Gazelle Belly Flop.

[motzartmerv]

Hey guys.

 

I was just thinking the other day, I havnt posted a thread for a while, I need an exiting story to contribute. Well, today I got one.

 

I was doing a BFR for a member of our club in the club Gazelle. The conditions weren't good, 15 kts of wind from the south with gust's up to 25.

 

On our first approach for a touch and go, we realised the winds upstairs were stronger then we thought, but still no real problem.

 

Over the fence the guy got the nose a little flat for my liking and i urged him to lower it slightly, especially due to the gusting wind. Id no sooner said that when the airspeed went from 60 kts to sweet bugga all. I was watching it when it happend, and we literally fell from about 15 feet onto the runway, full power was applied before we touched down but it was too late. We impacted hard. Real hard. The pilot still ahd the stick right back and the acft pitched up to what felt like a vertical climb position. I used alot of strength to push the nose back over and managed to unbreak the stall before a second impact. On the climb out i realised the right undercarriage was resting just below the wing strutt. After a further look i realised that the undercarriage leg was bent quite badly. I asked the pilot to look at the wheel on his side, he said it was fine "why?"

 

lol...I said well that makes at least 1 good wheel we have.

 

It took a few moments to dawn on us both that we were gunna have major problems getting it down on the ground.

 

I called a pan pan and stayed at cct height while i thought about the options.

 

The fire and safety guys at albatross ( 6 miles away) came on the radio and asked if we needed assistance. I thought we would be much better off landing on a sealed runway and elected to divert to Albatross.

 

Enroute the fireys and the aero club at albatross gave us info on winds etc.

 

I requested a fly over for an inspection to confirm the status of the nose wheel and the other main. The firey told me to fly at 100 feet directly over the trucks, and they checked it out.

 

They confirmed the right leg was rooted but the left and nose wheel looked intact.

 

No wukkers i thought. 2 out of 3 aint bad. lol

 

We climbed back to cct height and did some checks, then the firey asked me to stay in the cct untill further help arrived. I knew what that meant, there were already 3 fire trucks, 2 or 3 other sapport vehicles milling around, they wanted us to wait for an ambulance. hhhmmm..

 

Anyway, in the circuit ( which was quite turbulant) i noticed some notchiness in the ailerons, a little play revealed that the stick didnt really want to move left, it required alot more force then normal. Now I was a little concerned .. I have heard of the ailerons departing the acft after a hard landing... A quick call to let the fireys know, i was going to make an approach, and that i had concerns about the controlls.

 

The approach was rough, lots of airspeed excursions, sink, lift, and rotors. Lovely how things start to pile up.

 

The aeroclub CFI told me to land midway down the runway to avoid the worst of the turbulance..

 

I tell ya what, theres nothing quite like doing an approach when every taxiway has a firetruck waiting on it. lol.. wakes you up a bit..

 

In the flare I added power to try and minnimise the touchdown speed and landed on the good wheel, which slowly sunk into the same broken position the other one was. After a long slide we came to a stop on the tailskid and what was left of the mains. Evrything off and we were out in a flash.

 

The fireys were exellent. So were the the guys from 817 squadran, all pitched in to help us out, and get the gazelle clear of the runway and on a trailer.

 

Good Job fella's, much appreciated.

 

Pretty sure the Gazelle's had it, a quick look over by our L2 confirmed things have moved and twisted a bit.

 

The sink we got over the fence was like nothing ive ever seen. I was watching the airspeed indicator when it wound back so fast I thought it was broken.

 

I suspect not only a lull in the headwind but a slight tailwind aswell which all but nullified our forward speed.

 

Anyway, sorry for the length of the story..

 

cheers

 

 

 

 

 

[XP503]

Wow interesting story, glad you are ok. The undercarriage on a Gazelle is a tough bit of gear so it must have hit hard.

 

 

[planedriver]

Quite an experience that sounds well handled under the circumstances. Good onyer Merve.

 

Poor Destiny-Flyer will be probably be having flash-backs, but the great thing is that you guys are still with us to tell the story's, and we can all learn from that.

 

Kind Regards

 

Planey

 

 

[pudestcon]

Glad to hear you are alright motz and your account, whilst written with a few laughs, kept me focused on your account. Thanks for sharing this learning experience.

 

Pud

 

 

[Tomo]

Great report Motz... Good you're all ok :thumb_up:

 

Poor Gazelle

 

 

[Guest Wigg]

Great report MM glad you are both ok, Tough little plane the Gazelle. Wigg

 

 

[motzartmerv]

Thanx lads.

 

The winds weren't good, and forcast to get worse later in the day.

 

I had just done an hour of cct's with a student, and the winds were about 10 kts straight down the strip. Nil turbulance.

 

The sock was indicating about 13-14 when we took off for the BFR. No indication of gust's.

 

Its one of those things, perfect timing, right place at the perfect time.

 

I spose any good pilot should debrief himself on what he could have done better, and the most obvious point i have to take is we just shouldnt have taken off.

 

We have flown in winds like this before with no issues at all. But eventually i spose the luck has to run out.

 

If I was on the controls for the landing the outcome would have been the same. there simply was no time to do anything about it.

 

He had extra speed as per the technique, but it was no where near enough to overcome the windsheer.

 

I guess i need to be totally honest and take responsability for the incident, and give mother nature a bit more respect.

 

cheers

 

 

[Guest rocketdriver]

Sounds like some excellent airmanship and some top class pilotage ... congratulations on one you walked away from ....

 

 

[turboplanner]

This is from my post in the thread "Stick and Rudder" ; the issues were also debated in "Landing Methods"

 

"I've previously mentioned dutifully studying theory on wind shear, and idly thinking I probably should get around to landing longer, to give myself a better margin of safety but never experienced wind shear for about 20 years.

 

Then I copped two in a period of less than six months, where the aircraft was on late final and just dropped like a rock, requiring IMMEDIATE corrective action (throttle to the wall to gain altitude) to avoid picking mangroves out of my teeth for weeks."

 

I'm not going to get into the debate again, but just want to make two important points:

 

1. Wind shear is something very few pilots experience, and some may never experience it in their lifetime - it's a lottery, but it's vital to plan for it.

 

2. In this case the touchdown point was far enough down the runway that a clean bounce was possible, as against getting tangled up in scrubland or fencing and indicates, like the cure of my habit of touching down on the beginning of the piano keys and trying to stop before their end, that dropping in over the fence every time has the potential to one day drop you into the scrub.

 

 

[motzartmerv]

Yes, point taken Tubz.

 

In this instance we were expecting windsheer, its pretty much par for the course on the particular runway we were useing. Airspeed excursions are frequent of upto 6-7 kts. So adding 10 kts to the appch speed is one way we attempt to minimise the risk.

 

The pilot had this nailed, and as youve indicated, a touchdown point alittle further in was attempted. I shudder to think of what may have happ'd had we appch'd in the normal way. Even with the intended touchdwon point about 150 meters in from the fence, the scars on the grass from our tail skid are only 30 paces from the fence.(im pretty short, so thats not a long way)

 

cheers

 

 

[Guest ozzie]

Right leg? photo shows left is bent. or is it me who is?

 

 

[motzartmerv]

Try both...:thumb_up:

 

 

[Guest ozzie]

jaspers huh. not the first time carnage there.

 

long time ago when we used to camp and fly from there some mean westerlies rolling over that hill wrote off the playboy sponsered Condor rolled it and the trailer it was tied to into a real messy ball. i managed to save my 'works' lazair by grabbing it by the tail and flipping it onto it's back with just some bending on the upturned wingtips. went from perfect day to disaster in less than 30 seconds. just rolls off cambawarra like a fly swatter

 

 

[dazza 38]

Hi Merv, thanks for sharing mate, im glad you guys are OK.

 

 

[monty]

Thanks Motz,

 

We all learn from other peoples experience, thanks for sharing and glad that you both are OK.

 

Monty

 

 

[flightygirl]

hey motz,

 

glad you're both ok. looks like a doozy!

 

Rach

 

 

[Yenn]

Great educational story and well told, but when do you decide not to take off. Maybe if you had been landing a minute earlier or later there would have been no problems. I can't talk from experience on windshear, never having experienced it like that.

 

 

[Ultralights]

Merv, Is the Gazelle still at albatross? I went for a drive today and couldn't see it anywhere? how did you get it fixed and back out, if it is out?

 

 

[i_like_planes]

No Rob, its on a trailer at jaspers. The lads from 817 sqdn helped us lift it on.

 

 

[rgmwa]

Glad it all ended well, except for the plane. Probably just as well the left main collapsed on touchdown to even things up. Not a situation I'd like to be in though, so congrats on an excellent bit of flying under a lot of pressure.

 

rgmwa

 

 

[dunlopdangler]

Geezuzz Motz, you and ILP certainly hit hard...How are your backs??? When we did the drop tests on the skyfoxes for JAR-VLA we loaded the airframe up and static dropped from about the same height and that was equivalent to (from memory) about 12G's..and the undercarriage stayed intact...glad you guys are OK and thanks for sharing...try not to do it again!!

 

 

[motzartmerv]

Hi DD. That would explain the backache then..hehe

 

Would you suspect structural problems after an impact like that?.

 

 

[Guest ozzie]

lucky the gear did break otherwise it may have been your backs.

 

 

[Neil_S]

Wow - glad you guys were OK , it looks very nasty from the pics. Fortunately I have not experienced anything like that in our Gazelle, but have had some wind shear when flying a Texan not too long after passing my test. My instructor warned me that it happened on RWY36 when the wind was from the north-west, but it still came as a bit of a shock. Fortunately it is a long runway and I was aiming a bit further down than normal so was able to open the throttle and get a bit more height in time.

 

Shame about your Gazelle, but as others have said - you walked away from it, which is all that matters in the end.

 

Cheers

 

Neil

 

 

[Aussie Steve]

Good job Merv. Glad everyone is ok.

 

This does bring up a point that I am a firm believer of myself. That is the point that a couple of the guys have already stated, and that is about NOT trying to nail the landing onto the piano keys.

 

If you encounter ""wind shear"" on late final, as I did, you want runway under your bum !

 

I just clipped a marker and bent a landing gear leg on a Texan and scared the you now what out of me.

 

Also those pilots flying Gazelles, make sure that your planes landing gear is ""Regularly"" inspected ""INSIDE"" the covers on the rubber blocks. They are fairly hard to inspect casually. you have to drill out the rivets to move them a little bit to actually see inside. The steel rods come away from the rubber and you,ll have a collapse that will look just like the pics earlier. They are not a long wearing item.