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Posts Tagged ‘landing’

Crosswinds can be a real problem – “On Landings Part I”

That is a actually a pretty good summary of how most pilots feel about crosswind takeoffs and landings.

Here are two usual methods taught  in accomplishing a crosswind approach and landing:

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Nick has two questions about currency:

If I do 3 full stop landings at night, do I have to do 3 T&G’s and/or full stop landings in the day time time to fly as PIC during the day or do my night landings take care of the day requirement?

Do I have to complete 3 FS landings in both a tailwheel aircraft and non tailwheel aircraft to be current to act as PIC at night in both types of aircraft?

To answer your first question, your three takeoffs and landings to a full stop at night will also fulfill the recent flight experience requirements for day currency. If you never flew during the day, and did a full stop landing at night weekly, you’d still be legal to carry passengers day or night. Remember, you aren’t maintaining currency to act as PIC, you’re staying current to carry others in your airplane.

As for your second question, to be current in a tailwheel airplane, you must do landings in a tailwheel airplane. There is no such limitation on tricycle gear (or bicycle gear, for that matter). It’s like the old rectangle/square rule—tricycle currency doesn’t apply to tailwheel aircraft, but tailwheel currency works for tricycle aircraft. If you want to dig through the regs, FAR § 61.57 (a)(1) and (b)(1) is the place to look. There’s a lot in there, but most of it is aimed at pilots with instrument ratings or with jobs flying jets.

Well, keeping with the winter weather theme, I  thought it would be apt to talk about winter notams.   I was checking weather this afternoon for a flight and came across the following NOTAMS:

CLE 12/090 CLE 6L ERD MU 22/26/29 WEF 0712051030
CLE 12/092 CLE 10 ERD MU 39/32/39 WEF 0712051040
CLE 12/115 CLE 24L ERD MU 37/41/38 WEF 0712051421
CLE 12/120 CLE 6L/24R PTCHY THN SN DEICED SOLID WEF 0712051515
CLE 12/122 CLE 24L BOW MU 39/41/38 WEF 0712051515

First of all, what is MU? Prononced “Mew”, MU is a measurement of runway friction as reported by airport managament.  You can tell by looking at the number how slippery and how good your braking will be.

The ERD tells me what type of equipment was used to generate this number:

So ERD would be a Electronic Recording Deceleromter

What you are looking for is a MU value above 40.  The lower the MU, the lower the braking effectiveness.  You can supplement this information with the NOTAMs concerning runway conditions:

CLE 12/120 CLE 6L/24R PTCHY THN SN DEICED SOLID WEF 0712051515

This will give you a full picture of what the runway conditions are and how it will affect your landing performance.