Oh, Deer (Part 1)

ByAndrew Robinson

As far as I knew when I woke up, October 26, 2016 would be an ordinary day for me. It was a Wednesday, and I was scheduled to fly our Company’s BE58 Baron on a charter from Wings Field (KLOM), a non-towered airport just north of Philadelphia, to Pittsburgh International Airport (KPIT) and spend the day there waiting for my 3 passengers to finish up their meetings. The plan was to fly them back to Wings that evening and then make the short hop back to home base at Lancaster, PA. (KLNS).

It was a flight that I had done countless times, and I was comfortable with the airports, the passengers, and the airplane. Everything went smoothly that morning and my short flight from Lancaster to Wings was uneventful. I even made it there in time to spill coffee all down the front of my pants before my passengers arrived. The weather was clear, calm and beautiful as we loaded into the Baron and the sun was just starting to come up as I taxied toward runway 24 for departure. I was departing VFR and had an IFR plan on file which I intended to pick up with Harrisburg Approach once we were airborne. According to my calculations, I was on schedule to be drinking my coffee at the Pittsburgh FBO right around 8:30.

At 7:05, I advanced the throttles for departure. A few moments later, I received a very unpleasant surprise. I was quickly approaching rotation speed when 2 deer ran onto the runway directly in front of the aircraft. It was still dark enough that I was relying on my landing/ taxi lights to illuminate the runway for take-off.  As a result, I was unable to see the animals before it was too late. I don’t remember making a conscious decision to pull back on the yoke, but it was that or plow directly into them at about 85 knots. I pulled up as quickly as I could and the airplane rotated immediately.  A fraction of a second later I heard and felt a sickening THUD.

There was no doubt that I had hit one of them, but, somewhat unbelievably, the airplane was climbing as though nothing had happened. I put the nose down to get the airspeed back up and began to try and piece together what damage the airplane had sustained. Based on the noise and the feeling of the impact, my suspicion was that I had hit the deer with the left main landing gear. A review of the instrumentation showed no abnormalities and the airplane was behaving normally, so I didn’t suspect any damage to the airframe/ flight controls. I couldn’t see anything out the windows that looked unusual, and somewhat unbelievably I still had 3 green lights.

After gaining a safe amount of speed and altitude, I turned around and told the passengers that we had hit a deer. It was obvious that we had hit something and I was sure that they wanted to know what was going on. Then, I checked all my indications again and satisfied with what I was seeing, tried to bring up the landing gear. No dice. When I pulled the gear lever to the up position, the master “GEAR UP” warning light came on and I got a horn. There was never any change in the 3-green indication and the gear motor never came to life at all.

At this point it was obvious that, minimally I was going to have to divert to Lancaster and have the maintenance guys look at the airplane to see if anything was broken. I figured that they would either give me the green light to continue or I would just jump into one of our PC12s and complete the trip while they worked on the Baron.

The landing gear’s refusal to come up was my first indication that there was substantial damage. I set course for Lancaster and called our Chief Pilot. After explaining the situation to him, we agreed that KLNS was the best option and that he would let the maintenance guys know that I was coming.

The logic was that proceeding to Lancaster would allow a visual check of the landing gear by maintenance people as well as the tower and result in the safest outcome if an emergency landing were required. Lancaster would likely have better services available in terms of emergency responders and, not to mention, I was fairly certain that there was a dead deer on the only runway at Wings that I didn’t feel like hitting for a second time. In addition, the relatively long runway at Lancaster combined with light traffic at that time of day made it the ideal option to divert to.

I again turned around to brief the passengers. I told them that we were going to have to make precautionary landing before continuing to our intended destination and that I would be performing a few low passes for the tower.

Due to the drag from the landing gear, the flight to Lancaster seemed to take forever. The long cruise home, however, gave me time to try and reach someone on the ground at Wings in hope of having the runway inspected and cleaned off before other traffic tried to use it. After several attempts to raise anyone on the Unicom/ CTAF frequency, I called Philadelphia Approach for help instead. Philly answered right away and I explained to them what had happened. I requested that they call over to Wings on the phone or send someone out to check the runway. They told me that they would get it done and asked if there was any other way that they could assist me. I told them I was headed to Lancaster and that I appreciated their offer, but didn’t require any further assistance. I then switched over to Lancaster Tower and let them know that I was about 15-20 minutes out, but I would need to perform a couple of passes to have them check my gear. The tower cleared me for a low approach over runway 26.

I arrived at LNS at about 7:30. I performed my first low pass by the tower, not really expecting anything to appear out of place. I figured I had bent something or damaged the squat switch, but not much more. I climbed to pattern altitude and awaited the good word. Shortly after the fly-by, Tower reported that the left main gear didn’t appear to be down and locked. They suggested that I make another pass. The airport maintenance personnel chimed in, reporting the same. We had just started discussing whether cranking the gear a little by hand might help when Philly approach called the Lancaster tower on the phone.

Philly informed Lancaster that someone had inspected the runway at Wings and found the left main strut and wheel in the grass. I quickly concluded that cranking the gear down probably wouldn’t help!

This was found in the grass by the runway at Wings Field

To Be Continued…

(Read Part 2 Here)

Andrew Robinson is an airline pilot for Piedmont Airlines.  He is a former 135 Charter Pilot and flight instructor who lives with his wife and 2 daughters in Pennsylvania.  He instructs in Beechcraft Bonanzas.

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    ByHank Gibson

    When is the last time you talked to the Flight Service Station?

    Believe it or not, FSS is still in existence.  Over the past 10 years, they went from FAA run, the being bought by Lockheed Martin, to now being privately run by a company called Leidos. 1-800-WX Brief will get you connected with a weather briefer, but you’ll hear “Leidos Flight Service Station” now when the briefer picks up.

    Since the advent of Foreflight, most pilots these days get their weather briefings digitally on the iPad. Foreflight has come a long way since it’s inception.  The briefing part of their Flights page is quite comprehensive, with lots of information, and counts as a legal weather briefing (which pilots are still required to get before a flight).

    Why does a pilot even need to call Flight Service?  Well, when’s the last time you tried to interpret everything the Briefing on Foreflight told you?  As I said before, it’s a lot of information and a lot of it can be confusing.  Pilots are not fully trained on interpreting Prog Charts and getting an overall weather picture for a flight.  A weather briefer is.

    I have over 5,000 hours and I still call a weather briefer before almost every flight.  On the way to the airport is a great opportunity to get a weather briefing.  I get a great picture of what’s going on in my area or over my route, frontal movement, bad weather areas, and whether or not it’s a good idea to even take off. Calling in the car alleviates the main complaint I hear about calling the Flight Service Station, which is it’s inconvenient and causes a delay since you have to call them on the phone.

    I don’t do much private pilot training anymore, but when I do, I always teach my students how to get a weather briefing from the Flight Service Station.  I’ll show them how to get the briefing on Foreflight too, but usually their eyes bug out of their heads when they start trying to read everything.  A breathe of relief is released when I tell them there is a trained professional just a phone call away who can clear everything up.

    The other thing that the Flight Service Station provides that is important to a lot of folks are PIREPs.  It’s vital in sketchy weather areas for the FSS to get a report of what’s actually going on in the air.  This helps other pilots out greatly as they are getting information about icing, cloud bases and tops, turbulence and a myriad of other things from airplanes who are actually in the conditions.

    Finally, the most used portion of the Flight Service Station is the Clearance Delivery line (888-766-8267). At airports without a tower or a clearance delivery frequency, with IFR conditions present, the only way to get your IFR clearance is to call Clearance Delivery.  Yes, it can take a little time sometimes, but you will get a clearance every time, unlike taking off and trying to dodge the clouds without hitting anything, while trying to call Center on the radio (which isn’t safe or legal).

    Been a while since you’ve talked to the Flight Service Station?  Give them a call, either on the phone or on the radio.  Odds are, they are bored and just wanting someone to talk to, just like you are on that long cross country flight!

    Checkout 1800WXBrief.com to see all the cool stuff the Flight Service Station does.

  • Cirrus SR22 Partnership in Houston

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    Ever wanted to be a Cirrus owner, but the economics of being a single owner just don’t make sense for you? If you’re in the Houston area, you now have a chance to join a Cirrus SR22 partnership at the West Houston Airport, KIWS.

    The group, CirrusShare, is a 4 member group, but one of the members is looking to sell his share.  The airplane is a 2007 G3 SR22.  It is in excellent condition, with dual WAAS 430s and air conditioning.

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  • The Piper Saratoga Turbo

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    The 6 seat Turbo Saratoga is a very comfortable, very capable flying machine.  It is made for hauling, with a gross weight of 3,600 pounds, but that’s not to say it isn’t lacking in comfort, either.  The rear cabin has 4 seats, 2 facing forward and 2 facing rear.  It would be a little tight for 4 full size adults in the back seat.  To avoid knee knocking, the plane is an excellent 4 person and bags aircraft (or 4 adults and 2 kids).

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    Piper Saratoga Inside

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    The air conditioning works very nicely, though it did have a tendency to freeze up at altitude.  We discovered that quickly and just decided to turn it off and leave the blower on, since it was cool enough up high anyway.

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  • Setting Standards

    ByCharlie Precourt

    Type Clubs Lead By Example with Standard Operating Practices

    This article appeared in the May 2019 edition of EAA’s Sport Aviation Magazine. It is used with permission. For other articles by Charlie Precourt, please visit EAA.org and join for a full subscription.

    Imagine a year when there are no fatal accidents in general aviation. Does that seem impossible? The airlines achieved that many years ago, and so can we if we focus on the right things in our safety pro- grams. In fact, the overall trend in GA accident rates over the last few years is very encouraging. AOPA’s Air Safety Institute published its annual GA Accident Scorecard recently (see www.EAA.org/ extras), revealing fatal accidents from 2008 to 2017 are down more than 30 percent. Nevertheless, there were 185 fatal accidents in 2017, so we still have a long way to go. But, there are many developments in safety programs across GA that can keep the trend going.

    One such development that I’ve advocated through a couple of type clubs is establishing standard operating practices (SOP). When I flew for both the U.S. Air Force and NASA, we had what we called standard operating procedures. They were the law for our flying. That is, we had to follow them procedurally because the folks that paid our salaries said so. The objective was to ensure we all used the same playbook, minimizing the risk that one of us might develop a bad in-flight habit that increased risk to the organization.

    One way to think about SOPs is to recognize the difference between procedure and technique. For example, you have to follow the manufacturer’s pilot’s operating handbook (procedure)where it says to lower the landing gear before landing. If you don’t, you are in for a bad day. However, it does not tell you exactly when to lower the gear; that’s left to technique.

    In the middle, between procedure and technique, is a best practice. In this example, lowering the gear just before the final approach fix is a “standard practice.” It is the generally accepted “best” place to lower the gear. In GA, however, aircraft owners don’t generally answer to a boss, so I prefer the term practices instead of procedures.

    However, whether or not someone is paying us to fly, following best practices just makes sense. If you have a good set of practices, they enable you to do things the same way every time, leaving lots of brain cells to manage the unusual, the things that might go wrong. The safest approach to accomplishing a flight task is one that leverages consistency. On the other hand, if you are inconsistent, doing flight tasks differently each time, you’ll always be struggling to keep up. So, in my involvement with the safety committees for both the Malibu Mirage Owners and Pilots Association and the Citation Jet Pilots Association, there has been broad acceptance of recently developed standard operating practices.

    The good news in this development is that a culture of safety is growing broadly across most sectors of GA through these type club initiatives. Perhaps more importantly, there is much to learn from each other about the effectiveness of these various initiatives. EAA has seen a four-year drop of 47 percent in fatal accidents among homebuilts! So, there must be something right going on there — a major focus on appropriate transition training before flying a new homebuilt (as a standard operating practice) is paying off.

    So, what is covered in the SOPs these type clubs have developed? The following outlines the kinds of standard practices other type clubs have set up and represent SOPs you could establish for yourself regardless of the type of aircraft you fly. You just have to fill in the blanks for your particular type and commit to sticking to them in your flying. These are notional and are practices (not mandatory procedures). They don’t tell you how to fly your aircraft; they give you things to think about when you do. If you take a bit of time to set your own SOPs and then stick with them, you’ll be a far safer pilot. Here are some ideas:

    Duty Day

    Set the maximum number of hours of flight time during a calendar day and rest hours off between flying days. One example is a maximum of eight hours in the air and a minimum of 10 hours off until flying again.

    Cargo

    Establish best practices for what you will carry as cargo. One example is no lithium batteries in the baggage compartment.

    Flight Planning and Preparation

    What are your limitations for the types of flight you’ll take on? Consider SOPs such as designating a suitable alternate airport for all flights. Another might be for first flights after significant maintenance, such as no flight at night or in IMC until a day-VMC functional check flight has been done.

    Runway Field Length Guidelines

    Establish an appropriate minimum field length for your aircraft and commit to not going into shorter fields. Consider sea level operations and high-altitude airports as well.

    Surface Operations

    What should be your maximum wind conditions for taxi, takeoff, or landing? Maximum acceptable crosswinds on landing? Set them in your SOP and stick to them.

    En Route

    Consider establishing practices like no non-operationally necessary conversation below 10,000 feet MSL, during any segment of an approach procedure, or during the last 1,000 feet before leveloff during climb or descent. Also consider declaring “minimum fuel” when the fuel state becomes less than fuel to destination plus 45 minutes at current burn, even if flying day VFR.

    Approach and Landing

    Consider establishing personal minimums in your SOPs for things like visual approaches. Perhaps use a 1,500-foot ceiling and 3 miles’ visibility for day and 5 miles for night, even though these exceed the FAA’s requirements.

    Pilot Limitations, Training, & Currency

    FAR Part 91 rules allow us to fly with pretty marginal levels of currency. Consider setting your own SOP to something more appropriate for the kind of aircraft you fly and the kind of flying you do in it. For example, consider these ideas as SOPs:

    • If you have less than 100 hours of time-in-type or have not flown at least 15 hours as pilot in command in the last 90 days, use a minimum planned fuel reserve of one hour.
    • Also, if flying IFR in this situation, use a minimum visibility for takeoff of 1 mile.
    • On instrument approaches, increase the published minimums by one- half mile visibility and add 200 feet to the decision altitude or minimum descent altitude.
    • Perform landings at a weight that allows a full stop in 60 percent of available runway length.
    • Consider an SOP that establishes you will fly with a CFI on a refresher flight before flying as pilot in command if you have not logged at least an hour of flight time and one takeoff and landing in an aircraft of the same type within the preceding 45 days.

    Maneuver Standards

    Wherever there are “techniques” associated with things like takeoffs and climbs, cruise, use of autopilot, power settings, and approaches and landings, you can write down your preferred technique as your own SOP. Describe each maneuver in enough detail (speeds, altitudes, power settings, configurations, etc.) to define a routine you will use each time. This ensures you fly consistently each flight and leverage the power of the standard operating practice, that is, to give you the bandwidth you need should you encounter an unexpected event or an emergency.

    SOPs are among the exciting concepts underway to make safety programs work for us. Hats off to type clubs like MMOPA and CJP and many others that are taking the initiative. But even if you’re not in this kind of group, you can still set up your own SOPs. Let’s all look forward to our first year in GA without a fatal accident — and let’s make it soon!
    Fly safe!

    Charlie Precourt is a former NASA chief astronaut, space shuttle commander, and Air Force test pilot. He built a VariEze, owns a Piper JetPROP, and is a member of the EAA board of directors.

  • Fly Away Destination: Lajitas Golf Resort

    ByHank Gibson

    Talk about star treatment.  The Lajitas Golf Resort rolled out the red carpet for the 2019 Texas Top Aviation Lajitas Fly In.  I had been to Lajitas twice before; once in July when it was hot, miserable and bumpy.  The second time was the week before our Fly In.  Both times, everyone from the airport folks to the bus drivers to the front desk and restaurant staff were top notch.  It made for a very pleasurable experience.

    If you haven’t been out to Lajitas (or don’t even know where it is) and you’re a pilot (you don’t even have to play golf), you have missed a sure gem.  Lajitas is positioned on the southern tip of the Big Bend area of Texas, right on the Rio Grande river.  Lajitas has great lodging with several different room options from big to small, an excellent restaurant for 3 square a day (and even a bakery for sweets, coffee, and breakfast tacos in the mornings), and a 5 star golf course in Black Jack Crossing.

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    The resort and airport are so far south, radar and radio coverage with Albuquerque Center is pretty poor below about 15,000 feet, and non-existent below 10,000 feet.  This isn’t a big concern as any airplanes in the area should be on 122.9 and the airport manager will make contact with you, give you a weather report, and assign a runway.

    Once you are on the ground, there will be a resort bus waiting to whisk you and all your friends to the resort for your getaway.

    The 2019 Texas Top Aviation Lajitas Fly In was a big hit.  We had 7 airplanes total:  5 Cirrus SR22s, 1 Piper Matrix, and 1 Citation M2.  There were 15 attendees total, including 13 golfers.  Everyone raved about the resort and the golf course.  The only hiccup in the weekend was the cold front that blasted through on Friday afternoon, kicking up a lot of dust.  Golfing on Saturday was windy too, but Sunday morning was absolutely perfect.

    Thanks again to the folks at Lajitas for the star treatment!

    Go to top

    Interested in participating in the next Texas Top Aviation Fly In?  Contact Us or Sign Up for Our Newsletter and we will make sure you find out about the next one so you don’t miss out!

  • That Pesky Rudder

    ByHank Gibson

    Whenever I get in an airplane with a pilot for recurrent training, I can assure myself that I will mention rudder usage more than once during the flight.  If it is in a tailwheel (or if the pilot is doing tailwheel training), I’m going to mention the rudder a lot.  How do I know this?  Because basic rudder skills are actually one of the most difficult things to master in flying.

    Let’s start simple.  What does the rudder do?  The dictionary definition is it controls the movement about the vertical axis of the airplane.  If you stick a pole down through the CG of the airplane and rotate the airplane around that pole, this is the vertical axis.  Looking at it another way, the rudder moves the airplane’s nose left and right.  Keep this in mind as we move on.

    Rudder

    Every pilot thinks about the rudder during the takeoff roll.  Because of the torque effect, the pilot must add right rudder during the takeoff roll to stay on the runway centerline.  Depending on the airplane’s horsepower, more rudder pressure is needed in higher powered airplanes.  The problem usually shows up once the airplane gets in the air.

    In the worst situation, after takeoff, the pilot will set both feet on the floor and completely disregard the rudder.  Torque effect and now P-factor are continuing to cause the airplane to yaw left, causing the need for right rudder.  With his feet on the floor, though, the pilot is allowing the airplane to yaw.  It’s not terribly noticeable for him in the front seat, but the back seat passengers (especially in a six seat or larger airplane) are certainly feeling it.

    One particular problem spot on the climb is the climbing left turn.  In a climbing left turn, training says to add left rudder since it is a left turn (see below for the reasoning).  But, since the airplane is climbing and therefore experiencing left yawing tendencies due to the aforementioned effects, the pilot needs to continue pressing the right rudder, though the pressure won’t be as much as in a straight climb.  Watch the ball the next time you make a climbing left hand turn and it’ll make a believer out of you.

    I find only a handful of pilots are this egregious.  Most pilots have rudder problems in turns and in turbulence.  We’ll tackle turns first.  As we all learned when we first started flying, due to adverse yaw, a pilot must add rudder in the turn’s direction.  Again, this isn’t usually where the problem shows up.  During the rollout is the problem area.

    Let’s take a turn to the left.  The pilot rolls in, adding left rudder, arrives at his heading, then begins to roll out with the ailerons.  Left adverse yaw is now being experienced and right rudder is needed to smoothly transition back to level flight.  Need some visual assistance?  Watch the nose the next time you make a turn. If you are working the rudder properly, the nose will pivot on one point in the horizon.  If you aren’t using the rudder properly, the nose will draw a U shape on the horizon.  Try making some turns without rudder, see what it looks like, then use the rudder properly.  You’ll notice a big difference.

    Finally, let’s talk turbulence.  As we all know, turbulence in the hot summer afternoon is quite pronounced. When the airplane experiences a bump, it usually doesn’t bounce straight up in the air.  There is usually some kind of rolling motion involved.  As the pilot corrects this rolling motion by moving the ailerons, adverse yaw is experienced (just like rolling into and out of a turn that we talked about above), so rudder is needed.  There isn’t a need to stomp on the rudder or you’ll cause the airplane to severely yaw in the other direction, but rudder pressure is needed.

    Final approach is where this gets most pilots.  By controlling the nose and not allowing it to move around on final by using the rudder, this will make your approaches a little more stabilized leading to a more successful landing.

    Feeling lost when it comes to the rudder?  Ask your instructor the next time you go fly to do some rudder exercises.  Most instructors don’t emphasize these basic stick and rudder skills which leaves pilots lacking as they move on in their aviation lives.  So make it a point to do some basic rudder work the next time you fly with your instructor.

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