :), just practise before you go.

[microswitch]

I Had to dodge an absolute "DH" one time with a video camera.
:mad:
I was doing several trips into a property moving people and freight in the good old Navajo. On returning with a load of food I was on short final (20ft off the deck) when this guy runs up onto the strip with his video camera in hand and stands there filming.

He got quite upset when I had a few words with him about it.