I saw this malfunction three or four times in over twenty years, Flying the Line: An Air Force Pilot’s Journey and Flying the Line: An Air Force Pilot’s Journey Volume Two: Military Airlift Command. Instead of descending to maintain airspeed, he increases power. Apparently, he became focused on what was wrong with his INS. Melissa Phillips, 436th Airlift Wing Public Affairs Three C-5 Galaxy aircraft have been lost in crashes along with two class-A losses resulting from ground fire, with a combined total of 169 fatalities. / Published June 29, 2006, A firefighter hoses down the crash site of a C-5 Galaxy. The pilot started configuring by calling “Flaps 40,” and shortly thereafter, “Gear down.” The configuration proceeded normally until the slat annunciator illuminated. At 1:58 the airspeed has remained at 50kts for the previous 15 seconds. Crucially for the developing situation, this malfunction disabled the stick-shaker stall warning system on the pilots’ yokes. The copilot warns “Watch the (engine) temperatures! Then confusion arose with the pilots about their instrumentation centering on the Inertial Navigation Systems (INSs) as they extended full flaps. Aerodynamic control is returning. The aircraft is in a near 90-degree right bank.
When she told the pilot he was climbing, instead of descending, she was correct. The pilot pulls perfectly to 18-degrees AOA, the airspeed increases to 150-kts. The reserve pilot suffered a different fate. However, the only clouds for 100-miles enveloped them as they configured and approached the Final Approach Fix (FAF) for the landing runway. If he did not, he would risk them at the FEB. At 1:30 the copilot says, “That’s not good,” apparently about the condition of the INSs, as the airspeed falls below 100 kts. Read More, Flying the Line: An Air Force Pilot’s Journey and Flying the Line: An Air Force Pilot’s Journey Volume Two: Military Airlift Command, This Photo could show Highly Secret RQ-180 stealth drone flying around Edwards AFB, Interesting video shows 576th AMXS crews painting three variations of nose art on A-10 Thunderbolt II, Tom Cruise and Jerry Bruckheimer Named Honorary Naval Aviators. This was no doubt prompted by a lack of stall warning throughout the fall from 4900-feet to 1500-feet. Someone needed insist on more time to get their act together, but no one did. This, along with the inertia of a heavy aircraft at high speed, would require more runway length to stop the plane. A stall occurs at 18 degrees. While it provided more runway, it took away a precision ILS glide slope guidance.
This opens a gaping hole between the two sections with only a thin left side hinge holding the sections together. As the left seat pilot confirms “Flaps landing” (100%) the copilot realizes the error of the wrong flap setting for the heavyweight landing. The crew’s initial analysis of the event blames wind shear. At this point the pilot was in level flight and had advanced the throttles to hold his airspeed instead of beginning descent. A mechanical problem also occurred at the same time. So, he is now low and slow and does not have the power to recover on two engines. By the aircraft manual, the engine should be shut down expeditiously but in a normal fashion, not an emergency fashion. This 12,000-foot-long runway had more than enough stopping distance, and this should not have been a primary consideration. You’re climbing!” Actually, the aircraft nose is now falling through level flight in a full stall. The Angle of Attack (AOA) indicator is at 16-degrees nose high. Shortly thereafter the plane emerges from the cloud. The following video features a computer generated crash animation along with cockpit recorder playing.
We'll assume you're ok with this, but you can opt-out if you wish. He then turned directly toward the runway. He is also low to the ground, I presume to make sure he gets the plane on the runway expeditiously for his unwarranted fear of hot brakes on landing. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this blog contents without express and written permission from this site's author/owner is strictly prohibited. This error, too, is on the aircraft commander since he had briefed the full flap landing speed of 146 kts instead of the 162 kts for flaps 40%.
The following story comes the last book of the trilogy, in progress: “Flying the Line, an Air Force Pilot’s Journey,” book three, “Air Mobility Command, 1993-2004,” in progress.”. The Ground Proximity Warning System (GPWS) starts its emergency call out: “Too low, terrain!” and “Don’t sink”. The pilot has only two degrees of AOA to work with. Jay Lacklen is a former C-5 pilot with 12,500 flying hours and the author of two books, Flying the Line: An Air Force Pilot’s Journey and Flying the Line: An Air Force Pilot’s Journey Volume Two: Military Airlift Command.
The engineers were so flummoxed one did not realize they had the wrong flap setting, and did not catch the copilot briefing the wrong, full-flap, approach speed.
Passing through 1500-feet the crew regains visual conditions.
The aircraft commander needs to specify who is flying and who is investigating. That angle of attack gauge suddenly leaps from 17 degrees to 20. Outboard engines are torn from the wings.
It is unclear if the pilot feels his ADI is unreliable, or if he is checking for error codes on his INS. Most significantly, this crew had been briefed on this incident the day before this flight. The plane attains its highest altitude of the event at 4,900 ft. At 1:55 the aircraft is in full stall and has lost almost 1,000 feet. The aftermath got ugly as the reserve and active duty wings got into a squabble about whose fault the episode had been. In the summer of 1998, a Dover reserve crew C-5 experienced a stall and fall on approach to the tiny atoll of Diego Garcia in the middle of the Indian Ocean. At 2:06, the aircraft is 10-degrees nose low, in a 90-Degree left bank and passing through 3000 feet. At 1:46 the stall begins at 50 kts IAS.
This is followed almost immediately by the copilot saying “Your climbing, you don’t want…” At 1:35 the copilot says, with rising emphasis: “accelerate, accelerate.” The pilot acknowledges with “Yeah,” but the throttles do not move from the low 80% N1 range. That, unfortunately, can only be done by lowering the nose, which the pilot flying cannot do without crashing. And, that is just what he did here, with catastrophic results. You’ve got altitude to work with!” This was the perfect advisory telling the pilot he had enough altitude to lower the nose to gain airspeed. At 1:38, the pilot seems to decide something is definitely wrong and calls emphatically for “Gear up.” I presume he is initiating a missed approach, but the throttles do not move initially. A few seconds later, as the landing checklist is run, the engineer calls for “Flaps Landing.” The left seat pilot moves the flaps to 100% and says, “Flaps landing,” because that is the usual, rote, response to the checklist item. The copilot tells the pilot at 1:10 minute point on this video to descend since they are configured and past the FAF. The following story comes the last book of the trilogy, in progress: “Flying the Line, an Air Force Pilot’s Journey,” book three, “Air Mobility Command, 1993-2004,” in progress.”. He protested to the crew that they should have landing priority regardless of the fire truck problems.