The entire video is about what is going on at USAF Test Pilot School and worth watching. The F-16 stalls were particularly interesting
F-16 Departing Controlled Flight
- Thread starter tom slick
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Some awesome camera work in there
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So that civilian instructor is probably prior military, huh?
What a great video. I felt nauseous the whole time and loved it!
That guy looks like Nicolas Cage.
What I would give to ride in the back seat of an F-16. I spent a ton of time teaching stall recovery in small airplanes. The F-16 stall recovery looks pretty tame and the design allows the pilot to have good command authority in stalls. I noticed it didn't tend to spin while stalled. That's much better than a couple civilian airplanes I have flown that will enter an incipient spin moments after stalling. That kills a lot of pilots in the pattern then they get distracted and slow.
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https://flighttestmuseum.org/f-117/
Scroll to the bottom to read about “Evil” He’s done a little flying
When I was flying the F-16, they started a program to show line pilots how to recover the jet, instead of just reading about. They had the capability to transfer fuel aft before the event. In an aft CG configuration, the stall and departure is NOT tame or predictable. It was a handful, but it showed us that if the right procedure was used, it would recover. However, my stomach did not recover as quickly.
When the A-7 first appeared in Vietnam, a few aircraft were lost to departures. This usually happened at roll in for a bombing run (Heavy load & high G) and were typically accompanied by very large yaw excursions. (It almost seemed that the aircraft swapped ends). Initially pilots were unfamiliar with the departure characteristics, but departure training was quickly introduced into the RAG training syllabus. Replacement pilots were taught to recognize incipient departure and prevent it or if departure occurs, the proper recovery procedure.
Sounds like an inertial-coupling departure - most high performance airplanes are susceptible when high roll rates are present with high AOA.
And yeah, the F-14 did not have simple departure or recovery procedures. I talked about it in my F-14 questions thread.
The F/A-18 was simple, in comparison, though “falling leaf” mode was no joke and recovery took a long application of the recovery controls.
The recovery procedure for the A-7 was supremely simple . . "Put your hands on your knees and let the aircraft recover." But easier said then done because most pilots want to "Do something" when things go wrong.
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