Jacobson Flare

[Cloud Cutter]

I've thought more about this looking at the end of the runway business (and actually taken notice of what I do when landing). I think transferring your central vision to the far end of the runway is more useful for student pilots, but as you gain experience you are able to look more directly at your aim point and use your peripheral vision to take in the horizon and runway perspective. This is definitely true for chopper pilots - start by looking at the horizon, then, as you gain experience, look at the spot and use your peripheral to gauge the horizon. I guess the main thing is that you are getting all the visual information to your brain in a way it can be processed and used to good effect, and yes, there will be various different ways of doing that. I actually tend to 'scan' between the touchdown zone and runway end. It is interesting to break down into its parts a maneuver that we stopped thinking about long ago and just 'do'.

[Clare Prop]

I was given the task to brief and teach this for an instructor rating renewal with CASA. I was sceptical, but it does work.

The mathematics are silly as it went from accurate measurements to rules of thumb such as 1:60 and some of the trig was actually incorrect but the visual part of it really works and I've been teaching it that way ever since.

Although the end of the runway should be in your peripheral vision and eyes about 15 deg above the horizon for the best results.

[Capn Bloggs]

eyes about 15 deg above the horizon

That's how I do it...stare into space!

[Mach E Avelli]

At some stage our student may go on to fly in the world of hard knocks. Like where manual landings in 800 metres visibility with a low cloud base and no visible horizon is expected, or else you don't get to keep your job.
So why not teach pilots to look at the ground just ahead of the aeroplane from day one instead of all this exotic theory which won't work if you can't see the horizon or far end of the runway.

[Cloud Cutter]

So why not teach pilots to look at the ground just ahead of the aeroplane from day one instead of all this exotic theory which won't work if you can't see the horizon or far end of the runway.

In order to do that well, with consistent results, most people need a degree of experience to draw from. Teaching a student to look at the end of the runway and judge the touchdown using peripheral vision is like teaching them to swim in the shallow end of the pool - it's less likely to go wrong, and allows them to build confidence. By all means, once they've got the gist they should make up there own mind, but this is really the accepted practice for teaching someone to land an aeroplane (or hover a helicopter). Someone didn't just pluck this idea out of thin air - it's an application of what we know about visual perception, and it works!

[ChrisJ800]

Throw away the Flare book and learn to fly in an old glider with no suspension on the mono wheel or on a tail dragger piston that forces good landing and taxying techniques!

[Derfred]

Mach E Avelli,

At some stage our student may go on to fly in the world of hard knocks. Like where manual landings in 800 metres visibility with a low cloud base and no visible horizon is expected, or else you don't get to keep your job.
So why not teach pilots to look at the ground just ahead of the aeroplane from day one instead of all this exotic theory which won't work if you can't see the horizon or far end of the runway.

I think the point you are missing is that the reason the author developed his technique was to provide a simple framework of instructional steps for a instructor to use to teach a newby how to land. In other words, it was more aimed as an instructor's tool rather than a pilot's tool.

In the absence of a clear and consise methodology such as this, it is difficult for an instructor to teach exactly "when" to flare and "how much" to flare, other than by letting the student work it out for themselves after a succession of thumps and balloons... "Ok, so that one was too late, do it a bit earlier next time..." Every bad landing reduces the student's confidence, so a few early acceptable landings help enormously.

Once the student has got the feel for it, they are free to use other triggers and perceptions to land the aircraft - such as may be required for your low vis example. Once your confidence builds, your field of vision expands from beginner's tunnel vision, so it doesn't matter so much where you focus your eyes.

At least, that's how the author described it to me a long time ago over a beer.

I think he found that there was a lot of opposition to the technique over the decades and that is why he has gone to so much effort with mathematics and trigonometry to "prove" that, at least in theory, it works.

I think there are still some theoretical holes in the mathematics, which explains why it doesn't always work as well as it should, but the idea still should hold well enough for acceptable landings. Holes that I have identified include no accountability for ground effect, prop wash over wings, thermalling in hot weather, and wind gusts causing increase or decrease in IAS during the flare. These holes can be corrected by the experienced pilot during the flare through perception of the sink rate from peripheral vision and the G-forces through the seat of pants, for example. Hard to teach, but...