• Jets Are For Kids

 

Start, take off and flying a Skyraider

Be sure you drain both the sumps. (You can fill your Zippo lighter while you do this)
Look out the left side of the oily cockpit canopy and notice a very nervous person holding a huge fire bottle. Nod to this person.

1. Crack throttle about one-quarter of an inch.

2. Battery on

3. Mags on

4. Fuel boost on

5. Hit starter button (The four bladed 13' 6" prop will start a slow
turn)

6. Begin to bounce your finger on top of the primer button.

a. This act requires finesse and style. It is much like a ballet performance. The engine must be seduced and caressed into starting.

7. Act one will begin: Belching, banging, rattling, backfiring, spluttering, flame and black smoke from the exhaust shooting out about three feet. (Fire bottle person is very pale and has the nozzle at the ready position)

8. When the engine begins to catch on the primer. Move the mixture to full rich. The flames from the exhaust will stop and white smoke will come out. (Fire bottle guy relaxes a bit) You will hear a wonderful throaty roar that is like music to the ears.

a. Enjoy the macho smell of engine oil, hydraulic fluid and pilot
sweat.

9. Immediately check the oil pressure and hydraulic gages.

10. The entire aircraft is now shaking and shuttering from the torque of the engine and RPM of prop.

a. The engine is an 18 cylinder R-3350 that develops 2,700 HP.

11. Close cowl flaps to warm up the engine for taxi.

12. Once you glance around at about 300 levers, gauges and gadgets, call the tower to taxi to the duty runway.

Take off

1. Check both magnetos

2. Exercise the prop pitch

3. Cowl flaps open.

4. Check oil temp and pressure.

5. Crank 1.5 degrees right rudder trim to help your right leg with
the torque on takeoff.

6. Tell the tower you are ready for the duty runway.

7. Line the bird up and lock the tail wheel for sure.

8. Add power slowly because the plane (with the torque of the monster prop and engine power definitely wants to go left).

9. NEVER add full power suddenly! There is not enough rudder in the entire world to hold it straight.

10. Add more power and shove in right rudder till your leg begins to tremble.

11. Expect banging, belching and an occasional manly fart as you roar down the runway at full power.

12. Lift the tail and when it feels right and pull back gently on the stick to get off the ground.

13. Gear up

14. Adjust the throttle for climb setting

15. Ease the prop back to climb RPM

16. Close cowl flaps and keep an eye on the cylinder head temp.

17. Adjust the power as needed as you climb higher or turn on the super charger.


Flying with the round engine

1. Once your reach altitude which isnt very high (about 8000 feet) you reduce the throttle and prop to cruise settings.

2. The next fun thing is to pull back the mixture control until the engine just about quits. Then ease it forward a bit and this is best mixture.

3. While cruising the engine sounds like it might blow or quit at any time. This keeps you occupied scanning engine gauges for the least hint of trouble.

4. Moving various levers around to coax a more consistent sound from the engine concentrates the mind wonderfully.

5. At night or over water a radial engine makes noises you have never heard before.

6. Looking out of the front of the cockpit the clouds are beautiful because they are slightly blurred from the oil on the cockpit canopy.

7. Seeing lightning the clouds ahead increases the pucker factor by about 10.

a. You can't fly high enough to get over them and if you try and get under the clouds----you will die in turbulence.

b. You tie down everything in the cockpit that isnt already secured, get a good grip on the stick, turn on the deicers, tighten and lock your shoulder straps and hang on.

c. You then have a ride to exceed any terror ride in any amusement park ever built. You discover the plane can actually fly sidewise while inverted.

8. Once through the weather, you call ATC and in a calm deep voice advise them that there is slight turbulence on your route.

9. You then scan you aircraft to see if all the major parts are still attached. This includes any popped rivets.

10. Do the controls still work? Are the gauges and levers
still in proper limits?

11. These being done you fumble for the relief tube, because you desperately need it. (Be careful with your lower flight suit zipper)

The jet engine and aircraft

Start a jet

1. Fuel boost on.

2. Hit the start button

3. When the TPT starts to move ease the throttle forward.

4. The fire bottle person is standing at the back of the plane and has no idea what is going on.

5. The engine lights off

6. Thats about it.

Take off in the jet

1. Lower full flaps

2. Tell the tower you are ready for takeoff.

3. Roll on to the duty runway while adding 100% power.

4. Tricycle gear---no tail to drag---no torque to contend with.

5. At some exact airspeed you lift off the runway.

6. Gear up

7. Milk up the flaps and fly.

8. Leave the power at 100%

Flying the jet

1. Climb at 100%

2. Cruise at 100%

3. It is silent in the plane.

4. You cant see clouds because you are so far above them.

5. You look down and see lighting in some clouds below and pity some poor fool that may have to fly through that mess.

6. The jet plane is air conditioned!! Round engines are definitely not. If you fly in tropical areas, this cannot be stressed enough.

7. There is not much to do in a jet, so you eat your flight lunch at your leisure.

8. Few gauges to look at and no levers to adjust. This leaves you doodling on your knee board.

9. Some call girl friends on their cell phones: Guess where I am etc


Some observed differences in round engines and jets

1. To be a real pilot you have to fly a tail dragger for an absolute minimum of 500 hours.

2. Large round engines smell of gasoline (115/145), rich oil, hydraulic fluid, man sweat and are not air-conditioned.

3. Engine failure to the jet pilot means something is wrong with his
air conditioner.

4. When you take off in a jet there is no noise in the cockpit. (This does not create a macho feeling of doing something manly)

5. Landing a jet just requires a certain airspeed and altitude---at which you cut the power and drop like a rock to the runway. Landing a round engine tail dragger requires finesse, prayer, body English, pumping of rudder pedals and a lot of nerve.

6. After landing, a jet just goes straight down the runway.

7. A radial tail dragger is like a wild mustang---it might decide to go anywhere. Gusting winds help this behavior a lot.

8. You cannot fill your Zippo lighter with jet fuel.

9. Starting a jet is like turning on a light switch---a little click
and it is on.

10.  Starting a round engine is an artistic endeavor requiring prayer (holy curse words) and sometimes meditation.

11.  Jet engines dont break, spill oil or catch on fire very often which leads to boredom and complacency.

12.  The round engine may blow an oil seal ring, burst into flame, splutter for no apparent reason or just quit. This results in heightened pilot awareness at all times.

13.  Jets smell like a kerosene lantern at a scout camp
out.

14. Round engines smell like God intended engines to smell and the tail dragger is the way God intended for man to fly

• Blue Angels

With yesterday's French vid behind us, here's some amateur video from the back seat of the Blue Angels slot aircraft, with some rather odd music. Note how tight they fly, especially the inverted pass in the last few seconds.

The Van Halen msuic in the following classic clip is much better suited . . .

• A Strange Tale

In the Navy, tales are often prefaced with the statement, “This is a no-shit story,” which of course immediately makes its voracity suspect. This, however, is not such a story. While I can’t personally vouch for all the details, I can say that these are the facts as I know them unless stated otherwise. Those facts that I can’t speak for are from sources I trust completely.

Part The First

A Cessna Citation crashed January 24th, 2006 at Palomar Airport (KCRQ sometimes also referred to as CLD) killing three people and the pilot. The NTSB report reads as follows:

NARRATIVE: Citation N86CE departed Sun Valley (SUN) at 05:50 MST on a flight to Carlsbad (CLD). The airplane climbed to its assigned cruising altitude of FL380, which was reached at about 06:06 MST. The descend for Carlsbad was started an hour later, at 06:06 PST. Air traffic control cleared the flightcrew for the ILS approach to runway 24, which was 4,897 feet long. The flightcrew then reported that they had the runway in sight, cancelled their IFR clearance, and executed a VFR approach in VFR conditions to the airport. The reported winds favored a landing toward the east, onto the opposite runway (runway 6). During the approach, after a query from the first officer, the captain indicated to the first officer that he was going to "...land to the east," consistent with the reported winds. However, the final approach and subsequent landing were made to runway 24, which produced a six-knot tailwind. During the approach sequence the captain maintained an airspeed that was approximately 30 knots higher than the correct airspeed for the aircraft's weight, resulting in the aircraft touching down about 1,500 feet further down the runway than normal, and much faster than normal. The captain then delayed the initiation of a go-around until the first officer asked if they were going around. Although the aircraft lifted off the runway surface prior to departing the paved overrun during the delayed go-around it impacted a localizer antenna platform, whose highest non-frangible structure was located approximately 304 feet past the end of the runway, and approximately two feet lower than the terrain at the departure end of the runway. The aircraft continued airborne as it flew over downsloping terrain for about 400 more feet before colliding with the terrain and a commercial storage building that was located at an elevation approximately 80 feet lower than the terrain at the end of the runway. The localizer antenna platform was located outside of the designated runway safety area, and met all applicable FAA siting requirements. PROBABLE CAUSE: "The captain's delayed decision to execute a balked landing (go-around) during the landing roll. Factors contributing to the accident include the captain's improper decision to land with a tailwind, his excessive airspeed on final approach, and his failure to attain a proper touchdown point during landing."

A friend, who is also a United 757 pilot, watched the landing from a passenger seat on a commuter airliner as he headed for LAX before a flight to Singapore. Sitting on the right side of the aircraft, he watched a Citation ”dive bomb the approach lights,” and noted that it seemed extremely fast as it crossed the threshold. The commuter taxied into position, but then exited the runway instead of taking off. As they taxied clear he saw the smoke at the departure end, and knew what happened. He talked with the commuters flight crew briefly, and then called us with his story a few minutes later while driving to work at LAX.

Part The Second

One of our pilots brought in a photocopy of (I believe) a Business & Commercial Aviation article written by a corporate pilot. Seems he was IFR holding near Aspen, working his way down the stack, and was stunned to hear a Citation call in VFR requesting landing clearance. The next day, in the FBO’s crew lounge he heard a pilot call Flight Service with the same N-number. After the call, the writer asked the pilot if he was the one flying the day before, and if so, how did he manage to get in VFR. The pilot said he was indeed the pilot, and bragged that he often used a special route through the mountains under the clouds to sneak in. The writer commented that what the pilot described would have violated a number of his company’s procedures not to mention several FAA regulations. The article concluded with the moral that taking such chances will eventually kill you—as it did in the case of this pilot and three other people at Palomar Airport when the Citation he was flying went off the end of the runway and burned.

Part The Third

A woman showed up at our door about two weeks ago, and asked if she could come in and look around, explaining that she was a neighbor and heard we’d done some things to our house. She wanted to make some changes too, and her’s was the same floor plan as ours. We showed her around, and as she left she invited us to a Fourth of July bash at her neighbors. We had previous plans for dinner with a group of our former pilots and their wives known as the Dinner Gang, so we stopped by the neighbors just for a few minutes to say hello. The neighbor‘s husband is a financial advisor, and on hearing I was a pilot told me that he and his partner had had a Citation. Said they had a really terrific pilot, very safety conscious; but sadly he was killed when his Citation went of the end of the runway at Palomar killing his copilot and two passengers too. Just couldn’t understand how that could happen. I mumbled something about rare Santa Ana winds from the east and dropped the topic.

Part The Fourth

At the Dinner Gang get-together later that evening I mentioned to one of our former pilots the strange coincidence of having just met someone who’d flown with the pilot that crashed at Palomar in the Citation back in 2006. Another pilot overheard my story, and added the final, and most bizarre twist to this tale.

Seems he was in Citation refresher ground school class recently, and one of the pilots in the class was asking very strange questions. So strange that the instructor asked the Chief Flight Instructor to sit through the next session, and see what he thought was going on. He too thought the questions were extraordinary—suggesting a complete lack of knowledge of aviation fundamentals. At the next break, he asked the pilot to step into his office. During the ensuing discussion it was revealed that the pilot was mega-rich, owned and flew his Citation himself, usually IFR, from Seattle to a ranch in Arizona. He’d never flown any other aircraft of any kind, and he didn’t have and never had a pilot‘s license or medical. A friend taught him to fly his jet.

I’ll bet you can guess who the ‘friend‘ was.

Part The Last: Moral

Why was the Citation that crashed at CRQ high on short final, why did he go off the end of the runway? Because at altitude the prevailing westerly winds were actually from the east and much stronger than the surface. Normal descent rates meant much longer than normal distance covered. In fact, the day before this crash I was at 3000 feet about 5 miles south of the airport in a biplane. In slow flight (about 40 mph) we were able to hang in one spot over the coast.

Why was he fast? Because he was high. So he tried to get down, and in a slick aircraft all that means is that you go faster. Plus he had that tailwind.

Why did he land long? Because he was high, fast, and had a tailwind. Although the dive bomber maneuver put him more or less in the right place over the threshold, all the extra speed meant he floated well down the runway.

Why didn’t he go around? Because he was trying to land. Sounds silly, but even experienced pilots can get fixated on the fact that they’re about to land (or takeoff), come hell or high water, and press on regardless of new factors that may have entered into the equation. Don’t know if it’s true, but I heard rumors that the Citation pax were running late for a meeting.

In our Twin Beech I brief before takeoff (out of earshot of passengers) that we’re going to try to takeoff, and if by some miracle everything cooperates so we can reach Vse, then we’ll proceed on our way. In other words I’m cocked to abort, not wired to fly. Same thing applies to landings. If everything cooperates we’re going to land. If not, we’ll go out and try it again. It is crucial, however, that you make that decision early. Wishful thinking and a late decision often means the aircraft staggers into the air (or not) with dire consequences. You're better off, if you decide too late, to take your licks and sacrifice the aircraft.

My Dad, a WW2 A-20 pilot, taught me that you have to always have options, and you have to fly in such a way as to maximize your options. The option of going around is good one to keep in mind.

• A First Officer's Tale

So we took off from KTUL yesterday afternoon after airlining back to pick up the airplane that morning.

My leg to fly as we were empty. Captain calls thrust set . . .airspeed alive . . .80 knots and crosscheck . . .V1 . . . Rotate.

I pull her off initially 15 degrees nose up . . . he calls positive rate . . . I says gear up . . . he says gear's traveling . . and then says Oooop's we got a red light on the gear!

I says we got big vibration on the nose.

We did a low fly-by the tower (really cool, remember I'm flying) who said, it appears your nose gear doors are closed, but the gear is wedged up against them.

Mmmmmm, we are 1500lb's over max landing weight so we can either dump or burn it off. No place to dump so round and round we go.

Call maintenance on the sat phone who tell us to try dropping the gear to see if it'll come down (we had thought of that as well, but wanted to get some reassurance before pulling that lever again).

Thanks be to Darwin! Three greens! Albeit with some dodgy grinding of metal sounds.

Another (even lower fly-by) hey I'm getting used to this bird now, and the tower say "well it looks good but . . . hey do you guys want services out ? Duh, . . .yes please (You'll remember I'm not backwards when coming forwards with these things).

Airplane is down to max landing, adrenalin is a little increased Capt calls 1000 feet, on slope, ref plus 10 . . . .500feet, on slope sinking 600, ref plus 10, three greens. . .200 feet on slope, sink 500 . . . on ref . . . three greens.

I hold some power all the way to contact with the runway, and bags of back stick settling the nose down really slowly on the 10,000ft runway (not one of those short 6000ft ones), no reverse thrust just the open buckets and we roll off with no problem and back to where we had come from. Yes, that would be maintenance!

So here we sit and will stay until tomorrow now while men in blue coveralls stand around and scratch at parts of their bodies and say things like, Mmm, what the fuck?