The post previous to yours... not sure why it's there. No clouds with this Cirrus accident. It was VFR... no clouds... she could see the runways.
Security cam video of impact. Coming pretty much straight down from the looks of it. RIP LiveLeak.com - Plane Crash near Hobby Airport. Houston, Texas
The point being that people often associate the 'downwind turn' as an aerodynamic issue. Its not. I mistook Bob's mention of 'Cirrus low speed flying' query as making this misconception. Bob cleared that up. Not sure what the max x-wind component on a Cirrus is, but 13G18 direct crosswind would be challenging for most light aircraft.
I fly radio control airplanes occasionally and all the guys talk about keeping extra speed before turning downwind. I tell them that the wind doesn't matter....turning downwind, upwind, crosswind. No one seems to believe me though. Sad to hear the ATC audio. She seems polite and apologetic for being high. While it obviously isn't his fault, I do feel for the ATC controller telling her to make a tight low pattern. Seeing the plane crash was really sad. I wish I could have been in the cockpit to give her a helping hand. I wonder what her background is. Hours on type, etc?
Knowing what the outcome was I cringed when I read that transcript. 100% agree it was not his fault and seemingly benign at the time. Something every flight instructor should drill into the heads of their students is that the pilot is in command of the aircraft, and regardless of what a controller says the pilot must be able and comfortable in executing the directions of the controller. A pilot, especially a student or low timer, should not be afraid to a say "N1234X, unable". The vast majority of controllers are understanding when this happens and are able to make changes quickly that keeps everyone safe.
Yeah, you have to remember ATC is down there for us, we aren't up there for them. Ultimately, you are in control of the aircraft and ATC is there to help. The controller in this case was working to help her it seemed. It's always tough for me to listen to an ATC broadcast like this, knowing the outcome.
I think that I have to clarify the turning into downwind and turning on the downwind leg of a landing pattern. The incident that I mentioned earlier was turning onto base from the downwind leg of the pattern. My instructor asked me if it "looked like we had good airspeed" by the way the ground was going by on the downwind leg . It did and I said " Yes, it looks good." He then told me to execute a sharp turn onto base which I did. Then the bottom fell out and I was looking at trees coming up at an alarming rate. The airplane had stalled and entered a spin that my steely-eyed instructor quickly stopped and recovered from. The Lesson. Look at airspeed, not groundspeed. The sharp turn on the downwind removed much of the airflow over the wing and lift was lost, hence the spin. Turns in the downwind demands shallow banks in the turns and perhaps a little bit more power as a bit of assurance that the airplane will keep flying. His Socratic instruction technique has saved me several times.
This whole story confuses me... The movement of the air mass your aircraft is flying through should never (except in sheer) affect what happens to your airspeed when you execute a turn. A level turn, climbing turns, descending turns are all basic flying taught in what, lesson 1 of pilot training? That you add power in a level turn is pretty basic. Bleeding energy in a level turn without power is basic. As an instructor, I never gave any student an inch of slack on pattern speeds. Turning base may be a descending turn, depending on what kind of pattern you fly, in which case power comes back or you just do the turn leaving the power alone. In any case pitch/AoA controls the speed and power determines if you climb, descend, or stay level in your turn. Bank is only relevant in so much as the AoA required to maintain level flight increases exponentially with bank angle, so you will slow down or descend in a steeper turn unless you add power. This poor lady lost track of basics and likely pulled the ["keep it"] tight climbing turn into a stall/spin. If already climbing at full throttle, there's only so much turn you can demand out of your airplane before speed drops. This just blows all around.
Really confusing. You say "Look at airspeed, not groundspeed', then immediately make a claim that turning downwind removed airflow over the wing. Does this only happen when VFR?
Yeah, a constant wind has zero effect on an airplane flying through it, whether climbing, descending, turning, etc. Without external reference, you wouldn't know there was any wind. You don't get whiplash when you turn around quickly, even though your head is traveling 1000mph in one direction and suddenly 1000mph in the other due to the earths rotation. If fact, you can't tell the earth is spinning at all without external reference.
Yes, that only happens in VFR conditions. It doesn't happen IFR because you can't see anything and also sometimes at night when it's really dark. Jeeze! the snipers came out of the woods on this one. The point that was being made was to watch the airspeed indicator...upwind, downwind, daylight , dark, and in the clouds. Consider that we were flying a small light airplane that is subject to different things than a big high powered bird. See what happens when you are flying in a tailwind , throttle back , keep the same AOA, and make a steep turn without checking your airspeed. I started flying in the dark ages and there were a lot of things that were different than they are today and we even learned that an airplane doesn't know about the earth until you break the 1st Commandment, " Thou Shalt maintain airspeed lest the earth arise and smite thee!" I realize that most of you guys are highly trained and way ahead of what I could accomplish and perhaps my language is confusing. Is there going to be another test tomorrow?
I think what Bob was referring to was that the ground-track under you in the pattern responds to groundspeed while the aircraft only cares about airspeed. One only matters if you are landing and have to follow a particular ground-track to line up with the runway. The aircraft still only cares about airspeed, regardless of winds, and only sophisticated nav systems (and educated eyeballs and windsocks) see winds and related groundspeed. If you are going like a scalded ape on crosswind to final, you will have to turn earlier (or tighter) and low timers have a hard time getting that turn correct without running out of airspeed in the tight turn. Whoops, Bob beat me to it.
Probably the same thing that would happen if you were flying in a headwind or crosswind. VFR/IFR/day/night/small light airplane/big high powered bird, doesn't matter.
Yes, that's what I was trying to say, thanks, Taz. The most descriptive example of maintaining airspeed without referring to how fast the earth passed by was a landing made by a Douglas A-26 at Sarasota-Bradenton airport after the war. He was set up perfectly and came in on final with a perfect approach, engines roaring . The runway was 5000 ft. long and he had everything right except for one thing, he was coming in downwind. He kept the correct airspeed for the airplane but his "ground speed" was way too high. He ended up in the runout area with brakes red hot and smoking but luckily no damage to the airframe. The pilot was my late brother-in-law.
"There but for the grace of god go I" Certainly not an expert here, but sure sounded like she had a lot going on. That's a big airport with lots of runways, with lots of heavy metal coming at her in all directions. As has been said, airspeed is king, in the pattern I was taught never to make abrupt or sharp turns, seems like she was all over the place. Did she forget to raise the flaps?, switch tanks ? ( my friend with a cirrus switches tanks ever 30 minutes except on departure) Another thing I was taught very early on and always helps me at a new airport, is as soon as I'm given a runway assignment, put the heading bug on that number, certainly would of helped her figure out weather she was lined up for RWY 4 or 35. But first and foremost maintain airspeed..
This thread , again, has segued into something else but the " confusion" about my recounting an experience that took place 70 years ago still irritates me. For the life of me I can't figure out why there is "confusion" about why low speed and a steep turn in a tailwind would cause a stall. I assume that the critics think that the airspeed was up to where it should be but it wasn't. The instructor was showing me the danger of looking at how fast the ground was going by and not what the airspeed indicator was showing. MEANING that your airspeed was the critical element not what you were seeing on the ground. He mentioned that some students had killed themselves by not paying attention to the airplane. Keep in mind, we didn't have classroom training sessions in the physics of flight, it was done in the airplane by example. Some of those examples were very impressive and I had a few that are seared into my memory because they were so alarming. Flight instruction wasn't like it is now. We spent most of the time in the airplane going through maneuvers. There was little or no radio work, no navigation equipment other than an E6B and a compass. We learned about the physics of flight in the airplane not in a classroom. We had precision spins, climbing stalls, gliding stalls, high speed stalls, 720's, and accuracy landings as some of the things that we had to do before we were soloed. Later, I flew many different types of airplanes and was endorsed for "heavy horsepower" that meant airplanes in the 200-300 horsepower range and I flew a lot of stuff without incident. So, I was fortunate to have had good instruction in flying, not so much in the advanced stuff like IFR and I have not had the benefit of advanced engineering degrees but I have never bent an airplane even after doing air show stuff for seven years.
how about she wasn't ready for "prime time"... she could not execute simple piloting skill in demanding circumstances... the description of all events demonstrate that she was overwhelmed by the situation, each new circumstance was beyond the limits of her capability... indicate that her instruction was not demanding enough... had she been grilled like Bob in his training she would be with us today
I used to own a Cirrus and 13G18 at 090 and landing 35 is a nasty little x-wind (I think POH is maximum demonstrated of 20 x-wind). If you already had to go around (twice?) and are being asked to fly a tight pattern, it's easy to overshoot the final and hard to get a crab angle stabilized and also easy to cross-control when not lined up. I bet this pilot was very nervous and afraid to tell controllers she was in trouble - easy to say, but a better call might have been to go to another nice and easy little rural airport, maybe with at least a 13-31 runway to take out some x-wind and also have lots or room to fly a big pattern with a nice long final to get comfortable with the line-up and inputs. I'll also add that slips and crosswind control inputs have always been counterintuitive to me after getting "fly coordinated" pounded into me. A slip is a purposeful BIG cross-control with nose down to keep up speed and the same thing over the runway with a crosswind to keep upwind wing low but nose straight. Both feel wrong in comparison to coordinated flight and I have to think about them every time. Finally, it's real easy to say practice cross-wind landings, but how many folks really do it, especially in gusty conditions. If it is ever close to personal minimums I just don't fly and it can be hard to get a good instructor in the cockpit on shorter notice if winds are marginal. Such a tragedy.
Oh and I will add that flight training in a Cirrus by definition does not include any spins or accelerated stalls - it's not certified to recover from a spin. I have done spin training myself, but lots of GA pilots do not. This was not a simple landing for even a good pilot with those x-winds, at least IMO (I am a lowly under 300 hour pilot, but fly tailwheel exclusively these days)
Good points. I was taught, on challenging xwind landings, to fly just above the runway and see if you can hold the centerline. Most runways are long enough that (my home airport is 5500 feet), if the centerline alignment is working okay, to go ahead and land. Otherwise, do a go-around and depart for a nearby alternative airport that is lined up better with that day's wind direction. I tell the tower (or the CTAF) what my plan is before doing it. No reason to force a xwind landing if it is above your skill level. .
I also think she was reluctant to tell the tower that she was in trouble in front of her husband, etc. Tragic. Fatal. So if a Cirrus spins is it done? Nothing to do but fire the chute?
Mr P... I wasn't making any comment on your training or skill set, my comments where purely about the crash victim Well said.... best runway for those winds would have been 12.. not sure if they weren't in use or not an option. But I would have asked for it. Working out cross wind component is ( for me at least) very hard on the fly ( no pun intended), especially with ATC yammering in my ear, I absolutely rely on foreflight and my sportys E6b app on my phone at a quick glance I've instantly got my crosswind/headwind wind component and its then up to me to decide if its above my limits. I have absolutely once or twice not felt comfortable and asked for another runway assignment if available. ATC have always been accommodating where possible. Like you I'm a low time pilot, so once every few weeks i'll fly myself up to Fox Field or Mojave just to get in a few gusty cross wind approaches, (surprising how helpful mother nature is in the high desert.) adding a couple of kts of x-wind component each time, always ready for a go around but slowly increasing a skill set that I might have to use one day when there is no other option.
I continuously recommend all pilots take aerobatic training, especially new pilots and recurrent for long time pilots... not to fly aerobatics, rather an excellent way to hone ones skills in piloting a airplane... it removes the "white knuckle" piloting in unsettled weather by building confidence in ones piloting skills...
The "in a tailwind" part is what vexes... Your airplane, whether a piper cub, F-16, or 747 just doesn't have any clue that it's flying through an airmass traveling across the ground in any direction relative to the direction the plane is flying. It makes no difference. When on crosswind leg at one knot above stall I can add power, bank, and backstick to turn downwind all at one knot above stall (increasing speed a bit because we know stall speed increases based in g load) and my airplane won't give a hoot that I just turned downwind. There is no such effect as taking away some of the forward speed of the air as we turn downwind.
