Originally Posted by BMWTurboDzl
Thanks !
I can only imagine the stress level during those moments.
There is a famous (notorious?) study that was done during the Vietnam era. Fighter pilots were wired up to measure heart rate/stress.
Landing on the boat caused a higher stress rate than dodging SAMs in combat, or fighting MiGs.
I am here to tell you that the most scared I've ever been was during one particular night landing on a carrier*. Combat was easier.
*It's a bit of a story. Had a massive fuel system failure, leading to a leak of about 1,500#/minute. A tank ruptured, and the airplane was gushing fuel from every possible exit in the skin. I was 100 miles from the boat, at night, with overcast skies, moderate sea state, cold weather. I had 12,000# of fuel. 8 minutes. Not enough to get home at the rate it was bleeding...and the prospect of ejecting into the cold sea dozens of miles away left me with poor survival chances.
I managed to get it controlled by pulling the circuit breaker that controlled the system. RD2. Right side panel, by the pilot's calf, second column, fourth from the top...it should be clear why I can still remember that one...at the point that I got the leak under control, we were 80 miles from the boat. Problem 1: fuel leak, solved.
Problem 2: max landing weight was 6,000# of fuel. We had 12,000#. How to fix that? Can't use AB (not with fuel leaking everywhere...not a good idea to light 30 feet of flame in the vicinity). Can't jettison/dump, because that valve was de-energized by pulling RD2, and pushing it back in was likely to restart the leak.
So, we burned down to 6,000# by flying at full power on the left engine, while we shut down the right. Why shut down the right?
Problem 3: the fuel failure was in management. The system (normally automatic) had forced all the fuel into the left wing/left drop and aft tanks. With RD2 pulled, the system went to isolated operation. Right engine feeds from right/front tanks. Left engine feeds from aft/left tanks. No fuel remained in the right side. Well, about 400# remained, but that's gauge error...and about 500# per engine was needed for a full instrument approach...which I'll get to in a minute.
Problem 4: the limit for the airplane's Center of Gravity (CG) was a 2,000# difference between forward and aft tanks. We had 6,000# aft, and 400# forward. WAY out of CG limits. The airplane was handling poorly. Very unstable in pitch. Right wing down trim required to fly straight.
Problem 5: when this first started, we didn't have enough fuel to make it to the next landing cycle. So, once we had burned down to landing weight, we set up for an emergency landing....
Problem 6: not enough fuel to run the right engine normally for landing. So, I started the right engine (while flying a very precise instrument approach) and left it at idle. The additional hydraulic system powered by the right engine helped with control. But the airplane needed a bunch of left rudder trim to counteract all the thrust from the left with the right at idle... Did I mention that it was unstable in pitch? NOT an easy approach. Not only did I have a messed up airplane, it was at night. In the rain.
Which leads us to...
Problem 7: Because it was an emergency landing, the lens (visual glideslope) did not get turned on in the rush of events. So, when I broke out of the clouds, and was struggling to see the deck, I had no reference. The LSO, Robert John (BJ) Dwyer, talked me down. His calm, precise guidance over the radio was enough to get me in the wires and to a happy ending.
Compared with that night, combat was pretty low stress...
Night carrier landings. I talked about them a bit just on this page. But I wrote a detailed discussion on the anatomy of an F-14 landing in general in this thread years ago.
Cheers,
Astro
Thanks !
I can only imagine the stress level during those moments.
There is a famous (notorious?) study that was done during the Vietnam era. Fighter pilots were wired up to measure heart rate/stress.
Landing on the boat caused a higher stress rate than dodging SAMs in combat, or fighting MiGs.
I am here to tell you that the most scared I've ever been was during one particular night landing on a carrier*. Combat was easier.
*It's a bit of a story. Had a massive fuel system failure, leading to a leak of about 1,500#/minute. A tank ruptured, and the airplane was gushing fuel from every possible exit in the skin. I was 100 miles from the boat, at night, with overcast skies, moderate sea state, cold weather. I had 12,000# of fuel. 8 minutes. Not enough to get home at the rate it was bleeding...and the prospect of ejecting into the cold sea dozens of miles away left me with poor survival chances.
I managed to get it controlled by pulling the circuit breaker that controlled the system. RD2. Right side panel, by the pilot's calf, second column, fourth from the top...it should be clear why I can still remember that one...at the point that I got the leak under control, we were 80 miles from the boat. Problem 1: fuel leak, solved.
Problem 2: max landing weight was 6,000# of fuel. We had 12,000#. How to fix that? Can't use AB (not with fuel leaking everywhere...not a good idea to light 30 feet of flame in the vicinity). Can't jettison/dump, because that valve was de-energized by pulling RD2, and pushing it back in was likely to restart the leak.
So, we burned down to 6,000# by flying at full power on the left engine, while we shut down the right. Why shut down the right?
Problem 3: the fuel failure was in management. The system (normally automatic) had forced all the fuel into the left wing/left drop and aft tanks. With RD2 pulled, the system went to isolated operation. Right engine feeds from right/front tanks. Left engine feeds from aft/left tanks. No fuel remained in the right side. Well, about 400# remained, but that's gauge error...and about 500# per engine was needed for a full instrument approach...which I'll get to in a minute.
Problem 4: the limit for the airplane's Center of Gravity (CG) was a 2,000# difference between forward and aft tanks. We had 6,000# aft, and 400# forward. WAY out of CG limits. The airplane was handling poorly. Very unstable in pitch. Right wing down trim required to fly straight.
Problem 5: when this first started, we didn't have enough fuel to make it to the next landing cycle. So, once we had burned down to landing weight, we set up for an emergency landing....
Problem 6: not enough fuel to run the right engine normally for landing. So, I started the right engine (while flying a very precise instrument approach) and left it at idle. The additional hydraulic system powered by the right engine helped with control. But the airplane needed a bunch of left rudder trim to counteract all the thrust from the left with the right at idle... Did I mention that it was unstable in pitch? NOT an easy approach. Not only did I have a messed up airplane, it was at night. In the rain.
Which leads us to...
Problem 7: Because it was an emergency landing, the lens (visual glideslope) did not get turned on in the rush of events. So, when I broke out of the clouds, and was struggling to see the deck, I had no reference. The LSO, Robert John (BJ) Dwyer, talked me down. His calm, precise guidance over the radio was enough to get me in the wires and to a happy ending.
Compared with that night, combat was pretty low stress...
Night carrier landings. I talked about them a bit just on this page. But I wrote a detailed discussion on the anatomy of an F-14 landing in general in this thread years ago.
Cheers,
Astro
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