Mailing List lml@lancaironline.net Message #49092
From: <lalcorn@natca.net>
Sender: <marv@lancaironline.net>
Subject: Re: Stalls [LML]
Date: Sun, 05 Oct 2008 16:41:27 -0400
To: <lml@lancaironline.net>
I would like to add to this discussion on stalls and slow flight handling of aircraft.  One thing I see discussed by pilots is that, they do not need to practice stalls or slow flight because they know the speeds and simply stay faster than those speeds close to the "slow realm" of flight, which I would infer is also the region of reverse command and just above.  This is a great safety idea in ideal conditions, your familiar airport, standard traffic patterns, no controllers, etc.  Unfortunately real flight is nothing like this.  One good example is bird avoidance.  The proper method of avoiding birds is to climb and turn, since birds will typically dive away.  So you are on a downwind, gear extended, flaps slightly out, and there is a 10lb turkey vulture and you pull and turn.  Sounds close to an accelerated stall, doesn't it.  If you do not know what your plane feels like at slower speeds, how will you know how hard to pull or when to recover.  Add this during a base to final, and you have a stall spin accident.  How many of these accelerated stall base to final crashes have happened in the last year alone?  Next example is when you add those pesky controllers trying to fit your 120 knot aircraft behind a 150 in the downwind at an airport with a 3500 foot runway.  They ask you to slow, you do the best you can, but still eating this guys lunch.  Your busy configuring etc, then the tower controller sees its not going to work and orders a go around when you are crossing the threshold with full flaps and gear hanging out, starting to round out.  Do not think they won't do that either.  Especially with the new generation of controllers being hired off the street, many are not familiar with aircraft characteristics and are only concerned about having an error.  How many of the "don't practice slow flight/stalls" practice full landing configured go-arounds at high rates of descent.  Again, knowing your aircraft's slow handling characteristics might help here.

How about wind shear?  I've been in clear VFR days in florida and catch the outflow from a storm 20 miles away while in the downwind and loose 25 knots in an instant with a nice downdraft.  What is your natural instinct when you encounter a large sink close to the ground?  Pull back now that you are only 6 knots above stall?

I could go on and on with examples, but just things to think about.

Previously stated "The initial training for a Lancair needs to include exposure to the stall to assess the speed at which it is likely to occur. That assessed, continued testing of that seems superfluous given the mind set should be clearly engraved to avoid the area whereby such a condition of flight occurs". How can you simply avoid these regions of flight given the examples I have just stated?

Luke Alcorn



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