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Ditching checklist

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frans(at)privatepilots.nl
Guest

Posted: Tue May 04, 2010 2:22 am Post subject: Ditching checklist

Has anyone worked out a checklist for the unfortunate case one has to ditch?



I'm preparing one, but don't want to re-invent the wheel.



After reading some about this subject, my thinking is that one should

not use more than 10 degrees of flaps, to avoid the nose becoming too

low, and to avoid a wing digging in if the extended flap gets torn off

during the initial contact with water.



Another thing that crossed my mind is that it might be beneficial to

open the doors before touchdown. It is my understanding that they will

depart the airplane, which is probably a good thing in that situation,

anticipating the possibility that the airplane might flip over and one

has to evacuate the inverted airplane.



Has anyone done the math whether the wings and foam area's of an Europa

are sufficient to keep it floating?



Other Europa specific things to think about?



As far as I know no Europa has ever been ditched. Is that right?



I came accross these liferafts:

http://www.switlik.com/aviation-catalog-isplr-liferaft.html



The interesting thing about these personal liferafts is that they are so

small that you can wear them as a belt during flight. And with 5.7 lbs

they are very light. Two of these is not more expensive that one regular

multi-person raft, and appears to be more suitable for our small Europa's.



Any comments on these?



Frans



P.S. I appreciate that some folks choose not to fly over water. Mind you

though that in the Netherlands this would severely restrict ones

travels, so avoiding water is not an option.

davidjoyce(at)doctors.org
Guest

Posted: Tue May 04, 2010 2:58 am Post subject: Ditching checklist

Frans, I like the single person life raft, although if flying with a 

passenger it would be psychologically good to be in the same boat as your 

mate. Having flown a lot over water I have given the matter of ditching a 

fair bit of thought. With my mono my plan is to have max flap + wheel down 

to give minimum approach speed (water being awfully hard at speed) but I 

would leave the gear unlocked so that the wheel hitting the water would 

retract itself (I guess), and limit the tendency to trip over the wheel and 

bury the nose. There is good info on ditching at: 

www.equipped.org/ditchingmyths.htm together with useful leads. It seems most 

planes float plenty long enough to get out. If you compare the wing volume 

with a surf board (capable of supporting >200lbs), I am pretty certain that 

a classic would float for ever, and that an XS would float for a long time 

before sufficient water found its way into the wings.

         Hope it doesn't happen, but good for you for working out the 'what 

ifs'! Regards, David Joyce, G-XSDJ

---

frans(at)privatepilots.nl
Guest

Posted: Tue May 04, 2010 5:04 am Post subject: Ditching checklist

On 05/04/2010 12:52 PM, David Joyce wrote:



 	  Quote: 	
		   Frans, I like the single person life raft, although if flying with a

 passenger it would be psychologically good to be in the same boat as

 your mate.


	


I agree. But the best thing is being able to get the raft out, inflate

it before loosing it, and make sure the drift rate of the raft is lower

than the swim capabilities of the fully dressed passenger or pilot. 



 	  Quote: 	
		   Having flown a lot over water I have given the matter of

 ditching a fair bit of thought. With my mono my plan is to have max flap

 + wheel down to give minimum approach speed (water being awfully hard at

 speed) but I would leave the gear unlocked so that the wheel hitting the

 water would retract itself (I guess), and limit the tendency to trip

 over the wheel and bury the nose.


	


Yes, that could work I guess. The only flaw I see is that extending the

flaps lowers the nose somewhat, and with ditching you want to keep the

nose as long as possible out of the water, to prevent it from digging

in. And I have some doubts what will happen first; the wheel retracting

or the wheel dragging the nose down. Taking inertia in mind these things

may happen simultaneously. As I have a tri gear, this question is a

hypothetical one. I plan to get the main gear touching first, and bleed

off as much speed as possible before the rest of the plane makes contact

with the water. Big question of course is whether the gear will stand

the forces or gets ripped off immediately...



About the flaps: what I have read (on the same site you recommended) is

that a few things will happen if you extent the flaps:

1) The flaps will change the attitude of the Europa to a more nose down

position. This is what you want to avoid when ditching. The more you can

keep the nose up, the better chance you have.

2) With the low wing Europa's, the flaps are among the first things to

contact the water. As the flaps are behind the wing spar, they will

rotate the plan nose up/tail down upon contact with the water. This

might cause the airplane to dig in violently as soon as the flaps touch

the water.

3) Given the forces involved, the flaps might depart the airplane upon

contact with the water. If they both depart simultaneously, it might be

not such a problem, but if one departs before the other, it leaves you

with a very asymmetrical setup during the flare, probably leaving the

airplane out of control. The remaining flap will turn the airplane

sideways, not a good thing!



So, I plan not to use the flaps, or with a compromise of about 10 degrees.

The trade off of course is that with less flaps the approach speed is

somewhat faster.



Let's hope that we will never find out which approach is the best one!



Frans

rampil

Joined: 04 May 2007
Posts: 870

Posted: Tue May 04, 2010 5:13 am Post subject: Re: Ditching checklist

For the case of the trigear, one can only imagine a worse case.

It seems unlikely that a trigear can be prevented from digging

in at the nose and possibly cracking the canopy.



I fly over the Long Island Sound at least weekly (a minimum of

14 nm).  At least, flying above 5000 MSL will get me close to the

sandy shores on either side

_________________
Ira N224XS

davidjoyce(at)doctors.org
Guest

Posted: Tue May 04, 2010 5:52 am Post subject: Ditching checklist

Frans, Certainly the nose will be further down with flaps than without but 

either way it is still up as long as the plane is flying, and being able to 

see a bit more over the nose and being in the landing attitude that you are 

used to landing the plane with seem to me to be significant advantages, 

quite apart from hitting the water at an appreciably lower speed ( and of 

course the energy of impact varies with the square of the speed. so for my 

plane 49x49 = 2401 vs 39x39=1521, so barely 60% of the energy with flaps 

down. If you were flying into a 10kt wind the difference would be closer to 

half) Unless you are landing on a dead still inland lake I suspect that the 

landing will be a major fairly abrupt splosh rather than a skidding along 

the surface and lower energy will be very beneficial.

Regards, David Joyce, G-XSDJ

---

frans(at)privatepilots.nl
Guest

Posted: Tue May 04, 2010 6:39 am Post subject: Ditching checklist

On 05/04/2010 03:13 PM, rampil wrote:



 	  Quote: 	
		   For the case of the trigear, one can only imagine a worse case.

 It seems unlikely that a trigear can be prevented from digging

 in at the nose and possibly cracking the canopy.


	


Why does it seem that? Statistics show that tri gear aircraft have no

higher tendency to nose over than rectractables. Unless the Europa has a

feature not found on other tri gear airplane, I don't think it is worse

than comparable aircraft.



Contrary, I think the monowheel is worse in this aspect. It has a

tendency on land already to nose over if you brake firmly, and I don't

see why this would be different on water.



With the tri gear, before the nose is able to touch the water, the gear

has dissipated already quite some of the energy (either due to drag in

the water, or due to destruction of the gear).



Frans

rampil

Joined: 04 May 2007
Posts: 870

Posted: Tue May 04, 2010 7:12 am Post subject: Re: Ditching checklist

Frans,



The main gear touching the water will cause pitching moment nose

down because the wheels, with no rolling will be retarded by water

like hitting a brick wall.



This is completely unlike the balancing act on a rolling

wheel responsible for monowheel accidents.

_________________
Ira N224XS

grahamsingleton(at)btinte
Guest

Posted: Tue May 04, 2010 7:48 am Post subject: Ditching checklist

The mono is much less likely to dig in, think of the pitching moment that the gear exerts as it hits the water. 

Graham

From: Frans Veldman <frans(at)privatepilots.nl>

To: europa-list(at)matronics.com

Sent: Tuesday, 4 May, 2010 15:26:36

Subject: Re: Re: Ditching checklist

--> Europa-List message posted by: Frans Veldman <frans(at)privatepilots.nl (frans(at)privatepilots.nl)>

On 05/04/2010 03:13 PM, rampil wrote:

 	  Quote: 	
		   For the case of the trigear, one can only imagine a worse case.

 It seems unlikely that a trigear can be prevented from digging

 in at the nose and possibly cracking the canopy.

Why does it seem that? Statistics show that tri gear aircraft have no

higher tendency to nose over than rectractables. Unless the Europa has a

feature not found on other tri gear airplane, I don't think it is worse

than comparable aircraft.

Contrary, I think the monowheel is worse in this aspect. It has a

tendency on land already to nose over if you brake firmly, and I don't

see why this would be different on water.

With the tri gear, before the nose is able to touch the water, the gear

has dissipated already quite some of the energy (either due to drag in

the "http://www.matronics.com/Navigator?Europa-List" target="_blank">http://w.com" =   -->

hansjd(at)online.no
Guest

Posted: Tue May 04, 2010 11:28 am Post subject: Ditching checklist

---

raimo.toivio(at)rwm.fi
Guest

Posted: Thu May 06, 2010 10:24 am Post subject: Ditching checklist

They say it would be a good practise to lock the  wheel[s] by brakeing before ditching.

 So the gear will act a little bit longer as a water ski  before sinking.

  

 With mono, I would take the flaps and gear out to  lower the speed and to get a normal landing attitude.

 When the flaps hit water masses w speed of say 40 knots,  they will act as a water brake for a while and separate I assume almost  immediately.

  

 My boat´s top speed is around 58 knots and when  jumping from one wave to another wave I am happy it´s stern is 2 inches thick  laminate.

  

 When moderate or more waves (and wind): would  you still prefer to land headwind (and towards waves) or do you  elect maybe landing sidewind (and 90 degrees to  waves)?  

  

  

 Raimo OH-XRT

  

  

  

  

  



  From: GRAHAM SINGLETON (grahamsingleton(at)btinternet.com) 

 Sent: Tuesday, May 04, 2010 6:41 PM

 To: europa-list(at)matronics.com (europa-list(at)matronics.com) 

 Subject: Re: Re: Ditching checklist

 



  The mono is much less likely to dig in, think of the pitching moment that  the gear exerts as it hits the water. 

Graham



 

   From: Frans Veldman <frans(at)privatepilotsnl ([email]frans(at)privatepilotsnl[/email])>

To: europa-list(at)matronics.com (europa-list(at)matronics.com)

Sent: Tuesday, 4 May, 2010  15:26:36

Subject: Re:  Re: Ditching checklist



--> Europa-List message  posted by: Frans Veldman <frans(at)privatepilots.nl (frans(at)privatepilots.nl)>



On  05/04/2010 03:13 PM, rampil wrote:



 	  Quote: 	
		   For the case of the trigear, one  can only imagine a worse case.

 It seems unlikely that a trigear can be  prevented from digging

 in at the nose and possibly cracking the  canopy.


	


Why does it seem that? Statistics show that tri gear aircraft  have no

higher tendency to nose over than rectractables. Unless the Europa  has a

feature not found on other tri gear airplane, I don't think it is  worse

than comparable aircraft.



Contrary, I think the monowheel is  worse in this aspect. It has a

tendency on land already to nose over if you  brake firmly, and I don't

see why this would be different on  water.



With the tri gear, before the nose is able to touch the water, the  gear

has dissipated already quite some of the energy (either due to drag  in

the "http://www.matronics.com/Navigator?Europa-List"  target="_blank">http://wcom" =  --> 



[quote]



href="http://www.matronics.com/Navigator?Europa-List">http://www.matronhref="http://forums.matronics.com">http://forums.matronics.com

href="http://www.matronics.com/contribution">http://www.matronics.com/c

[b]

martinboyle53(at)bigpond.
Guest

Posted: Thu May 06, 2010 1:24 pm Post subject: Ditching checklist

The way we were taught in Australia was to touch  with one wheel and the wing tip 

 This than makes the aircraft turn to that direction  and enersa will cause the other side of the plane to ditch into the water and  uses the wing to stop it from rolling 

 Also if you go straight in and the plane rolls  forward you will wear the windscreen in your face at great speed not pretty  

  

 Martin Boyle 

 North QLD Australia

 [quote]   ---

josok-e

Joined: 29 Jan 2010
Posts: 16
Location: Ivalo Finland

Posted: Fri May 07, 2010 12:13 am Post subject: Re: Ditching checklist

As Graham once pointed out to me: There is still a lot of (thin) foam in the  fuselage and wings, and it could well be that also the XS will float forever. Speeds and attitude will be very important. Best glide for my mono was 70, landing speed with flaps down 55. At 55 and a stopped engine the sink rate will be quite high, and the nose attitude high. Judging the height over water is quite difficult. Summarizing i would raise the nose at a few meters over the water, aim for 55 knots. which happens to be the right attitude for a hard runway, and wait for the hit...



Regards,



Jos Okhuijsen

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