Landing with one wing

[Seth K 3]

Landing with one wing.....................................found this in my school forum

If discussed before, plz don't shy to delete it

[Guest Fendy]

wow how did he keep the plane so steady?

[Andrew Yong 0]

Ultimate pilot!!!!!

[S V Choong 4]

F-WWTF....

 

One hell of an experience!

Edited September 6, 2006 by S V Choong

[BC Tam 2]

Literally "flying on a wing and a prayer" I reckon !

[Kevin Teh 0]

salute to the pilot!

[Syaz 0]

cool~ hats off to the pilot i guess

[Imran K. 0]

Holy mother of mercy....

 

That's the "ultimate fighter pilot"...

[William Tee 0]

hahaha.... that's amazing no matter what people say how he did it

[Tony 1]

it just flew like as if it still have both wings attached! Edited September 6, 2006 by Tony

[Andrew Lim 1]

This incident has actually been brought up by Denny Yen just last week in another thread...

 

Anyway, nice to see the pics here...

[Seth K 3]

"I've just read the article, and so the pilot DID notice a strange motion, but did not notice the missing wing until it landed. The whole event still seem rather strange though, because the first thing I'm going to do if I realize a strange motion in my plane is check the instruments and look back to check the control surfaces."

 

Quoted from the site...................not sure about it

[Denny Yen 0]

F15 Wingless Landing

 

On May 1st. 1983, a dogfight training took place between two F-15D's and four A-4N Skyhawks over the skies of the Negev desert in Israel. The F-15D (#957, nicknamed 'Markia Shchakim', 5 killmarks) was used for the training of a new pilot in the squadron. Here is the description of the event as described in "Pressure Suit": "

 

At some point I collided with one of the Skyhawks, at first I didn't realize it. I felt a big strike, and I thought we passed through the jet stream of one of the other aircraft. Before I could react, I saw the big fire ball created by the explosion of the Skyhawk.

 

The radio started to deliver calls saying that the Skyhawk pilot has ejected, and I understood that the fire ball was the Skyhawk, that exploded, and the pilot was ejected automatically. There was a tremendous fuel stream going out of the wing, and I understood it was badly damaged.

 

The aircraft flew without control in a strange spiral. I re-connected the electric control to the control surfaces, and slowly gained control of the aircraft until I was straight and level again. It was clear to me that I should eject. When I gained control I said :

 

"Hey, wait, don't eject yet!". No warning light was on and the navigation computer worked as usual; I just needed a warning light in my panel to indicate that I missed a wing..." The instructor ordered me to eject.

 

The wing is a fuel tank, and the fuel indicator showed 0.000 so I assumed that the jet stream sucked all the fuel out of the other tanks. However, I remembered that the valves operate only in one direction, so that I might have enough fuel to get to the nearest airfield and land. I worked like a machine, wasn't scared and didn't worry. All I knew was: as long as the sucker flies, I'm gonna stay inside. I started to decrease the airspeed, but at that point one wing was not enough.

 

So I went into a spin down and to the right. A second before I decided to eject, I pushed the throttle and lit the afterburner. I gained speed and thus got control of the aircraft again. Next thing I did was lowering the arresting hook.

 

A few seconds later I touched the runway at 260 knots, about twice the recommended speed, and called the tower to erect the emergency recovery net. The hook was torn away from the fuselage because of the high speed, but I managed to stop 10 meters before the net. I turned back to shake the hand of my instructor, who urged me to eject, and then I saw it for the first time - no wing

 

The IAF (Israeli Air Force) contacted McDonnell Douglas and asked for information about the possibility to land an F-15 with one wing . MD replied that this is aero-dynamically impossible, as confirmed by computer simulations... Then they received the photo.... After two months the same F-15 got a new wing and returned to action. This is what "Flight international, 8 June 1985" wrote about the incident:

 

"The most outstanding Eagle save was by a pilot from a foreign air force. During air combat training his two seater F-15 was involved in a mid-air collision with an A-4 Skyhawk. The A-4 crashed, and the Eagle lost its right wing from about 2ft. outboard. After some confusion between the instructor who said eject, and the student who outranked his instructor and said no, the F-15 was landed at its desert base. Touching down at 290 kt, the hook was dropped for an approach and engagement. This slowed the F-15 to 100 kt, when the hook weak link sheared, and the aircraft was then braked conventionally.

 

It is said that the student was later demoted for disobeying his instructor, then promoted for saving the aircraft. McDonnell Douglas attributes the saving of this aircraft to the amount of lift generated by the engine intake/body and "a hell of a good pilot".

Source:

http://tailslide.firelight.dynip.com/f15wing.asp

http://www.uss-bennington.org/phz-nowing-f15.html

[Gavin Andrew David 6]

Wow .

[Azrin A 2]

if a commercial pilot able to land in such one-wingless condition, my salute will go to him.

for fighter pilot ?? yeah, sort of expected or just eject lor

[Teoh Z Yao 0]

Wow... I didn't know it is possible to fly with only one wing... F-15 must have a very good lift with the body itself...

[Azuddin 1]

saw that on TV before, on History channel. History channel got ine of this slot which only explain about aviation, like aviation history, disaster and others.

 

at my first look, it's very unbelievable.

[Lawrence L 0]

Ermmm.... I thought working in aviation sector is very strict and pilots must obey every rules...???

 

 

[Simon 3]

How amazing.....

[zealich 0]

really amazing..talented and outclass his instructor..