Thread: "Biggles" deliberately lands CT up a tree!!

original title truncated, "Biggles" deliberately lands CT up a tree on a golf course!!

try this for size:
http://www.eveningtelegraph.co.uk/outpu ... 806t0.shtm
also video interview with pilot:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/scot ... 198268.stm
excellent discussion here:
http://www.pprune.org/private-flying/38 ... undee.html

use maps to find crash location: Caird Park Golf Course, Dundee, Scotland

the hoary old question of co-ordinated flying, especially in turns on low fuel, features strongly in the story.

All human life is here!

He says he had 1/2 hour of fuel remaining. This may be legal but not very smart. That's about 2.5 gallons max. I wouldn't do that just like I would not have operated my C-182 with only 6 gallons remaining. I guess you learn these things with years of experience. I know I did after scaring the c#@p out of myself in my early years!

If you let it get that low and fly out of trim just enough you can slosh your 2.5 gals to the out board end of the wing and run dry. Very poor thinking on his part. With a possible 34 gal total, letting it get low is just asking for trouble.
Why would anyone fly with that little fuel and push the limits? So dodging out on spending $20-$60 on fuel cost him how many ten's of thousands of dollars, not to mention world wide fame.

Besides, it looks like you can fly from one end of England to the other with one fillup and plenty of reserve.

Originally Posted by Roger Lee

If you let it get that low and fly out of trim just enough you can slosh your 2.5 gals to the out board end of the wing and run dry. Very poor thinking on his part. With a possible 34 gal total, letting it get low is just asking for trouble.
Why would anyone fly with that little fuel and push the limits? So dodging out on spending $20-$60 on fuel cost him how many ten's of thousands of dollars, not to mention world wide fame.

From the links posted it seems that what actually happened was he diverted from his intended destination when he realized he had less fuel than planned, but felt safe because he had at least 1/2 hour of fuel left, but then discovered on his own that it was possible to starve the engine by sloshing the fuel out board.

In the US when in contact with ATC, and declaring an emergency, one is supposed to declare the amount of fuel remaining. Assuming he did something like that, it would appear that neither he or ATC would have known that 1/2 hour was really zero due to the possibility of sloshing fuel out board.

In the Cessna 182, the POH clearly states that letting the fuel get below 1/4 tank invites the possibility of fuel starvation, but the CT equivalent does not say anything about this possibility or at what low level the danger is present.

In fairness to the inexperienced pilot, he was unawre that some planes have the danger of fuel starvation by sloshing out board, even when the tanks have fuel left.

I dont agree with his drastic suggestion that the planes be grounded, but I do think that this particular danger should be included in the CT equivalent of the POH, just as Cessna carefully documents in their 182 POH.

I would be willing to bet that he is not the only CT owner who is unaware of this danger, based on looking over the many posts on this excellent forum on similar incidents.

OK Guys, what's the real range? FD say 2000km/1080 nm @ 97kts and 12l/hr (3.2USG)
how far would you plan on travelling? I hesitate to answer!

We have talked about this very issue many times here on the forum and uneven fuel flow is also posted on the FD website. This is not the only aircraft that you can do this with. No pilot should be down to 2.5 gals in an aircraft that can carry 34 gals or try to push the low fuel limit. When you get this low you are playing Russian Roulette with 4 shots in the gun with a six shot revolver. Since aviation began there are thousands of aircraft that have crashed for this very reason. Why wouldn't someone learn from a hundred years of low fuel crash history. It is also taught not to do this in flight school. Even if it wasn't possible to move fuel outboard you should never push the low fuel envelope because the consequences is a damaged $100K-$140K aircraft for a couple of gals of fuel. I know he had to be within an airport range within the last two hours of his flight or he didn't bother to fuel before he left home, either way it was pilot error.
Safety points. If you can't see fuel in the site tubes you should already be on the ground. Fill up after every 5 hrs of flight. Even if you burned as much as 6 gals. an hour and you carried a total of 34 gals this would give you 5.6 hours and at 5 gals an hour it is 6.8 hours of flight time. I figure 5 gals an hr on cross country's and that is based on my plane and cruise rpm and has a solid foundation with 445 hrs of flight time. This can and will differ for each pilot depending on his engine rpm and prop pitch and not his speed. All bets are off when flying full throttle for an entire trip or low rpm. Then everything changes.

I am not trying to make this person feel any worse because I know he already feels terrible, but my point to all this is to not have anyone else do the same thing. It just isn't necessary. I had my crash a long time ago so I know how he feels. All you can do is pick yourself up, dust yourself off and say I'll be better and smarter next time.

Originally Posted by navygolf

... that 1/2 hour was really zero due to the possibility of sloshing fuel out board...

when very low fuel in your ct,

Rule #1: land and get fuel now
Rule #2: (useful when rule #1 is not) If you can see fuel you have fuel available.

think about rule #2 it comes into play once you can no longer see fuel in 1 wing but can still see fuel in the other. at this point, if you have altitude, use your rudder to put empty wing forward, in this configuration you can confirm that the wing is empty. if not empty with your rudder move your ball towards wing that shows fuel, this will balance your flow.

othewise if your 1 wing is empty or near empty move your ball towards it so that you can see fuel in the other wing. if you can see it in the sight gauge it is available and not sloshed outboard.

the next thing to remember is that a crosswind approach can force you to slosh outboard, so watch the sight gauge, crab the approach if you need to.

Originally Posted by Roger Lee

... All bets are off when flying full throttle for an entire trip or low rpm. Then everything changes...

roger,

most of my flights are wot except for descents, getting a close look, maneuvering and patterns. many flights are wot from take off till descent for destination. granted my cruise altitude tends to be 10,000' MSL but i do burn less then 6gph.

its possible i burn closer to 5 but my fuel station doesn't have a meter, and my ct doesn't have a flow meter so my fuel burn is a bit of a guestimate.

my feeling is that the self leaning carbs work to a good extent and keep my fuel flow down at 10,000' where less then 70% power is available.

Hi Charlie Tango
My FE, a Delta retiree, told me the same in fewer words but your version especially in relation to a crosswind landing on low fuel is fleshed out the best. Essentially he said fly one wing low on alternate sides to extract the last drops of the get you home stuff.
To fly true is hard work in mine, but if I pay enough attention I can land with good equality in the tanks. The reason I say it is hard work is, I think, that I am fly off design speed at which the slipstream and rudder conspire to keep the plane in line. Wish I had rudder trim.

Say you are flying straight. Try this as an aide-memoire: "PUSH TO EMPTY". if you have too much fuel in the left tank, push the left pedal to fling it into the right tank. The right aileron required also helps. You then see the ball on the right. This is where the fuel is headed. Easy!

The crosswind landings are a trap. If in a slip, then fuel will not be symmetrically distributed. Say you are dry on the right and are slipping against (into) a right crosswind. Conventionally you will have the right wing lowered into the crosswind. So no worries, the left still feeds. I leave it to the reader to work out the other permutations.

So crabbing in full co-ordination is then the safer option; seems I will have to unlearn a few tricks and relearn others.

Question: If I crab down to maybe 50ft then transition to a slip, am I setting myself up for disaster?