Lot of planes can glide. There's the "Gimli Glider". Most infamous is Air Transat 236 aka "The Atlantic Glider".

As far as a pilot remaining calm, this Metroliner pilot achieved Boss Level.

quote:

Originally posted by YooperSigs:
The dude is quite the pro. But, the aircraft is 59 years old. Every time I took off I would wonder what was going to fail.
A pilot friend of mine once described his old Cessna as a motorcycle with wings.

There are thousands of airplanes that old or older that are still flying and will continue to fly for decades. There are required annual inspections and intervals for major overhauls (2000 hours is common for general aviation aircraft). If GA pilots were limited to aircraft that were newer, nobody could afford to fly. Even a ten year old Cessna 172 would run over a quarter million dollars, especially in today's market.

quote:

Originally posted by honestlou:
I don't know much about flying, but couldn't the tower have helped him out with more precise control of his descent? Could the tower not see his altitude and rate of descent and tell him where and when to turn?

Nope. In an emergency like that, all we can do is clear the way and make sure they have everything they might need. The pilot knows best in this case.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Phantom229,

quote:

Originally posted by V-Tail:
I found that a few instructional flights in a glider can do wonders for a pilot's proficiency in power-off landings.

Not only that, but it wakes up your lazy feet. After a glider rating your turns will be very coordinated.

He's lucky that he didn't have a fire, and that he had plenty of altitude when the engine failed. I would agree that he didn't have much margin for error when he landed it right about on the numbers. I would have tried to use more of the runway; if you're high you can always slip the airplane or use full flaps. Rather than using a normal traffic pattern, he could have opted to land straight in - I think the tailwind was only about 4 knots. But who am I to criticize - he did a good job with the emergency and landed successfully.

Your brain tells you the aircraft will drop like a brick with no engine to power it. But the first time your instructor pulls the power ... you learn otherwise.
My previous CFI did just that at about 6,000 AGL.
According to the flight log on FlightAware, we were gliding for well over 7 minutes as I aimed it toward a small untowered airport nearby.
My current CFI has yet to do so, but I expect it to happen every time we are in the plane. Same for pulling power on departure at 1,000 AGL or thereabouts.
Doing a power-off 180* landing is part of the final checkride.

quote:

Originally posted by VictimNoMore:

Your brain tells you the aircraft will drop like a brick with no engine to power it. But the first time your instructor pulls the power ... you learn otherwise.

When I was instructing primary students I usually did that on the first flight, to dispel the notion that if the engine quits we're all going to die.

I did not want to startle the trainee by reducing power abruptly (not a good idea for engine health, nor for adrenaline in a nervous student), so at decent altitude, at least 3,000' or higher, I would first set pitch trim for a good glide speed, then I would tell the trainee to reduce power gradually to an idle, all the while making slow S turns to show that the airplane was absolutely controllable without engine power and that we would not erupt into a ball of flame.

If conditions were favorable and airport traffic permitted, we would continue the power-off glide to a landing.

Doing that calmly on the first flight went a long way towards getting the student comfortable in the airplane.

If providing instruction in a single engine airplane, I do not allow a session to pass without one or more engine failures, some to landings, some to close approaches, some to a runway, many off-field, away from the airport.

A student who is accustomed to the power retarded in the same place in the traffic pattern by a safe runway is not a student prepared to lose an engine on a cross country flight, and a big part of addressing an engine-out is psychological. A student's first off-field landing and first off-field engine failure should never be solo, or when the student is without an instructor.

I prefer to find a location where I have walked the site on the ground, know there is no traffic, there are no powerlines or obstacles, and it's a good landing point, and use that initially for a student to experience an off-field landing (and subsequent takeoff).

A student soon learns to be constantly looking for a place to put the airplane down, such that no cross country flight is made without a connect-the-dots series of points chosen to conduct the flight path, such that the airplane is never in a point when it can't be glided to a landing. There is always a viable landing point available, and the student at any given second, second-by-second throughout the flight, has selected the place he will go. I can (and do) as the student frequently, where the student will go, and the student will have an immediate answer because he or she already has the place picked out. From time to time, I'll reduce the power and have the student take me there. Often, what a student might have thought viable from altitude, isn't, and we'll go down to have a look at determine if it's really as good an option as the student thought. A lot of things crop up at low altitude that weren't visible in cruise, and it's a good object lesson.

I'm a big believer in various types of power loss. Most engine failures are not going to be immediate engine failures. Partial power failures, from carburetor icing to a single cylinder failure, to spark plug fouling, are for more frequent than catastrophic, immediate power loss, and the startle factor that comes with each is part of addressing the situation. Sometimes, it's appropriate to simply reduce power. Other times to kill the engine. How it's done, and when, depend on circumstances, but if a student expects engine failures to be ammounced and always a power reduction by an obvious landing site (like a runway), it's not realistic training.

I'll never solo a student who can't make a landing on the runway with a power loss on the downwind leg to that runway, or on base. A big chunk of the time leading up to solo will include engine-out scanrios, to landings on the runway, engine-out on takeoff, just after takeoff, and before, and above the critical points during the climb when one can't make it back to the runway, and when one can, with a lot of discussion about both.

No training regarding engine-out scenarios should fail to include the thought process of crashing an airplane. The student needs to spend some time thinking about putting a fuselage between trees and letting the wings take the impact, for example, and the effect of various crops in fields on landing gear, water landings, and so forth. Not all can be simulated, but there will be plenty of discussion.

That said, every actual engine failure will have one's full attention, and if legs aren't shaking a bit after, then one isn't fully aware of what just happened.

I had an instructor that pulled my engine and he waited to give me power when I was sure I was about to land in a pasture.

Fun times, old memories.