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[OM] Re: [OT]... chicken and aircraft, but were afraid to ask..

Subject: [OM] Re: [OT]... chicken and aircraft, but were afraid to ask..
From: AG Schnozz <agschnozz@xxxxxxxxx>
Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 10:10:31 -0800 (PST)
> http://www.arnold.af.mil/aedc/newsreleases/1996/96-052.html

That article reminded me of an "incident" I was involved in
about twenty-five years ago.  My dad and I were doing take-offs
and landings at the TINY airport we hangered at. This one
evening the wind was blowing 15-25 knots out of the west. We
look off on Runway 23, but as we were on our takeoff roll a
couple of deer ran out of the forest (the trees were 75 feet
from either side of the centerline) and across in front of us.
As we flew the pattern we say that about a half dozen of them
took up residence on the runway.  This forced us to land on
Runway 17.  There was a LOT of turbulance and wind-sheer coming
in from the north because of the breaks in the trees and other
terrain issues.  As we approached we caught a windsheer and
dropped almost a hundred feet which took us down almost onto a
field just north of the airport.  We firewalled the engine and
proceeded to weave in between the three trees between us and the
airport (and still needed to clear the power lines).  We made it
around trees one and two but proceeded to plow through tree
three, which happened to be a 90 foot oak.  A five-inch branch
hit squarely on a rib on the left wing and pushed it back three
or four inches. (we knew it was a five-incher because it broke
and was laying across the road). The wing tip was sheered off
and another smaller branch got entangled in the landing gear.
After momentarily flying sideways we managed to make a firm, but
happy landing. The stall warning horn was blaring the entire
time.  As we taxied back to the hanger (dragging a tree branch
behind us) we saw the deer as happy as could be over on the
proper runway.

The damage assement showed that we lost the left wing cap, the
rib just out from the wing strut was destroyed, the left wing
strut was bent (having taken a hefty branch impact itself) the
left brake was shattered, the prop took two nasty notches, the
windscreen was scraped, the left flap was dented and the entire
plane required repainting.

Could have been worse.

Anyway, these planes are built a bit tougher than I ever
expected.  Oh, and there are wierd sounds that a plane makes
when it's going sideways through the air.  I've been up in
aerobatic planes since, and the sound was similar to that during
the first couple turns of a spin or during the recovery of a
hammerhead.  Not only is the plane creaking, but there are wind
sounds on the airframe that just are unnatural.

Imagine my concern when I heard those exact same sounds as a
passenger on a commuter flight.  We cought a wing vortice from
the 737 ahead of us and turned us nearly inverted crossing the
threshold.

I don't fly much these days.

AG

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