Originally posted by tim60 That runway looked a bit lumpy!
That's Birmingham Airport/BHX/EGBB, in the UK.
Originally posted by tim60 There were people at your company, way back, who said that the wing is everything. With the right wing just about anything could be made to fly.
Yes, but it requires a left wing too.
Of course thrust is always a consideration too. These jet engines put out thrust measured in six figures.
Originally posted by tim60 So that is why it is possible to build those extra fat EGAT 747s with the same 747 wing.
This one?
They also modified the wings, h-stab and vertical fin.
And swapped the engines out for bigger ones.
I think it has bigger tires and wheels too.
Originally posted by tim60 Racer, as for your crosswind pictures - good to know it can do it, but still not nice to be on. I tell people, "just remember, the plane is tougher than you are".
I've been in airplanes, large and small, that have made landings like that.
My mom had an American Yankee AA1A years ago. It looked like this one (Wiki photo), but was painted Yellow.
It had fiberglass struts for the main gear that also were the springs. She said that they were tough, and flexible enough that the plane could be landed hard enough to make the wheels hit the bottom of the wings and not break the struts off.
I never thought to ask if it would break the wings off.
In all the hundreds of flights I went on with her she always made the landings. Even though I had the controls many times for takeoff and flight, she never allowed me to make a landing. Apparently she felt that her efforts to bounce the wheels off of the wings were good enough.
Seriously.
She was a great pilot, but never did get the hang of putting that plane down gently.
But she always announced at the end of every touchdown, "Any landing you can walk away from was a good one."
*sigh*
I dunno, I would always want to grease it. Every time.
She sold it to a guy in California. He was on a trip to Osh Kosh or some such and ran low on fuel over Kansas. Fearing he wouldn't make it to the next airstrip he attempted a landing in a wheatfield. Unfortunatley the field had just been plowed. The landing gear sank into the freshly tilled earth and the plane did a ground loop. The pilot escaped with minor injury.
The airframe was a total loss.
*double sigh*