On Wednesday 26 December 2007 10:21, Detlef Faber wrote: > Am Dienstag, den 25.12.2007, 22:24 +0100 schrieb R. van Steenbergen: > > gerard robin schreef: > > > With an aircraft which has gears retractable , the > > > "landing" on sea can be done smoothly on the belly. > > > TableData "drag" (and "lift") can be given with the best > > > values according to the water reaction. > > > The values regarding landing on ground remains right. > > > We have, only, to select the right TableData according to > > > terrain type, which is easy to do. > > > > The possibility of belly landing an aircraft depends on the > > aircraft type -- an A/C with underwing mounted engines and a > > low wing is impossible to make a graceful belly-ditch (like the > > 737) since the engines would scoop up all the water and cause a > > huge amount of drag (and pitch the nose forward). > > In this case the pilot approaches the water with a slight bank, > so only one engines hits the water. The drag will cause the > aircraft to make a strong yaw-movement, thereby loosing speed and > reducing the tendency to dive nose over. > > This is a standard procedure for emergency landing and has been > successfully (without loss of lives) conducted in the past.
I've seen some footage of a medium-size twin jet airliner ditching just off the coast in just this way and there were _some_ survivors - not many though. The jet quickly yawed towards the engine that touched the water then rolled, ripping both of the wings off. IIRC, it took bout two seconds from starting to yaw to being stationary, on it's side. LeeE ------------------------------------------------------------------------- This SF.net email is sponsored by: Microsoft Defy all challenges. Microsoft(R) Visual Studio 2005. http://clk.atdmt.com/MRT/go/vse0120000070mrt/direct/01/ _______________________________________________ Flightgear-devel mailing list Flightgear-devel@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/flightgear-devel
