This:
Was my landing last month in Norway. It was not my shortest runway ever (that’d be 95 meters in my 150). But, with 7 meters excess runway length to aircraft performance requirement, this was my percentage tightest.
Speaking of short runways, what are the legal requirements for minimum runway length in your country? For landing, Sweden requires 141% of the POH figure (from 50 ft) for all flights. School flights (even non-commercial) needs 125% of the POH figure (to 50 ft) for take-off. This can be a real problem at grass fields even with 600 m (say) runways if you want to stay legal which can be a good idea if you ever need to use your hull insurance….
Part-NCO seems to have no such requirements.
In Canada there is no requirement for excess runway length for private operations. If you overshoot/undershoot a runway which is shorter than the POH requirements for your aircraft, you could be having an unpleasant discussion with your insurance company though.
My observations have generally been that it requires “unusual pilot skill” or pilots are a bit abusive to aircraft to even achieve the POH runway length performance in most cases. This is rarely a problem for 90% of the GA operations in Canada, nearly all runways well exceed the length requirements for most GA aircraft. My runway at home started out as 700’ long, though as winter turned to summer, and temperatures increased, I began to see the need to lengthen it. I made it 1400’. Then I had the C207 for a while and 1400’ was uncomfortable (but legal), so I went the final extension to 2100’.
EASA public transport has safety factors for different classes, which Sweden may have applied to training as well?
Landing on wet grass is always interesting – as a rule, from experience, I add 100% safety factor.
While the Super Cub is a STOL aircraft, around one third of the fatal accidents are in the take off/climb out phase – some may be due to landing light, picking up a load and then not getting out. There are a few types where landing is OK, but they would then struggle to take off and clear obstacles safely.
While it only needs around 150 yards the shortest farm strips in the UK are usually 300 yards – although I have seen some in Ireland which are only around 150 yards. I have not attempted to land in them, but people do.
Most of my recreational flying is into grass runways hence using a type where some people suggest runways are optional.
Speaking of short runways, what are the legal requirements for minimum runway length in your country?
Here in Germany, as of now there is no factoring applied to private operations. You can use the figures from your aircraft’s manual. The same applies to training basically, but the national aviation authority can make restrictions (like higher minima for training instrument approaches) and the local authorities can impose restrictions for certain airfields. We have a list of airfields for example where we are not allowed to send students on solo flights. All this may change with EASA Part FCL very soon though.
Private operation of complex aircraft (EASA Part NCC) will introduce factored landing distances. Which factors apply has not been discussed finally and anyway Germany has opted out of NCC until the last possible moment, August 2016.
For commercial operators the same factors will apply anywhere in EASA land some time next week when the last EASA Part CAT opt-out will expire. The factors remain the same as before under JAR and EU-OPS.
The UK has no factoring requirement for private flights, and it would be IMHO stupid to have one, especially with most private ops being SE.
Obviously there is factoring for grass, and wet grass 100000% 
Private operation of complex aircraft (EASA Part NCC) will introduce factored landing distances. Which factors apply has not been discussed finally and anyway Germany has opted out of NCC until the last possible moment, August 2016.
Isn’t this the “balanced runway” proposal which, according to AOPA somewhere, will remove about 900 airports (which is a huge # in Europe!) from being usable by private jets?
Landing on wet grass is always interesting – as a rule, from experience, I add 100% safety factor.
Yup. But the Swedish regs require +41% on top of this…. (Actually it expressed that the POH landing distance, including all runway surface corrections, should be contained within 70% of the available runway.)
Clearly another case of a national authority making completely arbitrary rules. Hopefully this will go away with part-NCO.
In Canada there is no requirement for excess runway length for private operations. If you overshoot/undershoot a runway which is shorter than the POH requirements for your aircraft, you could be having an unpleasant discussion with your insurance company though.
I didn’t even know we had any rules about this in Norway, but we do, kind of. The nominal length of a runway is set by the owner. As a general rule he/she shall set it according to the aircraft that uses most runway of the aircraft that frequently uses the runway. So, there are no minimal length, but a nominal length is a required property of a runway. However, there are a minimum with, and that is 10 m.
If it’s used for training with a normal category aircraft, or for commercial transport the minimum length is 550 m and a with of 18 m.
My old Commander 520 with the geared engines was a total champ in this regard. Published at max gross weight was around 1300ft, which is unheard of for a 5500lbs twin. Lightly loaded, she would be off in less than 600ft. Here’s the proof:
Helgoland was it for me too and I was surprised that I could land to full stop my Beech 33 within 180 meters. But the takeoff afterwards needed every single meter and I knew there was either airborne or kiss a dune.
