Accident Analysis

Listening to the lady behind the counter

Once upon a time, a commercial-pilot applicant was in the middle of a flight test, demonstrating complex-aircraft procedures to his designated examiner. He had just performed the emergency landing-gear extension procedure by pumping the wheels down by hand until the green "gear safe" light glowed on the panel. At that point, the examiner asked a surprising question: He wanted to know if the gear could be retracted using the hand pump. The applicant was momentarily at a loss. But the examiner, an easy-going fellow, smiled and ended the pregnant pause. "Why would you want to?" he asked.

Yes, I was there that distant day. No, I was neither riding in back nor administering the flight test. And it turns out that retired Naval aviator Russ Treadwell's question, "Why would you want to?" has many applications in flying. Until a pilot gains experience, simply knowing that something is possible without knowing its potential hazards creates a kind of vulnerability that may only reveal itself through a mishap

An opportune example to consider at this time of year is soft-field takeoffs. Training texts, videos, safety lectures, pilot's operating handbooks - yes, even the Private Pilot Practical Test Standards - hammer home the proper techniques for getting in or out of an airstrip that on a given spring day might be eligible for designation as a federal wetland. But few of those sources seriously address the "Why would you want to?" factor, leaving it to the novice to assume that muddy-rudder flying is normal and, by implication, a low-risk thing to do.

Not so, as a pilot discovered on June 9, 2001, in Middleton, Wisconsin. The accident report by the National Transportation Safety Board picks up the tale: "The pilot reported that he performed seven or eight touch-and-go landings on Runway 30, which is asphalt. He then decided to perform the last touch and go on Runway 36, which is grass. He stated he decided to land on the grass because two airplanes were back-taxiing on Runway 30 and because the winds shifted to out of the north. The pilot reported that after landing he configured the airplane for takeoff. He continued, 'The plane would not get up to flying speed. The engine was at full power and I was bogging down. I decided to abort the takeoff and pulled power out, full back elevator, and the airplane slowed down; when the nosewheel touched down in the very soft mud the plane nosed over and came to rest inverted.'"

Oops.

What did he say again? "The nosewheel touched down in very soft mud ". - The pilot got no argument on that from the NTSB, which commented in the report that "inspection of the airstrip after the accident revealed the grass was wet from recent rains." Of course visual inspection before the flight was the requisite course of action if the pilot contemplated using the grass runway, especially after a rain. And while he was faulted for attempting takeoff from unsuitable terrain, credit must be given for aborting the takeoff and minimizing the consequences.

This accident, while minor from the standpoints of injury and aircraft damage, to my knowledge is the first official acknowledgement of that mythological aeronautical entity known as "the lady behind the counter" in the FBO. If there is a character in general aviation who comes straight from Central Casting, she must be it. An aeronautical icon, she stands as a sort of Statue of Liberty of flying. She's the saint who puts on the coffee pot when she hears you on the radio declaring that you are inbound. She provides wind and runway information in the same unflappable voice whether the airport basks in a light breeze or cowers under a boiling thunderstorm. Although she is neither a pilot nor an air traffic controller, she speaks with the same sure authority, and is as revered, as the computer on Star Trek: The Next Generation. If she were to instruct us to fly around the pattern inverted and then land in the sea, many would surely comply. But she wouldn't. That's why we love her. It would be a sacrilege to find her mentioned in an accident report. Unthinkable!

Not any more. In the Wisconsin accident report we read that "the pilot reported that prior to takeoff he 'asked the lady behind the counter if the grass runways were open and she said yes.'" But we can only speculate as to whether she then called after the retreating figure of the pilot, "Why would you want to?" In any case, telling the pilot that the runway was open provided little more information than that it wasn't officially closed. Its immediate suitability at any given moment is another matter. And while that runway may be suitable today for a veteran in a Cessna 185 on tundra tires, perhaps it is not suitable for me and you, sitting side by side in a tricycle-gear trainer near its maximum weight.

There are other cautionary issues to consider about taking off from or landing on a soupy mess of a runway, despite your having been instructed in how to do so. One of those is whether you think the runway's owner will be happy that you dropped in. In my area, a very popular 2,000-foot grass strip is closed via an annually recurring notam until the snow melts, the frost exits the ground, and the sod-grass runway firms up in the warm, drying winds of late spring. The way this notam comes to life each year is that a fellow named Frank picks up his phone and calls our local flight service station, and one of the specialists there revives the notam. (You'd have to get a preflight briefing to know about the notam, so if you land there and have an accident on a closed, wet runway, whose fault is that?)

While this process unfolds each year, a group of dedicated souls is investing their free time in rolling the runway flat and mowing it (at considerable expense to them) so that it will be in excellent shape for all comers later on in the season. I have been on hand to hear their oaths and groans on discovering that an unauthorized arrival and departure (performed with the correct technique, one must suppose) has cut deep ruts into the soft field - ruts which, if not discovered and removed promptly, harden and become a permanent and hazardous feature of the airport until the next year.

Ruts might be forgiven were they the result of a spur-of-the-moment decision of a different sort, such as that which led a Cessna 172R pilot to a soft runway, and eventual trouble, in Milford, New York, on June 20, 1998. "The pilot diverted to a private grass strip to wait for fog to clear at his intended destination. During the subsequent takeoff roll, the pilot felt the airplane hit a soft spot, and he believed he was too close to the end of the runway to abort. During the initial climb, the pilot felt he could not clear electrical wires, so he dove under them. In the process, he struck a tree and crash landed in a field."

Pity that a good decision to land was followed by a mishap on takeoff. This reminds pilots that a point at which to continue or abort if not airborne must always be visualized when departing from any short, rough, or unfamiliar runway. This means knowing its length and the performance that you can expect from your machine. Walking the runway's length is always a good idea and could cause you to add an additional safety margin to those numbers.

Technique must also be exact because margins will be thin. A pilot's operating handbook for the Piper Cherokee 140 gives flap settings of 25 degrees (second notch) for all short-field and soft-field takeoffs. But a pilot taking off from a 2,555-foot runway in Iowa reported to the NTSB that he "initiated a 'short field' takeoff with 10 degrees of flaps because the turf runway was 'rough.' He said that he held the nosewheel off the ground, but the airplane only accelerated to 60 mph, bouncing on the rough runway. He said he then tried to abort the takeoff; however, the airplane drifted to the right of the runway and impacted a 3-foot by 10-foot pile of dirt that was partially on the runway. He said that if the pile of dirt had not been on the runway the airplane would have come to a stop on the remaining runway."

Flier beware! "A check of the FAA Airport/Facility Directory revealed no warning for obstructions on the runway. The airport management was notified and removed and/or leveled the dirt pile," said the NTSB report.

In all of these June accidents, diminished runway quality had something to do with the outcome. It is always a consideration when a pilot is pondering the go/no-go decision but can only be discovered up close. Just because a procedure for operating from less-than-perfect runways is published, it does not provide insurance, nor tacit approval, to do so under all conditions. It is only a starting point for a pilot's planning.

So the next time the lady behind the counter, or the voice on the unicom, or your own assessment, suggests that something is "doable," imagine that a wily old Navy pilot is sitting in the seat next to you and asking, "Why would you want to?"

Dan Namowitz is an aviation writer and flight instructor. A pilot for 18 years and an instructor for 12, he enjoys learning to fly "anything new and different."