Page 8 - Nov23T

path, noticing that the power he was carrying was slightly less than expected, something he attributed to the airplane being light. When he reduced power to begin the flare, it seemed the plane floated a bit more than was expected, and then there was this funny ‘ting,’ ‘ting,’ ‘ting’ noise as three of the propeller blades from each engine made gentle contact with the pavement. The funny tinging re- sulted in him pulling back on the control wheel slightly, which caused the tings to go away entirely. At this point, he suddenly realized that he had forgotten to lower the landing gear in his relaxed and bored state of mind. His next move was his most dangerous one.
Both engines went to full power, and although both were vibrating in a novel fashion, he pulled up and entered the traffic pattern. Hoping no one had noticed, he lowered the gear and began another approach by turning to base and final. This landing attempt, now with the gear extended, went just fine. He pulled the airplane up to the FBO front door only to find the chief pilot standing there, motion- ing for him to pull the aircraft further forward before shutting down so that when the passengers exited, they would have to walk aft to enter the building. That struck him as odd, as it was company policy to pull up right in front of the door. The line guys opened the aircraft door, and the passengers, seemingly oblivious to what had just occurred, walked the short distance aft to the building, then out to their cars and drove home.
If they had walked around the front of the aircraft, they would have noticed that all three propeller blades on both engines were bent 90 degrees, about one inch from the distal ends. Evident to the chief pilot, who had witnessed the whole thing from his office window, he promptly arranged the towing of the airplane to the maintenance hangar, where it was out of sight. He had another aircraft of the same model pulled out, and the next group of pas- sengers boarded as if nothing had happened. The pilot, however, never flew for the company again. Sometimes, you get what you wish for.
And finally, one mishap where the airplane failed the pilot.
The airplane was an older King Air. The ATP-licensed pilot had nearly 10,000 hours in King Airs. The flight was returning from a sunny south location, and the aircraft’s owner and his family were on board as passengers. The weather was about 2,000 feet overcast with five miles of visibility, which resulted in the pilot electing to make a GPS approach. When reaching the initial approach fix (IAF) and still in instrument conditions, the pilot lowered the landing gear, just as the checklist called.
Right after he moved the gear handle, there was a loud ‘bang’ from somewhere forward of the pilot’s seat. Shortly after, both main landing gear showed green lights, but not on the nose. The pilot continued the approach until below the clouds and then asked the FBO on the
6 • TWIN & TURBINE / November 2023
1st Source
http://1stsource.com/aircraft.com