The Importance of a good Landing
 

In Europe I was always told during training that the landing was not important and gave no bearing or indication of how I rated as a Pilot, a firm Landing was a "Boeing Landing" and was perfectly safe, "any Landing you could walk away from was a good landing", "if you can use the aircraft again even better".


After a spate of landing accidents, has the view of the importance of a good smooth landing changed (other than its importance to ones ego). Having worked in the US, China and the middle east; my view has changed, generally in these parts of the world the landing is considered to be an accurate indication of the ability of a Pilot to handle an aircraft well. Whilst everybody makes the occasional "firm landing" i.e. 1.5g+. In the past I've worked with pilots who never make anything other than firm landings. These days the automatics are engaged from 1000' up to 1000' down, the only handling required is the landing, we must be able to do that well. It can not be good for passenger confidence or the long term health of the aircraft to experience 1.5g landings repetitively. In addition to that we can see from the latest list of accidents that it bears directly to safety.

All that matters is greasing it on. Doesn't matter if the grease happens 3500 feet down the runway and you have to slam on the brakes and make Grandma Jones in seat 16C impale the back of Jack Spratt in 15C's head with her dentures in the deceleration. GREASE, as in VASELINE on that runway is ALL that matters.

And why is it that everyone cares so much about grease-on landings but not takeoffs? How about a good old-fashioned grease-OFF? You can see everything you need to know about a new (to you) FO or captain's flying skills from how they handle a simple 10-15 knot crosswind component takeoff.

I think that is taking things too far.

I would say that a good landing is very important. However a smooth landing is not necessarily a good landing. A good landing in a transport jet is one that is on speed, on centreline, in the touchdown zone, and within the g limits for a normal landing. A smooth landing that has floated past the touchdown zone is a bad landing. I suspect what your European instructors were telling you is that you shouldn't focus on a smooth landing, a smooth landing is not important and has no bearing on how you rate as a pilot. Consistently landing on speed, on centreline, and on target IS worth striving for though, and IS important.


Confusing good landings with smooth landings again. Some aircraft don't touchdown very nicely no mater how gently you put it down (half a degree off heading in a Dash 8 and a shudder goes through the aircraft) others are very easy to land nicely. I would much rather fly with someone whose landings were consistently firm but on target rather than someone who floated halfway down the runway to a greaser every time.

Indeed, you learn a great deal about someone's attitude to flying during the final stages of a manual approach & landing. There are those who forget the flare, touchdown & roll out are a pilot controlled flying manoeuvre. I've seen quite acceptable approaches flown to a reasonable flare and then "you have control" as captain gravity took over and the a/c met the rising ground in an arrival. This is more common on a calm clear day. Somehow the brain switches off. On the bumpy days the brain stays active and the pilot keeps piloting. Why not on every landing? It is necessary. Aerocat has the priority points correct. Have the correct crash spot in focus and don't let it move and hit it with a controlled bump/kiss/thump - what you will. Don't forget braking and steering technique is also important. Smooth landings on the spot followed by nose flattening braking and wet dog shaking steering will not leave the lasting imprecation you wanted. Smooth control throughout, all the way to the gate. Even then there are those who stamp on the brakes in the last 1m. Good news if the pax have stood up too early.

Stick-and-Rudder skills decreasing...bad landings increasing. :ok:

It is true that an approach flown at correct speed and glide path and good directional control during flare and landing resulting in touch down in the touch down zone qualifies as good percentage landing. Any one can do a greaser by floating beyond the touch down parameters but it only gets negative marks. However it is perfectly possible to do consistently smooth landings within touch down parameters but that requires seat of the pant feel and I am not sure it can be acquired. You will see some people routinely do it yet with some others it is a matter of chance. Those who fall in the later category can be extremely good pilots otherwise.

Landings are a bit like golf shots. You repeat what you did yeterday for the perfect greaser; today it doesn't work.

Al sorts of factors vary from day to day - visual cues from approach terrain and runway itself - the CoG of the aircraft - the weather.
(It's relatively easy to get into a groove at base training on one runway and no passengers).

Found on the 757 that our perception of the landing could vary markedly from that of passengers or cabin crew - depending on where they were seated. In particular I suspect that passengers equate noise of the gear making contact with "hard" whether there was noticeable g or not.

The ability to achieve consistent greased landings depends on the aeroplane - or so I've been told by more experienced (in type) brethren. I am but a mere 2-typer at this point in my career and can manage the more than occasional grease it on the ground arrival with the machines I have been fortunately tasked to operate. Otherwise, get it down regularly and safely within the zone and you're all right. :ok:

The Vickers Viscount was a kind aircraft to pilots. I cannot explain the technical issues but even a late flare and what should have been a firm landing often turned out to be a greaser.

I know of one airline that has a Boeing 737 Classic simulator where it is impossible to do a hard landing. ALL landings are soft when it was clear the landing should have been a real bummer. The technicians fiddled the computer to do soft touch downs in order to minimise maintenance on the instruments which can suffer from heavy impact touch downs.

On the L1011 Tristar there were five techniques for a smooth landing ..... unfortunately, no one knew what they were !:D

Don't be afraid to cut the power a bit earlier than your colleagues either. It seems to be a rising trend at my airline to go for a greaser by leaving the power on until about six inches above the ground with a late or minimal flare.

It's wrong for so many reasons:

1. It's not SOP.
2. It might give a greaser most of the time but when it's half-way down the runway that doesn't count.
3. You get a constant stream of "RETARD, RETARD, RETARD, RETARD..." which should be a clue that it's the wrong way to go about landing.
4. It scares the living daylights out of the other guy who thinks you've forgotten to flare.
5. It's not actually that consistent and regularly leads to a wallopy thump of a three point landing when you don't have as much ground effect as you thought you did.

Pretend the runway is 1500m long and wet, and concentrate on consistently touching down in the same place, on the centreline, with the drift removed and the pitch attitude sensible. Airbus want a positive touchdown and provided you don't actually bury it into the ground, who cares?

Passengers remember heavy braking far more than firm touchdowns.

On speed, 1,500 feet, in the middle !!!

In my airline days if you didn't do that on a check they'd have a real close look at you. It is so important ..... if you did regular hard landings then they'd also have a look at you.

You do need to practice firm landings - not a joke - all we ever seem to do is go for the greaser but in bad weather, wet runways, crosswinds etc it really is a bad thing to do - I used to deliberately practice a firm, not hard, landing - one in every four ...... you need to positively change your technique in the aforementioned conditions ever so slightly to avoid the automatic greaser mode

How often are manual landings done? Having talked to a Airbus pilot (and seeing videos online), it seems like most of them land with auto throttle on. On the flip, most Boeing pilots that I have seen use manual throttle all the way down. All in or all out with autopilot as it was explained to me.

I agree with the original poster. The inability to make a decent landing is a sign of lack of piloting skills.

This is the magenta line trend all over... Flying the ILS/FDs down to the runway and getting surprised when looking up.

The problem is that people are not looking where they are supposed to:
OUT THE "edit: BLO@DY" WINDOW!


The key to a good landing is looking out the window, and early on that is.... I'd say from 500 feet at least (conditions permitting), concentrate on airspeed indicator and aim point - forget the rest. But people are afraid to trust their vision (FODA ghost) so they resort to flying the instruments. Starting to look out the window at 100-50 feet is an inevitable "edit: fecal" landing.

Second problem:
So true, and usually it will be an even "edit: more fecal" landing, because the aircraft won't stop to fly. So it will be like 30,20,10, 6, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, *smack* - at the end of the touchdown zone of course.

Cut the power as recommended in the respective FCTM, for at 737 (and probably an Scarebus 32x too), it's 30 feet, not's 6 feet!!!

This is a pet peeve of mine and I wrote about it 10 times here already. A quote from one of my posts in another thread:

It is telling that there are quite a few overrun accidents filmed from the cabin where the passengers clap the landing.

Greasy touchdowns are a bonus but not imperative. However there is no reason why any decent pilot cannot put the aircraft in the right place at the right speed on the majority of approaches with an agreeable landing.

No, fly it like it is supposed to be flown. We fly ours with the AT in, as we did on another type, as the book says (or allows). I haven't flown the 737 but apparently the pitch-power coupling gets ugly with AT in when hand-flying. That doesn't necessarily apply to other types. On my type, hand-flying with the AT engaged is terrific.

I am so happy to have been long retired from the business of flying air carrier airplanes.

When the weather was good we could "grease them on," so to speak, within the company prescribed touchdown zone.

When the weather dictated otherwise, we still knew how to make a decent landing within that zone.

The 737 A/T is indeed problematic without George. I used to think the best use of the A/T on approach is to deselect the speed mode, with your Vref+ in the window, leaving the A/T in the ARM mode. This was a cheap insurance policy, or so I thought. Eventually I learned this configuration was non-standard and led to unwanted bumps in thrust levels when you got close to the MCP speed set.

If only 411A were with us - I'm betting he knew at least a few.

I don't know where this 737 AT/AP story comes from, but I flew the classic with an Australian operator for 3 1/2 yrs and comp policy (not Boeing I know) allowed retaining it in without the AP and no problem. Must admit it was for the first couple of sims doing the endorsement (first jet), but after fine, and shouldn't be an issue for any jet experienced pilot (maybe an exemption for AB only types!).

Not allowed to fly without autothrust at my airline (major European carrier), so a "true" manual landing is never. No restrictions on a raw data or visual approach though.