Mallard Down in Perth
Joined: Mar 2002
Aviation Qualifications: ATPL
Posts: 9,225
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From: Seat 1A
I don't know about that, Ultralights. If you don't often go out and do stall refreshers in XXX type, how would you know? The reason stall warning systems are put in aeroplanes is so the pilot gets advance notice of what is about to/may happen. If you know your aeroplane really well, fair enough, but if you don't or if it is a vicious bugger, then...
Turning onto final... even the experts get it wrong...
Turning onto final... even the experts get it wrong...
Joined: Aug 2007
Posts: 368
Likes: 3
From: Australia
I'd be very surprised that it didn't have a stall warning, unless specifically certified without.
The Heron and the Dove in original form didn't have stall warnings as they were specifically certified by the UK CAA without any.
The Heron and the Dove in original form didn't have stall warnings as they were specifically certified by the UK CAA without any.
Fleet Manager
Joined: Apr 2001
Aviation Qualifications: ATPL
Posts: 7,448
Likes: 310
From: various places .....
Re artificial stall warnings .. it depends on the aircraft shake, rattle and roll characteristics.
Current light aircraft requirements at FAR 23.207.
Current light aircraft requirements at FAR 23.207.
Joined: Sep 2015
Posts: 588
Likes: 99
From: Australia
I don't know about that, Ultralights. If you don't often go out and do stall refreshers in XXX type, how would you know? The reason stall warning systems are put in aeroplanes is so the pilot gets advance notice of what is about to/may happen. If you know your aeroplane really well, fair enough, but if you don't or if it is a vicious bugger, then...
Turning onto final... even the experts get it wrong...
Turning onto final... even the experts get it wrong...
Joined: Aug 2003
Posts: 3,833
Likes: 2
From: Sale, Australia
Should anyone really, really want to know stall warning requirements, the type received certification September 8, 1947 under Transport Category, CAR 4a.
http://rgl.faa.gov/Regulatory_and_Gu...20Rev%2010.pdf
Edited to add: Had a look, no requirement I could find.
http://rgl.faa.gov/Regulatory_and_Gu...20Rev%2010.pdf
Edited to add: Had a look, no requirement I could find.
Last edited by Brian Abraham; 17th February 2017 at 02:08.
Joined: Apr 2009
Posts: 61
Likes: 2
From: West Woop Woop
Having just read all of this I think the elephant in the room, as evidenced by the full right aileron & neutral rudder deflections visible as the aircraft started to spin, is the lack of effective spin training in GA - something that gliding (my world) still does very well. It seems like there are several reasons why he got into the situation but essentially he failed to immediately recover from an incipient spin/wing drop when very low. Sad.
Joined: Oct 2005
Posts: 1,599
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From: Australia
Training and stall warners aren't going to help you get out of a situation like that at that level. Disorientation would mean the pilot would possibly react inappropriately to visual and aural cues...if he saw or heard them. The series of decisions that took the aeroplane to that point are what caused the aeroplane to run out of numbers and stop flying.
Joined: Apr 2009
Posts: 61
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From: West Woop Woop
I agree that it was probably a series of decisions/circumstances that got him there Clare Prop (as in just about every accident) but I think it's unfortunate that GA training organisations spend so little time training for an instinctive & correct recovery for just this kind of scenario. With early recovery actions (right rudder, forward stick - no aileron - & full power) this may well have been recoverable in my opinion .. but yes, much better to not get in the situation at all. Humans will always make errors - best to minimise the consequences with appropriate training.
Joined: Aug 2004
Posts: 3,557
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From: moon
Rich, conventional wisdom is that the practice of teaching stall/spin training caused more accidents, therefore it was removed from the PPL syllabus.
All you get is a demonstration with the admonition, "don't do this". The syllabus deliberately warns against teaching a student how to spin or practice a recovery apart from the "dancing on the rudder to pick up a dropped wing" BS.
I had to sign up for aeros to get taught to spin and recover. Still rusty on the process because there isn't an acrobatic aircraft for training within 100 miles of where I live.
All you get is a demonstration with the admonition, "don't do this". The syllabus deliberately warns against teaching a student how to spin or practice a recovery apart from the "dancing on the rudder to pick up a dropped wing" BS.
I had to sign up for aeros to get taught to spin and recover. Still rusty on the process because there isn't an acrobatic aircraft for training within 100 miles of where I live.
Joined: Dec 2008
Posts: 42
Likes: 0
From: Sydney
Rich, conventional wisdom is that the practice of teaching stall/spin training caused more accidents, therefore it was removed from the PPL syllabus.
All you get is a demonstration with the admonition, "don't do this". The syllabus deliberately warns against teaching a student how to spin or practice a recovery apart from the "dancing on the rudder to pick up a dropped wing" BS.
I had to sign up for aeros to get taught to spin and recover. Still rusty on the process because there isn't an acrobatic aircraft for training within 100 miles of where I live.
All you get is a demonstration with the admonition, "don't do this". The syllabus deliberately warns against teaching a student how to spin or practice a recovery apart from the "dancing on the rudder to pick up a dropped wing" BS.
I had to sign up for aeros to get taught to spin and recover. Still rusty on the process because there isn't an acrobatic aircraft for training within 100 miles of where I live.
Joined: Dec 2005
Posts: 1,694
Likes: 15
From: Wellington,NZ
I think the better 'conventional wisdom' is to practice how to avoid getting in the situation in the first place.
I knew someone who was terrified of stalling the aircraft. Their partner, a very experienced pilot, had her fly it at normal cruising height all the way from departure to destination (a ~50nm hop) with the stall warning on all the way, so she could actually feel what the aircraft was doing, and how it reacted as it got a bit slow. This meant it took an hour to make the flight, rather than the normal half.
She reckoned it was a more valuable exercise for her than going up and practicing fully developed stalls. There's still a big place to practice stalls, though, as an exercise in why not to loose control in this manner.
Perhaps skid training in cars should be carried out using a similar philosophy.
I'm with Clare Prop: It was the decision making and general handling that was flawed, probably by the time the aircraft made its stall onset clear it was too late to do much.
How many of us, having gained the license/rating, then spend time on an ongoing basis, to play around with the behaviour of the aircraft near the edge of its envelope? For a lot, I think time and $ constraints would probably limit this sort of ongoing practice.
I knew someone who was terrified of stalling the aircraft. Their partner, a very experienced pilot, had her fly it at normal cruising height all the way from departure to destination (a ~50nm hop) with the stall warning on all the way, so she could actually feel what the aircraft was doing, and how it reacted as it got a bit slow. This meant it took an hour to make the flight, rather than the normal half.
She reckoned it was a more valuable exercise for her than going up and practicing fully developed stalls. There's still a big place to practice stalls, though, as an exercise in why not to loose control in this manner.
Perhaps skid training in cars should be carried out using a similar philosophy.
I'm with Clare Prop: It was the decision making and general handling that was flawed, probably by the time the aircraft made its stall onset clear it was too late to do much.
How many of us, having gained the license/rating, then spend time on an ongoing basis, to play around with the behaviour of the aircraft near the edge of its envelope? For a lot, I think time and $ constraints would probably limit this sort of ongoing practice.
Joined: Oct 2005
Posts: 1,599
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From: Australia
I was learning to fly (not in Australia) about the time that spinning was taken out of the syllabus and made optional. It was replaced by "slow flight awareness" pottering around right on the edge of the stall, horn blaring, keeping it in balance for a couple of hours from memory before you then did the fully developed stalls. People who wanted to do spinning went with the aeros instructor in the Chippy and did as as an aerobatic lesson.
Some interesting reading here:
An Evaluation of Stall/SpinAccidents in Canada 1999
http://www.richstowell.com/documents...a_TP13748E.pdf
In particular this part on Page 9 is relevant to this thread:
One feature that stands out in all except one of the 39 stall/spin accidents
examined is that knowing how to recover from the stall or spin was of no benefit to
the pilots in these circumstances. They stalled at altitudes so low that once the
stall developed, a serious accident was in progress.
Some interesting reading here:
An Evaluation of Stall/SpinAccidents in Canada 1999
http://www.richstowell.com/documents...a_TP13748E.pdf
In particular this part on Page 9 is relevant to this thread:
One feature that stands out in all except one of the 39 stall/spin accidents
examined is that knowing how to recover from the stall or spin was of no benefit to
the pilots in these circumstances. They stalled at altitudes so low that once the
stall developed, a serious accident was in progress.
Joined: Apr 2009
Posts: 61
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From: West Woop Woop
I still reckon some correct and instinctive recovery action may have saved the day .. certainly trying to correct the wing drop with aileron and no rudder guaranteed it was going in. Stick & rudder flying, just like was taught back in the good old days when Mallards were built.
Joined: Apr 2009
Posts: 61
Likes: 2
From: West Woop Woop
Even this Canadian research says "They (instructors) need to be able to teach their
students how to recover from these stalls as soon as the wing drops and before
autorotation develops" .. but everyone is saying the training is all too hard/not relevant .. confused!
students how to recover from these stalls as soon as the wing drops and before
autorotation develops" .. but everyone is saying the training is all too hard/not relevant .. confused!
Joined: Dec 2005
Posts: 1,694
Likes: 15
From: Wellington,NZ
Originally Posted by rich34glider
I still reckon some correct and instinctive recovery action may have saved the day .. certainly trying to correct the wing drop with aileron and no rudder guaranteed it was going in. Stick & rudder flying, just like was taught back in the good old days when Mallards were built.
Even this Canadian research says "They (instructors) need to be able to teach their
students how to recover from these stalls as soon as the wing drops and before
autorotation develops" .. but everyone is saying the training is all too hard/not relevant .. confused!
Even this Canadian research says "They (instructors) need to be able to teach their
students how to recover from these stalls as soon as the wing drops and before
autorotation develops" .. but everyone is saying the training is all too hard/not relevant .. confused!
I think, that in this kind of situation where there's been a stall/spin crash, that the pilots headspace was probably far enough away from what the aircraft was doing that the reaction time -even if stall recovery has been thoroughly taught - is likely to be excessive. By their very nature, it's clear these unintended events catch people by surprise.
I doubt that in this case recovery was possible once it was stalled. There may have been a brief opportunity before the wing started to drop, if the reaction had been correct and immediate. The out-of-spin aileron probably wasn't a mistake; it was more likely to have been a panic reaction, and by the time it was applied it was beyond recovery, anyway.
I believe that better training toward planning, and risk analysis regarding any proposed manouever, combined with some kind of resilience-against-surprise training might pay off better.
Last edited by Tarq57; 27th February 2017 at 08:36. Reason: incorrectly formatted.