Sketch landings

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andrew_j

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My 20 yr old daughter a thrill seeker typically, got scared on a landing with RyanAir to Madeira Portugal(island off coast of Morocco).

The plane circled first for 15 mins and then attempted a landing with plane making sounds and going in at angle. Touched wheels and had to do second attempt.

I peeked online and found this
 
That is a crazy airport. The runway was lengthened with a platform, and traffic to from the airport goes under that platform. Plus it’s named for Cristiano Ronaldo.
 
Madeira is well known for strong winds. It’s not alone in that regard.

My first landing in Keflavik was in 1/2 mile visibility, 200 foot ceilings, rain and with winds at 140 at 36 knots gusting to 49 knots.
 
andrew_j said:
My 20 yr old daughter a thrill seeker typically, got scared on a landing with RyanAir to Madeira Portugal(island off coast of Morocco).

The plane circled first for 15 mins and then attempted a landing with plane making sounds and going in at angle. Touched wheels and had to do second attempt.

I peeked online and found this
Click to expand...

Not sure what making sounds means. In high wind conditions, you’ll carry more power, so, perhaps the “making sounds” means she heard that the engine thrust was higher.

“Coming in at an angle” - well, if by angle, she means crabbing, then yeah, you have to crab with strong crosswind. The airplane ground track needs to be on runway centerline. If the wind is pushing the airplane off that centerline, you angle the airplane so that some portion of the airplane velocity is countering that lateral drift. The nose of the airplane is pointing into the wind.

But, you don’t really want to touchdown in a crab, where the nose of the airplane is pointed in a significantly different direction than the runway, because that angular difference at the moment of touchdown will put a large side load/force on the landing gear.

So, at some point (and I do this below 50 feet, some folks do it at several hundred feet), you transition from crab (wings level, nose pointing into the wind) to a slip. In a slip, you have a lot of rudder, and a lot of opposite aileron, and you dip the wing into the wind, so that the lift component is what counters the crosswind drift.

The nose is now aligned with the runway (and so are the tires on the landing gear) and the drift is managed and you touchdown with the upwind wing being lower than the other. There are limits to this. On the Boeings I’ve flown, above roughly 25 knots of crosswind component, you accept a bit of crab, and limit the slip so that you don’t risk hitting the engine on that upwind (wing low) side.

So, I reckon the pilot on your daughter’s flight was facing a very strong crosswind, and was holding the slip for a while.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crosswind_landing
 
Allow me to add, nothing “sketch” about carrying extra power and speed, and using a slip, in high wind conditions.

If they circled for 15 minutes, I imagine the winds were right at the aircraft limits, perhaps slightly above, and they were waiting for a wind report within the aircraft limits.
 
I have seen this video before.

As previously mentioned, it’s a no-no to ever push forward in the flare ( because of a bounce , or because the aircraft is floating and the pilot tries to force the aircraft onto the runway ) like in this video.

Very strong headwinds ( notice wind sock in the video ) can make the Airbus more susceptible to floating because of the extra speed it automatically adds due to “ ground speed mini”.

Ground speed mini can be very high on final approach until close to the runway.

I landed in St Johns NFLD two weeks ago with 58 knot surface winds ( cargo doors cannot be opened….40 knot limit ) and the approach speed was 172 knots ( 5 knots below full flap speed ) while the Vref ( VAPP ) was 136 knots.

That’s the highest GS mini I have ever seen on the Airbus in 24 years.

Flare, if it floats, neutralize the stick and let it settle, don’t push forward.

Edit: the approach speed was very high due to GS mini , well below 1000 feet when we normally cannot fly that fast ( above Vref ) due to the requirement to meet one of our stable landing gates but we are allowed if ground speed mini is active due to very strong headwinds. GS doesn’t add any extra speed with 90 degree crosswinds. Strongest crosswind ( also in the maritimes ) was 35 knots ( max recommended is 38 knots but it’s not a limit ) I landed in but GS doesn’t add speed in a 90 degree crosswind.

P.E.I. and NFLD are the strongest surface winds , and GS mini, I have seen on the Airbus.

NFLD is an unusual place because you can have very high winds with fog and low ceilings which make it hard to get in because of auto pilot auto land surface winds limits by Airbus.

Airbus just increased the surface wind limits for auto land ( HW and CW but we are limited to 15 knots CW still by the FAA in the u.s ) which helps out a lot in NFLD.
 
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If this was Ryanair then the aircraft was a 737, not an A320.
Looks like he drove the nose into the runway pretty hard and was lucky not to break something with disastrous results as opposed to the successful rollout this plane made.
 
She took a video inside and plane was rocking all about with passengers bracing. The pilot mentioned it was going to be difficult landing however half their pilots on RyanAir including himself train specifically for a Madeira landing.

She has been flying every weekend somewhere in Europe since early Feb, this was abnormal for her.
 
andrew_j said:
She took a video inside and plane was rocking all about with passengers bracing. The pilot mentioned it was going to be difficult landing however half their pilots on RyanAir including himself train specifically for a Madeira landing.

She has been flying every weekend somewhere in Europe since early Feb, this was abnormal for her.
Click to expand...
Lots of nervous passengers, even more so today given the news.

As a Captain, I would never tell passengers any landing will be difficult, even if it’s true.

Flew on another Canadian airline and the Captain told us over the PA that it was going to be the FO’s first landing.

Now, if I had to make an emergency landing ( loss of braking, partial extension of landing gear, etc ) due to mechanical problems, I am obligated to have the FA brief the passengers for an abnormal landing which would involve making two PA prior to landing ( emergency station, brace for landing at 500 feet ).

If the passengers don’t assume the brace position, they could get hurt while just telling them a normal landing will be difficult will scare many of them.
 
Just a civilian pilot said:
Lots of nervous passengers, even more so today given the news.

As a Captain, I would never tell passengers any landing will be difficult, even if it’s true.

Flew on another Canadian airline and the Captain told us over the PA that it was going to be the FO’s first landing.

Now, if I had to make an emergency landing ( loss of braking, partial extension of landing gear, etc ) due to mechanical problems, I am obligated to have the FA brief the passengers for an abnormal landing which would involve making two PA prior to landing ( emergency station, brace for landing at 500 feet ).
Click to expand...

Most passengers know it’s going to be a rough landing, so yeah it’s probably not a good idea to remind anyone of it.

I haven’t really dealt with many rough landings. The only one that sticks out was one at OAK on WN. It was raining and windy, and it was just buffeting all over the place. There was a lot applause when we landed, and I might have been the first. I would hope that the pilots were cool under pressure, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they weren’t feeling a bit of pressure.
 
That video wasn't from the actual landing it was 8 months ago?
might be some of the confusion.
 
Two topics here-

1. The landing the OP’s daughter experienced

2. The landing in the video the OP posted.

They are not the same. In fact, they aren’t really related, except that both took place in Madeira, because they took place under different conditions.
 
I've been on a flight into Madeira and it was interesting. It's the sort of landing that I imagine nearly always results in a round of applause for the flight crew.
 
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