Legacy Hornet F/A-18C Evening Pass LSO PriFly Proficiency with Extended Landing Gear and Tail Hook

Описание: It is common while holding above and waiting for a carrier to begin a recovery to go ahead and drop your tailhook early. Of course you do not drop the landing gear at this time because of the increased drag and necessary slower speed. Dropping the hook does not have any aerodynamic effect like the landing gear, and dropping it early helps to not forget it later.

1. Hook down means you have a “charlie” signal …cleared to come in and land.
2. Wingman can confirm each other’s hook is down and ready for carrier landing.
3. If you forget, and fly past the LSO platform with no hook, the LSO observer/writer calls it out and it is noted in the LSO debrief book AND it costs the pilot a bottle of adult beverage for the end of cruise celebration (unless of course the PC Navy has also spoiled that wonderful tradition too!!

AC could drop the hook at 350 kts but the gear didn’t come down above 220. AC would put the hook down when circling waiting for our “charlie” time. At night AC put it down in Marshall before descending.

There are times when a tail hook can be fouled in some way, though it is not very common.

Primarily, of course, it’s ideal to extend the landing gear before landing.

And given that the landing phase of flight can be a pretty busy time for a pilot, pilots tend to have particular times or places where they choose to extend the aircraft’s landing gear.

For example:
When on an instrument approach, the Final Approach Fix is the location where the aircraft begins its final descent for landing. That turns out to be the perfect location to extend the landing gear for three reasons:
1) It is a known location on every instrument approach.
2) Extending the landing gear will initiate the final descent (in many aircraft without even having to reduce power).
3) Extending the landing gear there helps ensure that the aircraft is configured early for landing.
When landing under Visual Flight Rules (VFR) there are a number of potential different paths that the aircraft might arrive at the airport. The “normal” one involves entering the runway’s traffic pattern on a 45° angle and then turning to parallel the runway. Most pilots will either extend the landing gear when starting on the 45° entry or will extend the landing gear when turning downwind. I’m a proponent of doing it early before reaching the pattern itself. For the same reason as above, to help ensure that the aircraft is configured early for landing.
Sometimes an aircraft landing VFR makes a “straight in” to the active runway. In that case, the pilot will usually pick a point or distance from the runway to complete the pre-landing check and that’s the time to extend the gear.

The point at which a pilot will extend the landing gear often comes with the completion of a Pre-Landing Do / Check List; verifying things like fuel valve on the proper fuel tank, extending the landing gear, setting mixture control, and so forth.

But smart pilots have a “Final Check List” which they perform when the aircraft is maybe 1/2 to 1 mile from the runway threshold. Once again they verify that the landing gear has been successfully extended. the propeller control is set to full pitch, landing flaps are set, landing lights are on, they have been cleared to land, and the runway is empty.

So you see, trying to explain when pilots should extend an aircraft’s landing gear can be a complex issue. The important thing is that each pilot has procedure (like outlined above) for each type of arrival for landing and that they follow the procedure and don’t get sidetracked.

A proficient and safe pilot will never have a problem with “going around” when and if they feel that the aircraft isn’t configured for landing or that the approach isn’t stable.