Intense plane landing, youll watch it twice.

[SportsJunky]

That's nuthin', I survived a couple of Dash 8 flights yesterday in some craaaaazy Alberta weather.

[Crispy's Critter]

definitely looked staged to me, especially the oh-so-coincidental restarts that gave them just enough power to get where they wanted to go.


But I'm feeling rather cynical at the moment.

[Bigtime]

Originally Posted by Crispy's Critter

definitely looked staged to me, especially the oh-so-coincidental restarts that gave them just enough power to get where they wanted to go.

This point has been brought up on some of the aviation forums, and the general opinion is that the restarts behaved like an engine would in that situation if it did restart. Notice how the 2nd time the engine restarted it didn't last very long at all compared to the first restart, pretty much the last gasps of the engine on those two restarts. Very lucky ones at that!

[jydk]

Originally Posted by MrMastodonFarm

Yup, I loved that part. It shows how quickly our priorities can change. Us humans are a crazy bunch. Seconds earlier they had just hoped to survive, now it's "watch the wing!"

Great video, watched it twice.

Well what's he supposed to do? It's funny how it came up, but it doesn't make us humans a crazy bunch. If he just let the kid crash into the light pole and said, "aw, we're lucky to just be alive, F the plane", that would make us a crazy bunch.

[Cowperson]

Originally Posted by Bigtime

This point has been brought up on some of the aviation forums, !

What is the prevailing opinion of his decisions in aviation forums? Just curious.

I haven't read stories on this incident and I saw the video only twice a few days ago . . . . . . but saying a highway or field is better than water is, I would say, obvious . . . . . unless you're trying to find a place to land in a busy urban environment, which is what we're talking about.

At the initial moment of engine failure, there is water to his left but he still has height and is obviously going through procedures to restart the engine as well as pointing to open spaces they could put down.

He's much lower when the engine fails again and you see him tilt the plane, briefly, if I remember correctly, to the right where the water is, then abruptly makes the decision to go for the highway. From that brieft action of turning to the right, I'd believe he was recognizing the obvious - "I'm over an urban environment and the water might be the only option where I may or may not kill ONLY myself and my passenger.

Because you're looking through a wide angle view - which you can also do on Microsoft Flight Simulator by the way - you're pushed much further away from what he would have seen with his eyeballs, so I'll cut him a break and say he might have seen the highway, in an urban environment, was mysteriously and miraculously free of traffic in the direction he's heading (but not the direction facing him).

Good luck for him.

If he had tried to set down on a busy highway in an urban environment, that would have been the wrong thing to do. He shouldn't be inflicting his problems on the innocents below, which was my point earlier. He wouldn't try landing in a schoolyard if it was full of kids just because it's an open field and better than water.

A famous photo I marvelled at as a kid when it appeared in National Geographic in roughly 1974 . . . . . who knew I'd be able to use it in a debate on something called the Internet!!! That plane is sure beating the crap out of that vehicle!!!!



Cowperson

[Bigtime]

I love that photo, I think it was a scene in a movie. However that Cessna would definitely have a lot more weight to it than the ultralight in the video, not to mention it is smashing into the truck while flying, not slowing down on a road. Oh and the impact is with the heaviest part of the plane, the engine.

On the aviation forums most are pretty impressed with the job the pilot did, of course its authenticity has been questioned as well. But most that are familiar with homebuilts say it seems to look like a normal engine failure to them (high compression Rotax engines usually, the prop doesn't tend to windmill after dying like it would with other engines). Heck even if the whole thing was staged it still shows a great example of pilot decision making and getting the plane and its occupants down safely.