Annoying as they might be while you’re trying to learn to cope with them, crosswinds also can be very convenient. They provide a ready explanation for any lateral excursion during takeoff, landing, or even taxi, and in the embarrassment of the moment plenty of our fellow pilots are happy—OK, willing—to seize on that excuse. An actual crosswind makes this easier, but it certainly isn’t required.
An instructional flight in South Texas last March provides a typical example. The student touched down left of the centerline, then swerved across an intersecting runway and into the rough, collapsing the gear before the instructor could stop the airplane with the hand brake. The student maintained that “a gust of wind caused the airplane to veer to the left.” Inconveniently, both the CFI and recorded weather observations suggested otherwise. A steady five-knot breeze blowing 30 degrees off runway heading added up to a 2.5-knot crosswind component.
Student pilots deserve a little slack, but lapses in very light air are hardly exclusive to students. The 3,100-hour commercial pilot whose Bonanza V35B went off the right side of a Mississippi runway had nearly 2,400 hours in type. Yes, the wind (reported as “variable”) shifted from a right to a left crosswind on short final. Still, it was only five knots. About five knots’ worth of crosswind was also enough to push a Super Cub off a 50-foot-wide gravel runway in Alaska. Its private pilot had logged more than three-quarters of his 400 total hours in the same make and model.
Perhaps even worse than surrendering control to a gentle crosswind is losing it because there wasn’t one. In Wisconsin, the 2,100-hour commercial pilot of a Cessna 172 “established a crab angle to compensate for the wind” on final approach to Runway 36. The wind in question was from 350 degrees (at, yes, five knots). The Skyhawk ran off the left side of the runway.
Given that flying takes place in the air and that air likes to move around, learning to handle its vagaries pretty much comes with the territory. Blaming loss of control on a “gust” should be more embarrassing than admitting that, just for an instant, you failed to give this aviation business your complete and undivided attention.
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