Sea Fury incident UK, pilot OK

[flightsimer]

The eye may be deceiving but in this earlier video the pilot appears to have popped the gear in the turn on to finals.

http://www.itv.com/news/westcountry/upd ... -culdrose/

There is a small gap not covered by the two videos where it appears the pilot has retracted the gear, possibly to extend the glide.

Not speculating...just observing.

PeterA

Your observation of the gear being out is right on.

One of the new cast video posted here said that a hyd. Failure may have occurred. And in the videos of the landing, you can see neither mains are locked down as they both moved within their swing motion on touchdown, but since the right collapsed first, it prevent the left from collapsing until a yaw force was applied.

Not familiar with that plane's L/G system. Does it have a hydro-mechanical up lock/down lock system? Wondering if once the L/G is down, there is a mechanical lock to keep in place until hydraulically released to retract back up??

I am not either, but wiki does say it has an 1800psi hydraulic system powered by an engine driven pump with a hand pump as back up to power the gear, flaps and tail hook. And based off of the way the gear moves throughout the entire incident, I would say it has a hydro down lock and not a mechanical one. But I'm sure someone here knows for sure what it has and hopefully they can shed some light.

This is just a complete guess, based off my viewing of the videos and assuming the above is true.

If it lost engine power, which to me it looked like it had as the props seem to be turning as if they were just windmilling at a low pitch (to extend glide)... And if the gear had been lowered once and then raised for whatever reason as well as lowering the flaps, upon lowering the gear again, the pressure in the system may not have been enough to create a positive lock. And since he was so low to the ground already, he did not have the time to hand pump the gear into the locked position.

Just my WAG

Either way, he did a hell of a job getting the plane down safely and in one piece to be rebuilt again!

[Ken]

In the U.S. with the american style of teaching the proper method is to keep the aircraft in the clean configuration until making the landing point is assured. This gives your best L/D. at the point of being too high, then drop the gear. DOn't use hydraulic pressure on flaps or other items or there may not be enough pressure to lower the gear. Gear down "Are you still going to make your landing spot?" Check airspeed and wait until again you think you are going to overshoot, then lower flaps and point the nose down. Last, open the canopy for more drag and quick egress after touchdown.
I have had 3 deadstick landings in single engine aircraft and one propellor failure and each time, by following the above principles, and the grace of God, I made it back to the runway.
Last tip, When the engine quits, point the aircraft straight towards the runway. You will probably come up short on airspeed and altitude so don't do the textbook downwind, base etc. Straight to the landing zone and if you have the luxury of too much airspeed or altitude, then you can slip, drop flaps, etc.
Kudos to this pilot for getting the aircraft down and easily repairable. Also, one reason why you might have to throw in the flaps early is if you have a stiff crosswind or headwind turning into a tailwind, you may not be able to make the radius of turn and airspeed required to have a successful outcome. Throwing in flaps is your last option to tighten that radius of turn and avoid a stall/ spin. Many folks have been killed from a couple hundred feet AGL stomping on a rudder trying to make the base to final and then it spinning on them.

I think that is a well-written summary right there. Complications in a large, complex taildragger include wanting to land gear up if there's a chance the landing will be off-airport (so as not to flip). Looks like this Sea Fury pilot did the best he could with the situation he had and, most importantly, he walked away.

Ken

[DH82EH]

Pilot's account thus.

'' We were displaying at Culdrose just before the Sea Fury and had just landed and were watching it and spoke to the pilot afterwards.. we also bought him a beer.

He felt the engine go rough during his display so he closed the throttle, climbed and put the gear down. He put out a PAN call. Then as he headed for the runway he opened the throttle and nothing happened.

He then realised he wasn't going to make the runway so he raised the gear to improve the glide. He made it to the threshold and then put the gear down. Both wheels made it down and he landed on them right at the numbers. Unfortunately the right gear hadn't had time to lock and it collapsed on roll-out. which caused the right wing to hit the runway. This then made it slew round and it was then going sideways which caused the left gear to fail. It then went off onto the grass and stopped. The pilot go out unaided.

It was a fantastic piece of airmanship. Having the presence of mind raise the gear and then lower it saved it from being a much more serious incident.


I lifted the above quote from the "Key" forum.

As was pointed out, coming up short would be far more serious in this type of aircraft. Great aviating, so glad no one was hurt.

Andy

[TAdan]

Nice article about the incident. Exemplary airmanship saves Sea Fury.

http://www.fnht.co.uk/exemplary-airmans ... -fury.html

[marine air]

One thing that is impressive was ability to go from low level aerobatics to emergency procedures where there was very little time and altitude to think about it. He successfully switched gears to getting the airplane right side up, and pointed to a safe place to put down. Great airmanship and the airplane will fly again.