Simulated Engine Failure On Climb Out| PA28

There is a big debate among pilots as to whether students should be taught how to land with a tailwind. Putting aside choosing whether to accept a tailwind landing if issued one by ATC, what if you had no choice? What if you are faced with an engine failure on your climb out?

In this video I show Carlos that it is possible at 1,000 feet to turn the aircraft around and land on the opposite runway, just like we brief in the takeoff briefing.

NOTE: Precautions were taken to ensure that we were safe to practice this type of landing.

[revmatch]

"A little high.." that is a great problem to have! I have never tried this and now I really need too! Awesome exercise!

[danharrodian]

Good job on this video. Did my first sim engine out about 6 weeks back before my first solo and as the man says: do not attempt the turn back at low altitude, your life could hang in the balance as a result. Excellent series. Love watching.

[Windtee]

Fun way to challenge your student while building his confidence! Cool demo!

[AeroRamer]

I will have to plan a visit there to say hi soon. I made it down to Apopka a few months ago to visit a friend and check out his Lancair.

[gregellis]

Nicely done Lewis. You can actually practice various scenarios at a much higher altitude. Just set a hard deck so to speak and see if you can make the turn to reverse course back to whatever you have arbitrarily set your runway heading to be. You can try it at various altitudes above that hard deck and see when you cannot seem to make it anymore. That way you are practicing at a safe altitude. And add the 3-5 seconds for the OMG moment that others have mentioned. Makes a huge difference. By the time you nose over to keep your speed at the proper glide speed you will be below your 1000 foot minimum possibly before you even start the turn.

[Iron]

Nice video! Let me know when you are near Vero Beach so we can go out for a flight!

[jamesmharvey]

Great video and definitely good to be familiar with.

[coreyjordan]

Man, that was really good. Very educational for flight training to be posted. I enjoy that. Good learning tool. Question: Do all planes have a 1000 feet minimum for "Simulated engine failure" practice? or is only on training planes. I was also thinking. I would have to look in the aircraft manual for each different plane to find out. Again, thank LewDix. You are man!

[apromero]

Interesting video. My issue with the "impossible turn" and the conventional wisdom not to make the turn is that it more or less ignores all other factors when it's really just boils down to altitude vs distance as this video more or less shows. It's not always impossible but there are a number of other complexities that go into it such as the aircraft climb/descent performance, density altitude, airport elevation, local obstacles, runway length, Vx vs Vy vs enroute climb, airspeed, turn radius, stall speed, selected departure, etc all play a part so I assume that's one of the primary reason students are taught not to do it; I imagine a low time pilot would struggle managing all those variables plus flying the aircraft with sufficient accuracy, especially in the turn, to land safely.

Additionally, both low and high time pilots have been lulled into the sense they can make it having that runway environment in sight and they have tried to extend their glide often with disastrous results. As others have said, if you let that airspeed decay even a tiny bit, especially while you are in a turn, you are quickly approaching a low altitude incipient spin that cant be recovered with enough altitude to avoid going splat on the ground... Only question in that scenario is whether its a big no survivor splat or a significant injuries/time in hospital splat. In that case, I assume the teaching is on the basis you are removing any decision to try to reach the field and committing to landing off-field and in so doing you are more likely to accept where the plane is going to land and not try to extend the glide.

In your case, knowing you've made the turn before also introduces a bias that could turn deadly in an actual emergency.

Like other's I'd be interested in seeing how a few seconds delay detecting and deciding how to respond to the incident makes a difference. I'd go further and say you should play with other portions as well. How does DenAlt affect your ability to perform this maneuver? How does the plane respond to a wingover or half lazy 8 which, while normally powered, is supposed to reverse course without altitude or speed loss? What about turning a cross wind at 700 AGL? How about extending the reaction time even beyond the 6 seconds to 12 or 15 as many fall prey to denial, indecision or wrong decisions such as trying to restart the engine? How about a Vx or Vy departure or something closer to a cruise/enroute climb speed?

[dennisking]

I’m a student pilot. What do you do if you don’t have a 1000 ft agl to work with ? Divert to a field road etc ?

[UPS]

Does cutting the power properly simulate the drag of a dead engine? Prop spinning in wind or stuck in one position.

[hardyje]

Why don’t people climb out at Vx every time? Doesn’t that give the best margin for turn back? I don’t understand why that’s not std op procedure. What am I missing?

[Ichibuns]

I nailed this in simulator on my second try right after smashing into a mountain. It's possible but is it really worth it if you can land in a field in front of you? The Impossible Turn could kill you with just a few gusts of wind that kill your forward momentum

[MegaBuckBuck]

Like your style.  I would like to see you add an additional 2 or 3 seconds to your reaction time, following your engine failure at 1000 AGL,  before you turn back.  Reason, because when it really happens, it'll take that before someone actually initiates the turn versus your instant reaction and turn.  You knew it was going to happen.  Can you do that on another video?  btw, love your work dude.

[inflying]

Another vote for the delayed reaction but good stuff as usual . Where do you find your music tracks ?

[spelldaddy]

Wouldn't it be more realistic to follow a normal traffic pattern for this maneuver? Usually you would turn crosswind before 1, 000 feet, so why not turn crosswind as normal until you cut power? I'd imagine if anything it would be easier to get back, because you would be closer to the runway and have less of a turn to make.

[andrescepeda]

This is a great airport to practice whatever u want I did my first solo back in 2013 in that airport... nice (Y)

[feetgoaroundfullflapsC]

First thing. Put a clear blue line on Vglide Speed. That way is easier and safer. I use blue plastic tape. China markers not clear enough..

[dundabird]

I didn't know they'd discovered flight in Lancashire yet

[howardflies]

Another one that is good to practice is an engine failure on crosswind above 700 feet, that one is more realistic