{"id":2966,"date":"2014-08-14T06:04:16","date_gmt":"2014-08-14T13:04:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tailwheelersjournal.mechadigital.net\/?p=2966"},"modified":"2021-08-26T20:37:56","modified_gmt":"2021-08-26T20:37:56","slug":"110-go-around","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tailwheelersjournal.com\/110-go-around\/","title":{"rendered":"#110 The Go-Around"},"content":{"rendered":"

I certainly didn\u2019t expect to have an epiphany that morning.\u00a0 I was doing a pre-flight on the Outlaw Aviation 172.\u00a0 Come to think of it, that\u2019s the way these things happen.\u00a0 It\u2019s not like you say \u201cI think I\u2019ll go to the airport and watch someone kill himself.” \u00a0Nope, it happens suddenly and with no warning.\u00a0 It had been that way a few years back when I was on the phone with a \"Conquest<\/a>potential glider rider at Sunriver Soaring.\u00a0 Suddenly I heard a loud \u201cBang\u201d.\u00a0 I rushed to the doorway of my office just in time to see a Cessna Conquest which had hit the runway so hard that he\u2019d struck the right prop and blown up the turbine engine on the right side.\u00a0 That was the \u201cbang\u201d I\u2019d heard.\u00a0 The pilot then decided to execute a go-around.\u00a0\u00a0 It was an impossible feat.\u00a0 With his speed well below \u201cblue line\u201d he cobbed the power to it but only the left engine could respond.\u00a0 The airplane left the ground, executed a lovely slow roll to the right and smacked into the ground beside the runway.\u00a0 It left a burning, smoking hole in the ground, killing the hapless pilot . \u00a0Glider rider Owen Shirley was waiting to board our Big Yellow Glider at the end of the runway and took the attached pictures of the crash.\"Conquest<\/a><\/p>\n

An improperly executed go-around had claimed another victim.\u00a0 Perhaps we who noodle about these things have been harboring some misconceptions about this overly-taught, often misunderstood maneuver.\u00a0 And perhaps it took this long for me to properly organize my thinking and figure out how to express myself about it.<\/p>\n

To prevent unfortunate results of a poorly executed go-around, I think we\u2019ve first got to understand the probable REASONS for that Go-Around:<\/p>\n

Dawgfahrt in front of us<\/strong> (credit belongs to my brother for coming up with this name). \u00a0\u00a0John Creason supplied me with an excellent example of this particular cause for a Go-Around.\u00a0 I won\u2019t get into all the details, but lots of times there\u2019ll be a guy in the pattern in front of you.\u00a0 It\u2019ll seem like there is plenty of time for him to either land and exit or do a touch and go.\u00a0 But for reasons best known to him alone, he\u2019ll lollygag around and cause that formerly comfortable distance to get smaller and smaller.\u00a0 That leaves the pilot (you) with a decision:\u00a0 Are you going to continue and assume that there will continue to be enough room?\u00a0 Are you going to go around?\u00a0 Are you going to hold off on making that decision?\u00a0 This one\u2019s complicated!\u00a0 Often, to go around will screw up everyone in a crowded pattern and put the pilot of the go-around aircraft in another pickle as he tries to maneuver back into the pattern.\u00a0 Hey, I didn\u2019t say I had the ANSWER, only that I would enumerate the problems!<\/p>\n

\"IMG_0894\"<\/a>
Is there room to stop? If not…<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Go<\/a>
… it might have been a good idea to execute a go-around a bit earlier!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Our own screwup.\u00a0 <\/strong>Just like the poor guy in the Conquest, this just could be the most common one.\u00a0 It\u2019s certainly the one I\u2019ve seen the most of.\u00a0 We\u2019ve simply arrived over the fence too high, too hot or some combination of the two.\u00a0 The most common way to exacerbate this screw up is to continue and actually land before realizing that you now have no room to stop!\u00a0 This is more of a problem in a tricycle gear airplane than it is in a taildragger.\u00a0 Why? \u2018Cause a trike MUST be fully stalled when landing.\u00a0 You simply can\u2019t hurry up the flare and landing.\u00a0 A tailwheel airplane\u2019s pilot can \u201cpull a Wolfgang\u201d and wheel it on, then hop on the brakes, keeping the weight of the aircraft on the wheels and thus making the brakes more effective.\u00a0 But the trike driver who instinctively tries that same technique (as they all seem to) will end up \u201cwheel-barrowing\u201d the plane, with weight on that poor nose wheel and wings, with very little weight on the mains.\u00a0 As he tromps on the brakes, the usual result is smoke from the tires as the plane continues toward its date with the overrun and the airport fence.\u00a0 That\u2019s when the go-around is often initiated.\u00a0 It\u2019s too late.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s what I recently witnessed on that morning when I was pre-flighting on the ramp. \u00a0The guy was fortunate that he had enough power to pull it off. \u00a0He got off, made a left turn to avoid the ridge ahead and was able to come back and land normally the other way. It was really the reason I was prompted to write this article.\u00a0 One of my own students was once guilty of this one (you know who you are).\u00a0 I used to think that the departure stall was the biggest villain in go-around accidents.\u00a0 I\u2019ve changed my mind.\u00a0 I think it\u2019s more likely the delayed decision.\u00a0 \u00a0The answer to this one is that a pilot must evaluate his accuracy or other considerations well before reaching the airport fence.\u00a0 Then he\u2019s in a position to make a very comfortable go-around and come back for another try with a better approach.\u00a0 Interestingly, those who customarily do the \u201cstabilized approach\u201d, which I spend a lot of time criticizing, will rarely make this mistake.\u00a0 They may not be capable of making a short approach, but they\u2019ll have hit all their parameters and a decent landing will be assured\u2026 as long as the local deer don\u2019t show up at the last minute.<\/p>\n

\"Grumman<\/a>
This Grumman hit a coyote on the runway. I’ve chosen not to include the picture of the coyote. It wasn’t pretty.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Sudden obstacle<\/strong>.\u00a0 Here at the Sisters Airport, where Tailwheel Town is located, we have a deer problem.\u00a0 As many of us have learned, we all have a tendency to focus on the runway in front of us.\u00a0 We may not see that pesky ungulate herd, which seems to have a compulsion to graze on the centerline.\u00a0 If we see them in time, we\u2019ll often make a low pass to scare them off.\u00a0 That works, but you\u2019d better be prepared to make a \u201cTailwheel-Town- tiny- pattern- and \u2013short- approach\u201d in order to come back and land before they turn right around and come back.\u00a0 Where I used to teach in St Mary\u2019s, Georgia, Gopher tortoises were a common problem.\u00a0 They weren\u2019t\u2019 big enough to see when you were a half mile out, but they were sure a good reason to either lift a wheel or execute a go-around.<\/p>\n

These are just some of the reasons for the Go-Around, as well as some of the ways it can cause disaster.\u00a0 I\u2019m sure there are others.\u00a0 I have often described the go-around as \u201cover-taught\u201d.\u00a0 I may have been mistaken.\u00a0 Perhaps we simply need to look at it from a different angle and change \u201cover-taught\u201d to \u201cimproperly taught\u201d.\u00a0 Our objectives at Tailwheel Town have always been to Teach and to Protect.\u00a0 There are few maneuvers that combine those two purposes so well as the proper method of teaching the Go-Around.<\/p>\n

And, like so many other flying operations, the go-around is a lot more complicated than it first appears.\u00a0 When we begin to examine all the reasons for it and the ways it can be accomplished, we begin to understand why, when my pal, Jerry, is asked his opinion about it, he will often reply, \u201cit all depends\u201d.<\/p>\n

Happy Swooping!<\/p>\n

Brian<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

” It\u2019s not like you say ‘I think I\u2019ll go to the airport and watch someone kill himself.’ Nope, it happens suddenly and with no warning. “<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":2971,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[35,67,82,174],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tailwheelersjournal.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2966"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tailwheelersjournal.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tailwheelersjournal.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tailwheelersjournal.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tailwheelersjournal.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2966"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/tailwheelersjournal.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2966\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tailwheelersjournal.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2971"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tailwheelersjournal.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2966"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tailwheelersjournal.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2966"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tailwheelersjournal.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2966"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}