Engine Failure Does Not Cause A Fatal Accident In An Ultralight Aircraft!

[Gravity]

Ex

 

If by "no throttle landing" you mean a glide approach, I absolutely agree. I was taught that unless you have to do a long approach to fit in with traffic, all landings should be a glide approach. Pull the throttle to idle as you turn base and if you have judged it right you should not touch the throttle again until you need it to taxi clear of the runway.This way you remain familiar & comfortable with your aircraft's glide performance, so when the fan does stop you are not in a completely different situation to most landings. Obviously there will be some difference between an idling prop and a stopped one, but better to practise at idle than not at all.

 

To open yet another debate I also agree with being able to turn a motor off completely, while overhead an airstrip and carry out a practise forced landing all the way to touchdown. This should only be done with a CFI on board and at a suitable strip that has safe options, at a time when it will not affect other traffic. I have done this and believe it is worthwhile to experience it. Having done it in a controlled & supervised fashion will help reduce the shock & possible panic when it eventually happens for real.

excellent post, shame some don't see it that way!

 

 

[turboplanner]

Exexcellent post, shame some don't see it that way!

That's what I was taught too Gravity, and it has the merits Mick described, plus it keeps you on your toes to have the aircraft in the correct position for the base and final turns.

HOWEVER, some engines are different, and have different operating requirements

 

 

[Methusala]

Are you talking about 500 cc air cooled two strokes, or GA aircraft?

I was flying in a friends newly acquired Luscombe. It had a C65. He asked me to pull throttle and stall. I did. The engine stopped! Don

 

 

[facthunter]

That can happen.. If the nose drops suddenly the fuel in the bowl can be affected. It's usually hard to get a fixed pitch prop to stop turning (windmilling) in flight. To demonstrate air restart often a spin entry in the "correct" direction had to be done to stop the prop . The plane had to go near vertical sometimes to get the prop to start turning again. NO mechanical starter type plane. Nev

 

 

[farri]

This could have been a Fatal!

 

The pilot was the owner and this was his first flight; I`d test flown it for him the day before, it flew well and was quite maneuverable; he was flying circuits off a local turf farm here at Deeral, was on final approach, reduced the power and the engine stopped; had he been 100` higher when he reduced the power, he would have easily been able to safely land, where he took off from.

 

What isn`t in the photo is the drain about 2 mts wide and 2.5 mts deep and about 1.5 mts behind the tail, he just cleared it, had he hit the bank of the drain, it would have ended completely different.

 

That`s Ron Biondi holding the prop and myself, the guy looking under the AC is the owner/pilot.

 

 

These days I mostly fly from home, but over the years I flew from many different places, one thing that has never changed though is my principal on final; I always keep more than enough height to make my landing point then slip it off if I need to.

 

I believe, what is needed on this thread, is more stories of real-life experiences, from those who have had engine failure, talking from theory is almost useless.

 

Frank.

 

 

[Riley]

I was flying in a friends newly acquired Luscombe. It had a C65. He asked me to pull throttle and stall. I did. The engine stopped! Don

Had a similar instance when I first flew the Aeronca Champ. With lack of familiarity, just prior to flare, backed off on the throttle a bit and the C85 quit on me. By the time I'd worked out which way my a.s was pointing, the little aircraft had landed itself. Ya never get to the end of the learning curve.

 

 

[farri]

In my post above, I should have added, there was no damage to the aircraft or pilot because he kept it flying all the way down and just settled it on top of the tall sugar cane.

 

If done correctly, landing on top of tall sugar cane can be a soft landing in all the types of Ultralights` that I`m aware of and have flown, I`ve had to! but I`m not so sure about the nose wheel LSA.

 

Frank.

 

 

[Yenn]

At an Old Station fly in a few years back, an early cold morning flight and at the end of downwind I puiied the throttle of in the Corby, pulled the nose up to slow down and the engine stopped. Ah well, plenty of strip so I decided to do a dead stick landing. Nobody of the many people around even noticed, even when I hit the starter as I rolled out.

 

In a Thruster I had a pipe between fuel pump and carbie split. I gave a radio call as a friend was flying with me. A chopper from The Heron Island run contacted me and monitored my progress. I put it down in a paddock near a house and near where a tractor was working. No problems. I was glad for the care shown by the chopper pilot. I managed to fly it out by using the gearbox breather hose as a replacement fuel hose. The hose was about 3 months old.

 

The main thing is to not panick and fly it right to a standstill.

 

 

[M61A1]

My first engine stoppage was ( in a 95.10) on approach. I had stabilised on short final and was satisfied that I would clear the large gums either side of the road that ran north/south on the west end of the threshold. As I reduced power to idle the engine stopped dead and about then I found out how much difference the lack of idle thrust made. I figured that getting over the large trees was now too close too call, so rather than take the chance, I dropped the nose and turned 90 deg to the left, then slipped down to 5-10 feet into a short stubble paddock.

 

Turning lined me up with the furrows, and parallel to the trees, slipping got me on the ground with the most possible paddock in front of me. As it was I pulled up few metres from the fence with no damage to anyone or anything.

 

A bit of faultfinding (low coil resistance) showed a coil burning out. (single ignition)

 

 

[Oscar]

If you fly gliders, every landing is a gliding landing - without go-around as an option.

 

Your ONLY reference point - forget local landmarks for where to turn - is the threshold and the angle of declination that you know is appropriate to your machine. You do NOT blindly follow the 'tramped-out track', you vary your approach according to how your energy management (which is height and speed, power is not a factor) - relates to arriving at the threshold at the right height and speed. Without doubt, effective airbrakes are a major part of your calculation - but I personally - as trained - only used them to wash off excess energy at the last few dozens of feet, to hit the threshold at the minimum possible distance. Until then, we glider pilots keep a reserve of energy up our sleeves.. Has saved me some embarrassment on more than a few occasions.

 

 

[farri]

Great! Now we're starting to get information on what contributed to a successful safe landing instead of what might contribute to a successful safe landing.

 

I`m only going to talk about high-drag, low-momentum, low-speed Ultralights...This particular incident occurred when I was instructing for our local club, the Far North Queensland Ultralight Asociation, at that time the club owned the Drifter I fly...This story is a bit long but it makes a few very important examples of surviving engine failure.

 

A guy doing his nav wanted to fly to Ravenshoe as he`d grown up there. Back then I did a lot of flying for our club from the Pioneer Valley holiday ranch on the Atherton Tablelands. We took off from our property here at Deeral, with the guy at the controls and me in the back seat, went over the Gillies range and stayed within gliding distance of a suitable landing area all the way to Pioneer Valley then onto Ravenshoe.

 

We flew around Ravenshoe a couple of times then started heading back when the guy in the front asked me if he could track back to Pioneer Valley in a straight line from our current position, this meant flying for quite a while over tiger country completely unsuitable for a forced landing, I considered it for about 10 seconds and said NO! we`d go back the way we came; I`d hardly said it when the engine surged and began to lose power, it kept running enough to keep us flying but the guy in the front seat couldn`t keep the stick steady enough and every time the nose went up we lost power, I thought the engine would stop so I took over.

 

Because we were over terrain that I could land on if the engine stopped I set a track to Peter Grimley`s property at Kaban, which was a lot closer than Pioneer Valley; Peter was a club member, owned and flew a Drifter and had cleared a large area of trees and made a couple of strips there and I knew a couple of our club members would be there.

 

I was able to maintain 1500` agl but as I got closer to Peter`s, there was a large area of trees between us and one of the strips, I could see if the engine failed over those trees I wasn`t going to make the strip, I had to climb to be safe and I was fairly certain that as soon as I started to climb the engine would stop so I positioned the Drifter over the 2 paddocks below us with a headland between them and started to attempt a circling climb, as soon as I lifted the nose, the engine stoped, nothing to do now but land on the headland that was twice the width of the wheel bace.

 

Peter had heard us coming and when the noise stopped he and another club member came to us by Ute. We thought we`d found the reason for the failure, started the engine and it ran quite well so I sent the guy in the front seat back to peter`s in the Ute and I flew it out to Peter`s. We went right over everything on the Drifter, again and again, we thought we`d found the problem so I flew it back to Pioneer Valley holiday ranch where some of our club members were...That was the first engine failure that day, the second was with a club member flying solo but it didn`t end so well.

 

I`ll tell the story of the second failure and the reason for the two failures that day, after I give someone else a go to tell theirs.

 

Frank.

 

 

[M61A1]

Not always, no you don't.Take a look at some of the restricted areas closed off around Williamtown, Amberley, or even the CTR around some of the major airports, and the only practical option to get around, under or through, these areas is not overly friendly. The lane through Dungog and Gloucester has an upper limit of 1000AGL. Do I fly over tiger country? Certainly. But I am comfortable wrapping the -9 up into a ball to walk away, and with a stall speed in the mid 40's, I am confident such an arrival would not be life-threatening. Painful, perhaps, but not fatal.

Being a recreational aviator, you always have a choice about where you fly.. I see it as a good thing that you understand the risks and accept them, and I hope that never have to test your RV structure.

 

 

[Downunder]

To open yet another debate I also agree with being able to turn a motor off completely, while overhead an airstrip and carry out a practise forced landing all the way to touchdown. This should only be done with a CFI on board and at a suitable strip that has safe options, at a time when it will not affect other traffic. I have done this and believe it is worthwhile to experience it. Having done it in a controlled & supervised fashion will help reduce the shock & possible panic when it eventually happens for real.

I 100% agree with this and have done it. I think being unfamiliar with your aircraft in a true glide, the shock and panic as you state, plays a major factor in all these fatalities which seem to be in survivable situations.

 

I started turning the engine off at a fair height and just consentrated on maintaining good glide speed, managing energy, going through checks and re-start procedures. Then re-starting and climbing back to height. Obviously all this over a suitable strip.

 

After a while you realise that you have TIME. The aircraft still flies relatively normally at glide. You are able to make unflustered conscious decisions rather than panicked, potentially wrong decisions under perceived pressure.

 

 

[turboplanner]

That's right Nev. It would be interesting to see just how many stall spins were in tiger country compared to away from tiger country though. Just going off my memory I would think that more go into open paddocks than not which would raise the question why? If people aren't pulling back to extend a glide over trees etc. why are they holding back and stalling in reasonable surroundings?[

Tiger country is a totally different issue, where there's virtually no chance of a survivable landing. It's a term which seems to have stuck with RA pilots, who, with the least reliable engines in the flying spectrum are the ones who should never be flying over it.

There are several areas in flying where you can guarantee never to meet your end at, by practising Total Risk avoidance, and this is one of them; never fly over it.

 

I'm aware of a couple on this forum who do regularly, and a couple who fly over for long enough periods, that a glide to safe country is not possible.

 

The one exception would be where you flight plan for enough glide performance to be able to glide over it; but I've never seen the word flight plan and tiger country used together here.

 

There are some doosies of "methods" of forced landings, like the one which says you can land in the crown of a tree; some have, there are photos to prove it, but have a look some time at spot landing competitions, or the number of people who float several hundred feet along runways in J170s or Warriors, and you'll know that landing on a 6 metre spot let alone being stressed doing it, is nearly impossible, and you're more likely to overshoot into the heavy boughs of the next tree, or undershoot into the boughs of the tree you chose.

 

Without even going to documents, I can recall:

 

• the son of Brian Naylor killing himself and a passenger, I think in a drifter, by using a paddock where the only climb out was over mountain ash; the engine failed and the result was inevitable.
   
   
  
• Rod Hay going down off a strip carved out of the trees in the Blue Mountains.
   
   
  
• A trike pilot with paying passenger on a joy flight going down off a strip carved out of the bush north of the Yarra Valley, where there was only a small are of open country up one end; the wrong end on that day.
   
   
  
• a number where weather also played a part, i.e. if they hadn't been over tiger country they could have made a forced landing.
   
   
  

 

 

Shouldn't happen, but it does because people choose to do it.

 

 

[Gravity]

Good reply there turbo.

 

As we all know aviation is all about risk. That risk level is entirely up to the driver to asses and what value they put on their own life. Personally I now never fly over terrain where I don't have an option to at least have an excellent chance of surviving and I fly behind one of the most reliable engines ever made! I have a secret deal with my maker. I don't bother him and he doesn't bother me! -:)

 

 

[dsam]

Another form of "Tiger Country" involves Bass Straight crossings (AIP SP1). In my case, I did the recommended track over Flinders Island (via Cliffy Island, Hogan Island, Deal Island then via Cape Portland or Waterhouse Island). Many of these islands are very rocky looking from above, and seem not viable for a good landing should the Rotax 912 fail.

 

Of course I did the recommended SKED reports at 15 minute intervals, at flew at high altitude (8500 & 9500) for best glide range - so only travelling in ideal weather helps here. Also mandatory was my life jacket & floating PLB, personal strobe, and for extra help, my SPOT locator, OzRunways tracking, and ADSB-out. With all of this, I still considered it a calculated risk and flew solo, not feeling I could put someone else at the same risk in my Eurofox.

 

I'm happy to report that my journey went just as I (carefully) planned, and was without incident. Being RA-Aus, I have no access to Class D at Launceston, so I had to track along the north coast to Devonport to re-fuel, making my journey much longer for no good reason. The regulations as they currently stand are very discriminatory towards RA-Aus pilots, forcing us low under CTA steps in rough tiger country, or preventing me having Class D access at Launceston when that would be shorter & safer for Bass Straight crossings.

 

I wish CASA would do as their name implies, and put RA-Aus pilot's safety ahead of their bureaucratic intransigence on CTA access/transit.

 

 

[Gravity]

Another form of "Tiger Country" involves Bass Straight crossings (AIP SP1). In my case, I did the recommended track over Flinders Island (via Cliffy Island, Hogan Island, Deal Island then via Cape Portland or Waterhouse Island). Many of these islands are very rocky looking from above, and seem not viable for a good landing should the Rotax 912 fail.Of course I did the recommended SKED reports at 15 minute intervals, at flew at high altitude (8500 & 9500) for best glide range - so only travelling in ideal weather helps here. Also mandatory was my life jacket & floating PLB, personal strobe, and for extra help, my SPOT locator, OzRunways tracking, and ADSB-out. With all of this, I still considered it a calculated risk and flew solo, not feeling I could put someone else at the same risk in my Eurofox.

 

I'm happy to report that my journey went just as I (carefully) planned, and was without incident. Being RA-Aus, I have no access to Class D at Launceston, so I had to track along the north coast to Devonport to re-fuel, making my journey much longer for no good reason. The regulations as they currently stand are very discriminatory towards RA-Aus pilots, forcing us low under CTA steps in rough tiger country, or preventing me having Class D access at Launceston when that would be shorter & safer for Bass Straight crossings.

 

I wish CASA would do as their name implies, and put RA-Aus pilot's safety ahead of their bureaucratic intransigence on CTA access/transit.

Ive done the Bass Straight crossing to both major Tassy Islands many years ago several times and thought it was more fun than dangerous but now I'd never contemplate doing such things, self preservation has kicked in big time! -:)

 

 

[facthunter]

If you land in mountain ash on the sides of steep slope you will be lucky to be found let a lone make a survivable landing. Your low landing speed is your friend in RAAus planes.. If you are in a Lancair you need a better aerodrome. Small wheels fast landing speed.

 

Shutting your engine down is an extra risk. You might not be able to restart it.. I recall one instance where an R-2000 would not unfeather on a flight test, and another where a DCA chap turned the keys off on a Piper Colt or the 4 seat thing and the keys came out of the lock and fell on to the floor and could not be reached. A motor that has no starter is not easy to restart in flight but starters , solenoids and batteries can fail too.. The shock and panic comments concern me somewhat. You should KNOW that any motor can fail at any time. On each take-off you should plan to cope with it happening at various stages of the take off and initial climb out. You should check your engine performance early on the take off roll and if it's not right on abort the take off. If your runway is on the short side run up on the brakes or do a rolling start.. When you are learning to fly your instructor gives you lots of forced landing practice, and many times you will have no warning. When you fly solo you know you are going to pull the throttle so it's nowhere near the same. Not all emergencies are engine failures. You could have an engine fire with the motor still running. or a cabin fire. Getting back on the ground quickly is part of that deal but crashing an already burning plane is not advised. Do you do any of this since you learned to fly? or is just what happens on a BFR enough to cover it? I think you know the real answer to that. Nev

 

 

[kgwilson]

My GA training back many moons ago in a C150 always included glide approaches when the instructor would pull the throttle somewhere on down wind. I never had to sideslip & that wasn't even taught. The process was to immediately turn for the runway & turn tightly on to final. Judging the height when to do this was paramount. Too high & a couple of zig-zags washed it off. Too low & it was power on (& failed attempt). I never did get it wrong. I only started using sideslip when converting to RA in a Gazelle with no flaps.

 

After I'd test flown my Sierra a bit I adjusted the idle as it was a bit high & then pulled the throttle on final & the engine stopped. I had a good angle & should have landed a hundred metres or more into the strip. There is swampy land before the strip & there can be a bit of sink there so if you are low you sometimes need to give a bit of a blip on the throttle to maintain your slope trajectory. Murphy dictated that the sink was there for this landing & that threw me a bit as it was almost too late for a restart. Anyway I didn't try a restart & landed dead stick about 50 metres into the strip, started up & taxyed 850 metres to the turnoff.

 

Landing a hang glider is always forced as there is no go around. Flying a coastal site back in the 80s with no beach, top landing was essential. The sea breeze was light & then almost disappeared. The other 2 guys were able to top land but I was at the wrong end of the site & got below the top. Waves were crashing against the rocks below & there was a single large rock there about 3 metres or so wide & my only option to get out of my dilemma without damage was to land on it & I did. Sometimes absolute necessity has the ability to really focus the mind. Getting back up the cliff was a 2 hour mission I'd rather forget though.

 

 

[Jerry_Atrick]

<snip>

I'm happy to report that my journey went just as I (carefully) planned, and was without incident. Being RA-Aus, I have no access to Class D at Launceston, so I had to track along the north coast to Devonport to re-fuel, making my journey much longer for no good reason. The regulations as they currently stand are very discriminatory towards RA-Aus pilots, forcing us low under CTA steps in rough tiger country, or preventing me having Class D access at Launceston when that would be shorter & safer for Bass Straight crossings.

 

I wish CASA would do as their name implies, and put RA-Aus pilot's safety ahead of their bureaucratic intransigence on CTA access/transit.

Not allowing RAAus a/c into class D is completely nuts! I can understand not over major conurbations, or lose to the airport or normal routing in (ATC would give a clearance to avoid these areas within Class D). But within all of a class D zone or area is nuts - CASA probably has blood on their hands with that rule.

 

AIUI, permit, ultralights and microlights are permitted in Class D with ATC approval. In fact gliders operate in Class D here... Suitably equipped permit a/c are allowed to fly IFR and night (each a/c has to be individually approved). Are RAAus a/c falling out of the sky?

 

Isn't there a couple of MPs with RAAUs or PPL (or other) tickets who can exert parliamentary pressure on this guy and his board cronies: Key Appointments to the Civil Aviation Safety Authority

 

 

[Gravity]

Plenty of engines have to have the motor opened up every few thousand feet or they might stop . Are you aware of that? Nev

Near 40 yrs driving planes and well over10000 hrs yeah am kinda aware of that!

 

 

[dsam]

Not allowing RAAus a/c into class D is completely nuts! I can understand not over major conurbations, or lose to the airport or normal routing in (ATC would give a clearance to avoid these areas within Class D). But within all of a class D zone or area is nuts - CASA probably has blood on their hands with that rule.AIUI, permit, ultralights and microlights are permitted in Class D with ATC approval. In fact gliders operate in Class D here... Suitably equipped permit a/c are allowed to fly IFR and night (each a/c has to be individually approved). Are RAAus a/c falling out of the sky?

 

Isn't there a couple of MPs with RAAUs or PPL (or other) tickets who can exert parliamentary pressure on this guy and his board cronies: Key Appointments to the Civil Aviation Safety Authority

Yes, it is nuts! To be clear, my aircraft fully complies with CTA access, and can enter C & D airspace with a PPL pilot in the left seat (and I have already done so legally). I have an RA-Aus Pilot “Certificate”, therefore I shall not enter as pilot-in-command!

RA-Aus authorities have been negotiating this unfair anomaly with CASA for the last two years (or more) without result. Of course I’m happy to comply with any proposed endorsement exams, CFI check flights in my aircraft, etc. etc. but nothing has happened yet!! Very frustrating!

 

I’d love to fly up the coast to Far North Queensland, but cannot do so without CTA transit rights. Instead, I’m forced inland over mountainous & often cloudy terrain ducking under CTA steps, or perhaps even further inland into remote outback territory.

 

C’mon bureaucrats! Get going on this endorsement:angry:

 

 

[dsam]

Jerry, I should also point out that RA-Aus training schools have a CASA exemption to train their pilots (incl. solo flights) out of Class D Aerodromes such as Camden, but as soon as their students are awarded their Pilot’s certificate they are “grounded” and must fly from somewhere else!! Tell me how that makes any sense:doh:

 

 

[Gravity]

Yes, it is nuts! To be clear, my aircraft fully complies with CTA access, and can enter C & D airspace with a PPL pilot in the left seat (and I have already done so legally). I have an RA-Aus Pilot “Certificate”, therefore I shall not enter as pilot-in-command! RA-Aus authorities have been negotiating this unfair anomaly with CASA for the last two years (or more) without result. Of course I’m happy to comply with any proposed endorsement exams, CFI check flights in my aircraft, etc. etc. but nothing has happened yet!! Very frustrating!

 

I’d love to fly up the coast to Far North Queensland, but cannot do so without CTA transit rights. Instead, I’m forced inland over mountainous & often cloudy terrain ducking under CTA steps, or perhaps even further inland into remote outback territory.

 

C’mon bureaucrats! Get going on this endorsement:angry:

You won't be able to get CASA to see any form of common sense. All I can suggest is if you feel that strongly about having access to class D airspace then get a full GA pilots license.

 

 

[dsam]

......All I can suggest is if you feel that strongly about having access to class D airspace then get a full GA pilots license.

Thanks, but that’s really not good enough IMHO. That would involve much unnecessary additional duplicate (and ongoing licensing costs), only to fly my own aircraft at the end of that pointless exercise.

Besides, I’m really not keen to waste time & money getting “re-schooled”, checked & approved on some random, primitively equipped VH registered aircraft, only to get back into my own (perfectly capable) aircraft to do a coastal flight to FNQ.

 

Yes, I expect an endorsement process for RA-Aus CTA, but should be able to do it in my own aircraft - currently not permitted!