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.

I used to hunt smooth touchdowns until I buggered up a landing with a very old and bold Captain in the LHS who gave me a bit of a pep talk in the cruise on the next leg. His point was if you can't validate your performance calculations by hitting the slot at the threshold and planting the mains on the aiming point there's no point. The TDZ is pretty bloody long and you can be a fair way past your aiming point and still in the TDZ.

These days I score my landings based on speed control and touchdown point. Adjustment of -1 for a cruncher and +1 for a smooth touchdown. How smooth your touchdown is can all depend on which main gear sinks first - on the 737 if you touch the left first you only get the flight spoilers and the aircraft sinks nicely. If you touch the right, you get all the boards and it drops like a sack of potatoes.

The fact that we are all professional pilots, and we are engaged in an online thread of what is a "good landing" scares the sh*t out of me. I'd like to believe that we all know what a safe landing is, fullstop.

There's this colleague of mine, loves to grease it and then steps on the brakes so we won't end up in the mud. On stand he goes out in the galley greeting every single pax.. On the other hand, after a positive landing, the cockpit door stays closed.

Why do some pilots need to be acknowledged? Desperately looking for reassurance, approval, passenger's applause, a tap on their shoulder.. :uhoh:

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

Love it ... can anyone use it or do you claim rights ? Echo the comment re 411A.


One consideration not apparently raised in earlier posts .. putting to one side the floater attempt to get a greaser which we all agree is poor practice.

On those very rare occasions where the ordinary folk amongst us accidentally get a perfect touchdown the result can be very unnerving. I can recall only two such events (one each on B727-200 and L188).

The L188, being the pussycat it is, was fine.

For the -200 example, though, and we all feared ending the flare more than a few inches above the runway, the touchdown (nothing much to do with my efforts although, naturally enough, I claimed the credit at the time) produced no shudder, no sound and I really didn't know whether we were on the ground .. or still in no-man's land.

Eventually, after what seemed an eternity .. but was probably a couple of seconds, the ASI and the boards told the story.

Nonetheless, it was probably the most unsettling feeling I have ever experienced in an aeroplane.

Lest anyone think it typical of my skills, the other few thousand landings brought my average back down to where it justly resided ...

Just kiss it, like you're kissing your sister...
 

Bloggs:

Spot on!!

John T:


I will claim that very nice landings can be made in an L1011 but not as consistently as nice as a 727 (nor a 707).

Repeatedly doing those special landings require the ability to very accurately judge the height of the airplane in last few feet before the touch down and feeling the increasing heaviness of elevator as the speed starts decreasing. Like any sportsman or a performer a pilot also keeps developing the judgment but finally best landings start to happen when you get into what sportsmen or artists call "in the zone". All planning and calculations are done but dissolve in the subconscious and the execution is marked by absence of thought. B747 was a very good airplane for the pleasure of landing. You could feel the aircraft entering the ground effect cushion. A small flare and controlled thrust reduction and the touch down was noticed only by the reluctant speed brake moving gently back and forth as full weight of the aircraft was not yet on wheels. This is difficult to achieve in Airbus FBW as it lacks tactile feed back so it is purely visual landing as other senses do not come in play.

Turning off the silly DLC system would be a start.

I laughed out loud Bloggs.

Not much more to add that hasn’t been said already about getting it in the right place at the right speed.

On the large types I’ve flown, touching down with a small but definite rate of descent often led to a better perceived landing than skimming the deck. If the oleos had fully compressed by the time the spoilers deployed, you didn’t get that thump as the lift dumped and you effectively fell the rest of the oleo travel. Also, you were more likely to actually land as opposed to do a low flypast through the TDZ...

A really good pilot can usually make the plane do what he wants. As in land on centerline, on speed, and in the touchdown zone. With plenty of stopping ability grease it on. At 6700 feet field elevation, a 6000 ft runway, and in a snow storm you had better be able to plant it firmly.

Depends how hard your planting is:p
What Vila wrote concerning the feel of the elevator is quite important hence the need to avoid entering the flare with a thrust higher than necessary..too often seen as a technique to achieve a smooth landing...all it will achieve when the day comes is a large bounce.
Yes landing softly is in the passenger view important as it is a way if not only the only way to judge the skills of the pilot in front.
However i never intervene if my colleague is seen to come in harder than usual (as long as all is in limits) as experience of mistakes is a key learning fact...and i wont let a passenger feel go before that.
First officer is the time and place to learn by mistake.
So let them learn and when the day they get on the left,hopefully they will do the same.

Look at the end of the runway, barring a last minute high sink rate and after observing the correct response to the flare, take the power off and touch down at idle thrust.


Elementary stuff you would think but I see pilots leaving power on all the time in an attempt to 'grease it on'


They don't realize they are just 'powering it into the ground' and using up a lot of runway in the process.

In the end it comes down to practice.

Changed type a couple months ago and still in the phase of alignment of my lower back to the regular touchdowns.

AVRO RJ after some 2'000 landings the touchdowns were within narrow margins on the touchdown marker, not firm, not soft but then this is a real pilots aircraft as far as landing is concerned.

E190 still getting used to the longer aircraft and different attitude but my landings are in general on speed and on touchdown zone on the normal firmness one would expect. Power off is important and needs experience as with all "mastering" of skills and has been said in the other posts on this thread.

This is my personal goal:
Develop the ability to get "consistent" landings in the touchdown zone on "normal" speeds not being hard nor soft with different landing masses.
Then advance to be able to land it with overspeeds up to 5 kts above VApp which is the SOP limits. (Normal and ice-speeds.)

I fly short and narrow runways as well as steep approaches and there the landing becomes important. Be on speed on centerline and on touchdown marker as often as possible on "ANY" landing to develop the eye - the skill - the seat of your pants feel and you will have a high probability to put it exactly where you want all the time.

Not at the expense of the passengers and cabin staff who can be badly frightened in any severe landing impact due pilot misjudgement. The time to learn is in the multi-million dollar full flight simulator under the tutelage of a competent simulator instructor who has the enthusiasm and flying ability to actually demonstrate what he wants - not just shout from the back.

Landing mistakes by the first officer - especially during line training - should not happen if he has had proper training in the simulator especially on crosswind landings. Pilots should not progress to line training until his approach and landings are consistently sound in the simulator. If that cost the company extra time and money, then that's a company problem.

Too many simulator sessions are a head-long rush to tick all the boxes. The result being rarely do we see first officers (and some incompetent captains, too) given sufficient simulator practice until these pilots are confident and confident in handling crosswinds, for example. I once observed a type rating candidate on an A320 simulator conducting an all-flaps up approach and landing on a 11,000 ft runway. He was far too high and fast over the fence - floated for 15 seconds or more and touched down well off the centreline with 3000 ft left to go. He over-ran the runway on to the grass.

Clearly he should have gone around earlier but he didn't. The simulator instructor looked at his watch and saw the session time was up. He ticked the box as all flaps up landing successfully completed, without insisting on further remedial training. The same first officer had similar problems with other parts of his type rating training and was simply out of his depth. But his boxes were ticked and that man has been let loose on line.

I sort of agree but having flown in five different level-D 777 sims in the last couple of years, I’ve come to the conclusion that they are good for technique, yes, but to really build confidence there’s still nothing like the real thing. Unless your particular sim hits the sweet spot.

There were significant differences between all five: in one every touchdown felt like you’d collapsed the gear and in another whatever you did produced a greaser.

It’s sounds OK to tell people that everything they did was right but if the last thing they remember was a bang and a crunch, it doesn’t do much for confidence, whatever the instructor might say.

A really good instructor can talk their way though flying a demo with the other guy watching and feeling. I rarely see trainers do this and although sim time is precious and should be used by the trainee, every once in a while having something demonstrated by someone in the other seat can be highly educational.

Good G-d, I'm speechless Centaurus! :eek:

Of all the 737 simulators I flew, none of them were anyway like the real aircraft. Like for anything else, the sim is a good procedure trainer. And the same for landing, to get a feel for the timing of the event (callouts, when to reduce thrust, when to make flare inputs)..

But there is a risk!

For comparison, I recently I flew with a fresh F/O. His rotation was very brisk (enough to get me startled and holding my thumbs on the control wheel to prevent him from over rotating). By himself, he paused the rotation at 10 degs. Later on, we talked about his rotation and I asked him where he was looking during rotation. His answer was on the PFD, because that was what he had been taught during the type rating in the sim.

That is the problem with the sim for anything that is relies on vision - it's 2D. So to compensate you have to do things a bit different in the sim. Like keeping an eye on the PFD during rotation and flare. These are techniques that are NOT desireable to bring over to the actual aircraft.

So, I agree with your post to a certain extend. The COMPETENT simulator instructor should emphasize the pitfalls of the sim. But since the instructor can't see exactly what the student is doing or where he is looking, it might go unnoticed and the topic not brought up.

As in the case of the guy with the rotation, I am pretty sure that no one intentionally taught him this technique. Probably, rather it was mentioned to him to keep an eye on the RA and pitch during rotation as an aid in the sim. And unnoticed he brought that to the aircraft.

I have yet to operate a simulator which has flown like the real thing.

I have flown just about every type of aircraft, by this I mean types not models, ie single piston, single jet up to heavy, wide body and four jet. I am convinced that it depends on the type. For example; BN2T, VC10 - grease them on. C206, A300 - usually a controlled crash :{

Exascot
A300B4 had marked lack of ground effect and that made it challenging to do a greaser. That doesn't mean it could not be done only it required more skill to do that.