Career ending mistake?

[RitterKreuz]

http://www.zianet.com/tedmorris/dg/bombers4.html

:-/

DOH!!!

[Isak922]

Ouch... That's painful to look at  :'(

[expat]

Pull up, Pull up, Terrain, Terrain, Gear, Gear, Config, Config

Also what was the tower doing at this time. It is the military, no Greens conformation?

Matt

[beefhole]

Man, especially a B-1B.  You have to be someone special to get into the cockpit of one of those, and then... that.  Over in a heartbeat.

[beaky]

Considering how many qualified pilots there are slavering over his flying slot, I'd say he's done, with that type anyway.
Maybe they'll keep him in fixed-wing trainers, if he promises to FOLLOW THE CHECKLIST!!  

Not saying I'm perfect, but military flying requires a much higher standard... this isn't like scraping your Mooney during that first inevitable landing-gear brain fart.

[RitterKreuz]

GUMP check times three EVERY TIME!!! works if your flying a cessna 172 RG or a 747-400 (minus the props)

downwind abeam the numbers - "Gas Undercarriage Mixture Prop"

base - "Gas Undercarriage Mixture Prop"

Final - "Gas Undercarriage Mixture Prop"

When i fly any General Aviation Retract i make a little placard that says "GEAR" and i stick it on the panel right above the airspeed indicator.

On an aircraft like the B1 i would certainly think it had TAWS / GPWS bitching at them all the way down "Too low gear!"   "Too low gear!"   "Terrain terrain"... the only thing i can think of is that MAYBE it was inoperative and didnt give them the usual warnings?? but still.

[DaveSims]

Ouch.  In a pavement/aircraft collison, the pavement always wins.  Airplanes have to try really hard to damage the pavement.  

[expat]

GUMP check times three EVERY TIME!!! works if your flying a cessna 172 RG or a 747-400 (minus the props)

downwind abeam the numbers - "Gas Undercarriage Mixture Prop"

base - "Gas Undercarriage Mixture Prop"

Final - "Gas Undercarriage Mixture Prop"

When i fly any General Aviation Retract i make a little placard that says "GEAR" and i stick it on the panel right above the airspeed indicator.

On an aircraft like the B1 i would certainly think it had TAWS / GPWS bitching at them all the way down "Too low gear!"   "Too low gear!"   "Terrain terrain"... the only thing i can think of is that MAYBE it was inoperative and didnt give them the usual warnings?? but still.

When I stared gliding the one thing I wanted was to get those hours and quals together so I could get into something "plastic". Our club piece of "plastic" was an Astir, also known as the plastic pig. Looking back a horrible glider, but she had retractable gear and was sleek looking even if she did fly like a house brick. I was introduced to WUF. Water, undercarriage and flaps. This is now many years ago, but spent the day going up, down and around in a K13. The weather was not so great for gliding that day, but it was flying. After lunch, the weather improved, so I got into the Astir. I was scratching away, just holding my own, but my time was up. Now when you land a glider one of the first things that you notice after touch down and the speed has bled away, one wing gracefully starts to drop and you sit on the ground at 20 degrees. If however, you forget to lower the gear of the Astir, it has a very fat underside and sits perfectly level advertising to the entire club that you have just fucked up. Fortunately no damage occurred other than to my wallet that night in the bar. Our QFI asked if it was at all likely that I would be making the same mistake again and we both felt that a lesson had been learnt and that a repeat performance was not on the cards. Had I done some damage I am sure that I would have spent the WHOLE summer driving the winch.

Matt

[Chris_F]

The whole time I was looking at those pictures I was thinking "gee, that B-1 sure is a beautiful plane, isn't it?"

A guy makes a thousand perfect landings and everyone always remembers the one "oops".  But this one is a BIG oops!

[BFMF]

That would be one terrible statement of charges. I wonder if their CO smoked them for a while.

How fast can you say "Front, Back, Go!"....?

[beaky]

[quote]GUMP check times three EVERY TIME!!! works if your flying a cessna 172 RG or a 747-400 (minus the props)

downwind abeam the numbers - "Gas Undercarriage Mixture Prop"

base - "Gas Undercarriage Mixture Prop"

Final - "Gas Undercarriage Mixture Prop"

When i fly any General Aviation Retract i make a little placard that says "GEAR" and i stick it on the panel right above the airspeed indicator.

On an aircraft like the B1 i would certainly think it had TAWS / GPWS bitching at them all the way down "Too low gear!"

[Hagar]

I'd say he desrves another chance if his record is otherwise good, but not in that mama... back of the line for him.

Not sure I would be so forgiving. In fact I would throw the book at him. I doubt very much that the USAF has operated any fixed gear types since this chap started basic training so he can't use that as an excuse. There was obviously something very wrong with their operating procedures. I don't care how many warning devices are fitted to the aircraft there is no substitute for correct procedures.

[Brett_Henderson]

That's really amazing. I don't know diddly about B-1 systems, but it's hard to imagine how many systems were either; ignored, turned off or malfunctioned. Other than the Cardinal (I still even check for a wheel in a 172), the last retract plane I flew was an Arrow. This beast was equiped with a seperate pitot-tube and any time the airspeed falls below 80knots, the gear come down whether you remember to do it or not...

My weird school of thought on this is;  This guy is much more likely to NOT commit such an error, as the guy who's never messed up. I'd put him right back in the left seat.

[beefhole]

[quote]
My weird school of thought on this is;

[C]

Surprising to say the least. Certainly in my military experience, before being cleared to land, ATC remind you to check your gear is down if you don't tell them yourself...

...and if it isn't you either put it down very quickly (unlikely) or go around!