Halons were only banned due to their harmful affect on the ozone layer, not for any other reason. They are not banned for aircraft use however (indeed, they are mandated on some aircraft).

mariner 9, spot on, halon is the only suitable all rounder for in flight use. co2 is to bulky, foam has poor penetration properties, powder is instant IR conditions.

When I was flying Citations as a co pilot/ FO We made a night departure from Biggin Hill enroute to Majorca.
Climbing out in the pitch black with a Cabin full of PAX I noticed a slight shimmering around the Captains head.
At first I thought my eyes were playing tricks and blinked only to see the shimmer now intensifying.
Then I noticed the strong acrid burning smell the type that caught you in the back of your throat.
There was now visible smoke in the cabin. I looked back to the PAX compartment and could hardly see the PAX who were getting very alarmed.
Smoke was billowing out of the vents.
ATC asked us to contact Paris and we were passing FL240 in the climb.
I told ATC that we had a smoke filled compartment and needed an immediate return and landing to Biggin Hill.
We were given a direct and cleared in the descent.
Oxygen masks on we tried to clear the smoke by depressurising the cabin
Joined left base and landed at Biggen to be met by the usual fire engines.
My hair stank my clothes stank the PAX were in a state.
What caused it? a burnt out fan motor in the induction system

Pace

Of all the possible emergencies in a light aircraft a cockpit fire is the only one that really concerns me. In the tight confines of the cabin life will get very bad very quickly and good luck trying to wield an extinguisher inside your typical SEP.

The good news is that a true fire is almost certainly going to be electrically caused and turning off the master at the first sign of a burning odour and/or smoke will likely stop whatever is smoldering from catching fire.

But it is vital that you do not delay turning off the master as a dead short can result in localized temps of over 1000 deg F in as little as 30 seconds. With those kinds of temps any adjacent nasty plastic bits will be set alight and then you are in big, big trouble.

From the C 152 emergencies procedures section of the POH.

Engine Fire During Start on the Ground

1) Cranking ........ continue to try to get a start which will suck the flames and accumulated fuel through the carburetor and into the engine.

.............. If engine starts..................

2) Power....1700 RPM for a few minutes
3) Engine....Shut down and inspect for damage


..............If engine fails to start .............

4) Throttle........... ..Full open
5) Mixture...............Idle Cut Off
6) Cranking ............Continue
7) Fire Extinguisher...Obtain
8) Engine ...............Secure

Seems to em a pretty poor performance on the part of your instructor as he did not do any of the correct procedures for this situation.....

I have to say that I don't understand what seems to be a very UK flight school prevalent tendency to keep the aircraft POH's carefully hidden away still in their plastic shrink wrap. I guess you wouldn't want students to actually follow the recommendations of the aircraft manufacturer, now would you?

Also I guess actually incorporating the POH recommended procedures in flight training makes it kind of hard to continue to follow all those silly UK flight schoolism like turning off the carb heat at 300 feet on final, something explicitly prohibited by the Cessna POH which specifies that the carb heat should be full on prior to closing the throttle :rolleyes:

I wasn't far from Laddingford and did consider putting it down there, but I was 99% certain it was the autopilot, which by then I had disconnected. I only put it on for a moment while I was writing something down!

It was a bit of a brown trouser moment and a real reminder of the things you lose when you fly with the master switch off.

Aircraft inspected by an engineer at Headcorn, then returned to Biggin with many CBs pulled (as a precaution) and just one radio on.

Shutting the master off immediately makes sense, however in my plane, as I assume is the case with most other spam cans, you lose the stall warning which has to be taken into consideration in a fire/smoke situation where your attention will be diverted from the basics of flying

smoke hoods
 

one question that came to mind when reading this thread is.

How many people carry a smoke hoods?

i remember Avweb carried a feature on it a few years ago and i wondered if people actually carried one.

here is the link to the item

Cockpit Smoke Hoods

Fats

Is it worth looking at the ammeter first? Do most shorts result in a high discharge shown, or are shorts that don't show on the ammeter common enough that this isn't helpful?

Come on Big Pistons, don't be so high and mighty, how many flying schools in the US have instructors who have memorised the POH and trot out the precise procedures in a critical moment? I thought he did right well to locate the fire extinguisher and put out the flames without delay. Exiting the aircraft promptly seemed to be a top priority as far as I was concerned.

Even Capt. Sullenberger and his co-pilot didn't have time to read more than a couple of pages of all the useful information on water landings...step one, restart the engines, step two, try again, POH says a lot but experience and judgement say if you are on the ground and believe your aircraft is on fire, leave the vicinity with all deliberate speed.....

I have seen avgas burn, and it just goes WOOOF!

High and Mighty ?

I guess if insisting that instructors actually know the emergency procedures for the aircraft they are teaching in, which in a Cessna/Piper SEP are few in number and pretty simple; then guilty as charged.

When I teach the flight instructor rating everyone of my students better have them down cold by hour 5 or I am not going to be happy.

I once had the exact same situation occur on start. The engine fired as soon as the throttle went in, sucked in the flames and then died as the excess fuel was consumed (the ICO mixture ensured no new fuel was introduced). No heroics with a fire extinguisher was required and except for a slightly melted air filter no damage to the aircraft.

The POH procedure works and I reiterate my belief that it is totally unacceptable for an instructor not to know and follow it.

You should see the ammeter pegged in the event of a dead short. Where the problem occurs will determine what you see ( i.e. full scale discharge or full scale charge)

I once had a voltage regulator fail and the ammeter went to full scale charge ( ie more than 60 amps). I immediately turned off the alternator side of the master and the ammeter then indicated a slight discharge appropriate to the draw of the selected electrical load items. There was no smoke or strong smell so I treated it as a charging system failure and landed at the nearest airport before the battery was depleted

Hey, Big Pistons, I just had a look at your public profile, and am impressed, as a Fire Bomber Pilot in a Convair 580, you must have smelled a bit of smoke from time to time. Should amend my description of you to read "Low and Mighty" which is a lot more impressive......apologies for any disrespect.

Have you any good yarns about fire bombing from the air? Do share!

was rolling for takeoff in a Jabiru, gravel strip, doing about 60knots, when there was a bang. I was in a takeoff mindset, and lifted off, thinking, what was that? was it bigger piece of gravel? At about maybe 100ft AGL, just as we were passing over the end of the strip, suddenly smelt burning. My instructor said "my aircraft"; I responded "your aircraft!!". We did a low -level circuit,declared an emergency, asked another plane on final to get out of the way (they did, right away, to my relief) and we landed, engine running fine. On the strip was our exhaust pipe, which had come off. We were smelling exhaust gas.

Happy ending.

Lessons:
1. It took maybe 2-3 seconds to assimilate the "what on earth is happening?" thought.
2. If something goes wrong before you lift off, then abort the takeoff if you can.