Best landings, let's hear about them.

Lou- That is a smooth one, for sure. No tendency to float with a soft landing? I guess a 747 is heavy enough to get the squat switches to work for ground roll spoilers, etc, even with a smooth landing.

 

I still remember the first time, as a student pilot, I was able to hold the centerline with a slip in gusty cross winds all through the approach,flair, and touch down. This was the first time I really felt like I was a PILOT.

 

Since Ive been flying mostly the same serial number for 3 years straight, Ive had time to get intimate with her. That has been the biggest factor for me. I have the perfect setting for the seat (height/fore aft angle tilt), pedals and my little silicone seat cushion. A true squeaker for me is when the ground spoilers are activated via wheel spin up Vs squat switches. You can feel the plane settle down on the mains fully when they deploy.

Due to logistics, I had to land in Shannon during some massive winds. The calculated cross wind was 24 kts (25 max) with a steady wind of 55kts. It was pitch black outside in the middle of winter and raining. I briefed the landing, told my FO exactly what I would do and flew as briefed. The little barrier of water cushioned the upwind mains perfectly. Smooth landing. That was the one that sticks out in my head due to squeaking it with all the ugly variables.

And then I have the ones where we are empty, end of a long day and Im cranky. Those are the ones my FA knows are coming and straps in accordingly hahaha.

 

Okay in a Mooney any landing that does not result in a porpoise or a bent prop is a Great landing!

 

Probably my lowest touchdown V/S and one of my lowest touchdown Gs. Didn't do too well with the decrab though.
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I'd say the same for the Viper. The F-16 wants to fly and fight so bad, she never wants to land. So all we do is fly to a couple feet off the ground at idle/boards and eventually she'll give up and squeek on every time. Formation landings out of ILSs for crap weather were the exception and could sometimes set up some funny landings, but that's about it.

Here's a typical one...(not in bad wx)

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=lLV9ja251GU

 

Early in the 767's career, all the landings seemed to be rough. I attributed that to the supercritical wing causing the aircraft to tend to float in ground effect, so the pilots sometimes had to exhort to other techniques to get the aircraft to stop flying. (Like, perhaps, popping the speed brakes before the aircraft actually touched down.)

Eventually, they got the techniques straightened out and subsequent landings seemed to be much smoother.

(I once got to sit in the cockpit of a C-5. You're so far off the ground up there that it looks like you're already airborne!)

 

Rollers always put a smile on your face. In a seaplane the equivalent is when you notice the spray without feeling the touchdown.

Any pilot who can grease a 737 deserves a round of applause. Usually a 73 always leaves you wondering whether the pilot is ex-Navy.

 

Hah! I flew my Mooney 231 into a Norcal airport with a friend who was flying in a small aircraft for the first time. As we were on final, I explained to him that there was a lot more to landing than getting a "greaser" and to expect a small bump or even two on touch down. So wouldn't you know, I got probably the best landing I've ever done in that aircraft, before or even since. As we rolled down the runway, he asked "did we touch down yet"?

I dreaded the return flight when I knew his high esteem would surely be shattered with one of my more typical landings.

 

I think my best was landing at my old home field of KCDW, landing on runway 22 with a 30kt headwind I was able to turn off on taxiway November in my DA20, making my landing roll a total length of 250' or so lol

 

I had to go through a lot of stuff in my head and ran across my first time flying a Lockheed Model 12 back in '67. The owner was an airline pilot , Mike Strong, and we had flown to Spokane to escort the EAA's replica of the Spirit of St. Louis on its flight to Seattle. Weather messed it up and we had to fly back to Arlington and I got to do that with him in the right seat. I made the landing at Arlington and greased it in but started to push forward on the controls to plant it but Mike stopped me with a comment that the airplane didn't need it. We decided to go to Boeing Field to meet the NYP but they decide to go Portland. Made a fairly good landing there but we we missed the Spirit. I got to fly the Lockheed back to Arlington where I made another greaser. At the time, I was not an experienced " big twin" flyer but I felt completely comfortable in the airplane and it wasn't a bit squirrelly and I think that it is one of the nicest airplanes that I ever flew when I was trying to be a pilot. Another airplane that was nice to fly was a Monocoupe 90AW. That was owned by another generous airline pilot friend. I never was able to put together a series of good smooth landings in the Stearman BUT I never ground looped it.

 

Will If that video was started a minute sooner you could have seen my old house in El Mirage as it was directly under the approach path. Spent a lot of freetime watching the Vipers flyover, If I was not at the end of the runways shooting photos.

Photo: 90-2056 (CN: ) Lockheed Martin F-16C Fighting Falcon by Robin Guess - www.Jet-Fighters.net Photoid:5820780 - JetPhotos.Net

 

Apologies, Bob, as I know you're a Boeing guy through and through, but I've always heard that anything made by Lockheed was wonderful to fly.

 

No argument here, Don. I think that my lack of glitches was due to a good airplane that seemed to be helping me.

 

Boeing even uses/used a Lockheed chase plane... T-33

 

Lou, great thread. Please help educate the uneducated (me) on your statement above. Why isn't a smooth landing always the right landing?

 

Not on a contaminated runway for example. You'd want a fairly positive touchdown to break through the contamination and get some traction.

Also if the cabin crew are feeling a little tired.

 

Nice area!

Nice picture of the boss' jet too!

 

My best landing was not MY best landing, but my Colonel's landing.

He was my squadron commander in Civil Air Patrol. Some of us cadets had piled up enough brownie points (I think it was when we painted Grace Page's new building at Sanford NAS--I mean, International). Anyway, three of us got to go on an airplane ride. That was big stuff for us!

The weather was great when we took off from Herndon Airport--I mean, "Orlando Executive", in a Florida Wing Cessna 172. We headed east to the Cape and landed at an airport on the coast.

Remember, this is Florida. Weather happens regularly in Florida, especially in the summer. Every afternoon, thunderstorms kicked up on Florida's west coast and proceeded east across the state. One was headed for Herndon.

Rats, we gotta go back!

So we got back in the 172 and putt-putted back west. That thunderstorm suddenly, and I mean suddenly, loomed tall and dark before us. It was a big, big storm. All kinds of calls rasped out of the radio: airliners screaming for higher altitudes. A military fighter topped the storm and radioed in the altitude: 70,000 feet. No, I am not kidding.

The wind, which had been fresh breezes before, hammered the 172. Again and again. All at once it felt like four healthy, big horses surrounded the airplane, one at each corner. Each horse kicked and kicked the little airplane, with its full strength. Totally out of synch with the others. We were bouncing around the sky.

Long tendrils of grey rain blew out from the base of the thunderhead. The nose of the 172 lurched drunkenly around the horizon--no, there was no horizon. There was just a grey-black wall of cloud and a tiny runway in front of us. Static scratched out of the radio: perhaps Herndon had been given the Colonel clearance to land.

The horses kicked at us all the way to touchdown. I don't know how it happened: one moment we were being hurled around the sky, and the next, we were rolling down the runway. As soon as the wheels rolled, rain misted the windshield.

After the Cessna was tied down and postflight done, the Colonel admitted to us that that was the most challenging landing he had ever made. And the Colonel flew B-17s in WWII!

 

One that stands out for me was in a V-tail Bonanza. I had flown some people to a graduation ceremony. The landing runway was 27, while the winds were 180 at 25G30. Greazer. Just about full aileron deflection. The passenger (a one time private pilot) took off his hat and shook my hand.
Another one I remember was going into Greensboro in the early AM in a CL-44. It was one of those nights-still, dark, and FOGGY. I don't care what they were calling the weather, in reality it was zero zero. We landed and used a whole lot of reverse to stop quickly (very noisy). We came to a halt about half way down the runway directly in front the tower, which would have been less than 1/4 mile away from us. Tower called us and said "I assume from the noise you are down-I can't see you from here-cleared to taxi, report when clear of all runways and taxiways.
It was a very very slow taxi to our ramp.

 

That is a nice account, thank you. I think that my best landing was in a PT-19 after giving a fun flight to a very rich friend of a friend who soon after purchased a Bonanza and learned to fly in it. He contacted me some years later and commented on the silky smooth landing in the PT-19. I didn't dare tell him that the PT-19 was the easiest landing airplane in the world.

 

They say that the best landings are the ones that you can walk away from.

My 2 best landings were these:

1991 - Dead stick into Taos (TSM) after having carb ice form 15 miles DME out. Was flying between Alamosa (ALS) and Santa Fe (SAF) on first cross country solo and did something boneheaded. I was killing time, looked up, saw I was late and instead of walking out to 5MC and doing a walk around, I just jumped in and went. Was winter, didn't think about carb heat. When I got to altitude, engine ran rough. Tried to fix it with mixture controls and the engine died on me. Dropped altitude, engine started back up and I would climb, engine died, down I went. Engine started and I climbed again. When it died this time, I couldn't get it to restart. Luckily I somehow was able to get her into Taos after a strong bank and landed downwind. When it stopped on the runway, I got out, pulled her clear of the active, dropped to my knees and got sick to my stomach. It took me a few hours before I was able to get myself together enough to finish the flight to SAF.

Same plane, same winter. Flying into SAF and I was practicing short field landings. There was a King Air waiting to take off on 20 and I was landing on 33. Runway was snow packed. I told the tower that I was going to do a short field landing and will hold short of 20. I landed, called the tower to say I was holding short of 20. Someone called "How short was that landing?" I replied "very short" with a smug grin on my face.

I know, the days of C-172s and my joyful experience in N775MC.

 

all the landings must have been good to date, walked away from all of them... although one was a little hot and got partially barbequed while getting 5 others off the plane first before I could get off