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What on your aircraft could kill you?

That’s very interesting. The A380 and the F-35 has essentially the same actuator system concept, only the 380 use the electric system (PBW) as a backup, which seems kind of counter intuitive. The F-35 relies entirely on the PBW. Do you know why the 380 use the electric system as backup only?

The elephant is the circulation
ENVA ENOP ENMO, Norway

On amphibious aircraft the gear is a single source of sorrow if left down for a water landing. But that is not easy to mitigate, other than training and proper procedures.

mh
Aufwind GmbH
EKPB, Germany

LeSving wrote:

It seems to me that accidents in the last decade with airliners are happening because some pilot makes a resolvable situation worse, instead of solving it. The main reason to have pilots there is to monitor and solve dangerous situations when/if they occur. It doesn’t seem to me that this practice is working anymore.

That is because we can’t observe all facts.

  • There are accidents that are caused by pilot failure. These are visible.
  • There are near-accidents that are caused by pilots and prevented by machines. EGPWS or envelope protection saves the day. These are visible to insiders, as these are reported and analysed, but don’t hit the general public
  • There are accidents that are caused by machine failure, that pilots fail to prevent (or make worse). Again there are visible
  • There are near incidents that are caused by machine failure that pilots prevent. These again don’t hit the general public.

Unless we know all of the above, we can’t really judge what is going on.

Biggin Hill

Cobalt wrote:

Unless we know all of the above, we can’t really judge what is going on.

True. But it is a bit strange that of the ones we do hear about (my impression) is number 3, while number 1 seems to be almost gone in later years (except for GA, and pilots going mad).

The elephant is the circulation
ENVA ENOP ENMO, Norway

AdamFrisch wrote:

Uneven deployment of flaps close to the ground, could be a bad day in many aircraft.

Reading this made me think about my flap cable to one side that on my first annual was found to be worn to a degree that half of the cable was already gone at one point. I did note that the flaps didn’t extract exactly equally, but being new to the plane I wasn’t bothered.

There’s quite some load on these flap cables on a Comanche, against some quite strong springs for retract as I found out during replacement of that cable.

Imaging the cable coming off on one side in final approach and the flap retracting in a fraction of a second pulled in by the springs, and the size of the Comanches’ flaps, and me with very low time in it just surprised, I think that would have killed all on board.

It’s a real bad design on all Comanches (edit: those with electric flap activation, which is the latest ones), because there’s one point where the flap cable is not guided over a pulley, but runs over a plastic strip. The load that comes on that cable during flap extraction is quite high, so the left flap cable will wore out sooner or later.

Last Edited by UdoR at 29 Nov 23:06
Germany

UdoR wrote:

Imaging the cable coming off on one side in final approach and the flap retracting in a fraction of a second pulled in by the springs, and the size of the Comanches’ flaps, and me with very low time in it just surprised, I think that would have killed all on board.

That kind of thing has happened a few times over the years in different airplane types. I agree, assymetric flaps (or slats) will cause massive problems and near the ground almost always result in fatal crashes.

One of the most horriffic was the crash of an Airspeed Ambassador at London Heathrow. G-AMAD was carrying 8 horses and 5 grooms together with a flight crew of 3 when one of the flap rods broke due to metal fatigue shortly before touch down. The aircraft veered off the runway while the crew tried to go around. It struck 3 parked airplanes before disintegrating, killing all but 2 on board.

https://aviation-safety.net/database/record.php?id=19680703-0

Another event where assymetric high lift devices were contributory to a fatal crash was the DC10 which lost an engine at O’Hare in 1979. During take off, one of the engines separated from the wing due to metal fatigue, destroying parts of the hydraulic lines in that wing. As a result, the outboard slats on the damaged wing retracted. The crew followed the profile for a one engine out climb and reduced the speed to the prescribed value. This however was below the stall speed of the slatless wing, which consequently stalled. The airplane banked hard and control was lost. All on board perished.

https://aviation-safety.net/database/record.php?id=19790525-2

Last Edited by Mooney_Driver at 30 Nov 07:37
LSZH(work) LSZF (GA base), Switzerland

Jeez, its obvious – by far the most likely thing to kill you on your aircraft is you, the pilot.

Upper Harford private strip UK, near EGBJ, United Kingdom

That’s true, but really bad maintenance can too. Happily, on fixed wing, this is rare.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

Jeez, its obvious – by far the most likely thing to kill you on your aircraft is you, the pilot.

Sure, fully agree… though for me the height above our planet in a fragile flying conception, and an eventual subsequent fall either from it or from my piloting is a very likely killer

Dan
ain't the Destination, but the Journey
LSZF, Switzerland
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