The pilot, accompanied by a passenger, was attempting to land the RV-7A at an airport in Altoona, Pa. He maintained 80 mph on final approach and slowed to 70 mph at touchdown.
Upon touchdown on the main landing gear, a wind gust occurred, and the airplane ballooned, then came down hard on the nose landing gear, which collapsed.
The airplane then rolled off the runway onto grass and nosed over. Both the pilot and passenger were seriously injured.
Both occupants reported having their lap belts “snug” but not as tight as they could have been. Both occupants sustained head and neck injuries from hitting the canopy.
The NTSB determined the probable cause of the accident as the pilot’s improper recovery from an encounter with a wind gust during landing, which resulted in a hard landing on, and displacement of, the nose landing gear and a subsequent runway excursion and noseover.
NTSB Identification: ERA13LA288
This June 2015 accident report is provided by the National Transportation Safety Board. Published as an educational tool, it is intended to help pilots learn from the misfortunes of others.
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Richard Warner says
June 18, 2015 at 6:04 amAnd these guys get paid to come up with the obvious cause of some accidents. Typical government B.S.
Brian says
June 18, 2015 at 5:27 amBased on the information provided, I agree with Marvin. “Upon touchdown of the main landing gear…” So the pilot was likely still in the flare, still bleeding airspeed, & hadn’t lowered the nose when the wind gust hit. After the momentary burst of airspeed from the gust lifted the plane, it likely experienced a subsequent, significant drop in airspeed. The plane came down on the nose gear, which suggests to me an inadvertent aerodynamic stall after said loss in airspeed. If that’s indeed what occurred, there’s not much the pilot really could have done to recover at that altitude.
Bart says
June 18, 2015 at 9:57 amCan’t do anything about it?! If you beleive that you need to get some more training, this isn’t the first time an airplane has ballooned up on landing and most don’t crash. The solution to the problem is the throttle, open it! The airplane will fly again, you don’t just sit there waiting for it to land or something else to happen.
Brian says
June 18, 2015 at 10:59 amFair enough, I won’t argue that I probably need more training, but we’re all constantly learning. Also, technically I didn’t say he “can’t do anything about it” but that there wasn’t much he could do, but I don’t want to split hairs. That statement was based on the possibility that a stall occurred. We’re also not talking about ballooning because of excessive elevator input in this case, which is the most common cause for ballooning But looking at the available information, it’s clear I was likely wrong in my conclusion
We’re told he was at 70 kts. According to www.vansaircraft.com/public/rv7perf.htm the stall speed (solo weight) for an RV-7A is 51 kts. So he was 19 kts above stall, meaning I was most likely incorrect in my earlier assumption. Point taken, crow eaten. Yes, you are correct, the solution for softening a landing after ballooning is add power to reduce vertical speed, so he could have done something. The possible unknown here is whether or not the plane hit nose-gear first as a result of a stall or due to the pilot applying forward input on the yoke to try to get the plane back down. Since the NTSB (who have more experience than me and have been doing this for years) came to the conclusion that the cause was improper recovery from ballooning, and given the information I found about the stall speed for the RV-7A, my earlier comment about the stall being the cause seems less likely. Thanks for your correction Bart, which caused me to take a closer look at the information available.
Bart says
June 18, 2015 at 1:04 pmBrian,
The worst thing an instructor can tell a primary student is that the elevator makes the nose go up and down. This is completely wrong! The elevator changes the angle of attack of the wing, the Wrights knew this and that’s all it does. A pilot who tries to recover from a balloon on landing, whether caused by a gust of wind or excessive back-pressure on the stick, by pushing the nose down is doing EXACTLY the wrong thing! He’s now unloaded the wing which is no longer pitched at the proper AOA to sustain flight, the result isn’t a stall but the nose will fall every time, that’s what took out the nose gear. POWER, POWER, POWER when the airplane balloons up!
“If you want to go down, raise the nose. If you want to go down faster, raise it some more”. Advice from an old pelican who knew more about flying than I ever will.
Marvin says
June 18, 2015 at 5:09 amBlame it on the forces of nature.