There haven’t
been any earth shaking stories to discuss so I am going to just deal with the “everyday
mundane” issues out there.
Some of what
follows will be rather a bit of rehash. Recently as well as in the past I have
written about mundane things as gear up landings, taxiing off the runway or
crashing for no apparent reason. I don’t mean to be blasé about accidents,
people getting hurt, even dying. But, It seems that all I am reading on the FAA
Preliminary Accident and Incident Reports is just about all of the above. Just
look at the data presented on 4/22/14.
Don’t believe me? Here
goes a synopsis from today’s FAA report:
C-172 lands short in the grass and flips over
Cirrus SR-20 Landing at Sanford Int’l Apt went off side
of runway and through a ditch
C-210
Struck the prop on landing (we’ve discussed that too)
Pa-18 On landing went off the runway into the trees at
smaller county airport
Champion –on landing went off the runway and gear
collapsed
Pa-24 Gear up landing and struck
prop
I don’t
remember ever having trouble keeping the plane on the taxiway or runway. Now in
a high wind, especially a cross wind, while piloting a light plane like a Pa-!8
or a Cessna 150, one might get challenged. We’ve discussed gear up landings,
and how best to avoid them several times. Still it seems to be one of the main
errors occurring every week. Please don’t think I am trying to make light of
serious problems that occur, such as icing, engine failure, heavy IFR etc.
So what’s
the answer to all these rather senseless and probably avoidable accidents? The
principle one is to have had good instruction and to pay attention to what you
are doing and Practice, Practice and Practice.
Till next
time.
