COPA's Mike Radomsky Fills ANN Readers In On A
Good Piece Of Flying
Mike wrote ANN today to report that... "Today, I just missed
witnessing a truly great landing."
Local pilot Larry Grippo took off in his P210, N75LG, to do a
little pattern work. When he selected Gear Down, nothing happened.
He informed the tower, who sent him away to some less-busy area to
try to pump the gear down, or whatever else he could do... but
eventually, after nothing worked, he came back to do an intentional
gear-up landing.
By this time, many around the airport were glued to ATC radios.
The thing I heard from everyone was how professional the pilot
sounded. When Larry was on final approach, a fairly large crowd had
gathered to watch. Unfortunately, I arrived at the airport right
then - saw the crowd, but missed the landing itself. From what I
heard, it was just about the sweetest touchdown imaginable. Tower
assigned Rwy 7 - the longest runway. Larry touched down extremely
gently after mixture cutoff and switches off, just a second or two
before. The airplane apparently slid for about 1,000 feet before
coming to a stop. Later, I asked Larry what it felt like.
He said it was gentle but noisy - and he felt the heat radiating
from below. He also saw and smelled smoke, which he thinks was the
oil on the belly (yes, the P210 has it too!), burning off.
This is what I saw:
A short while later, a crane arrived, and after about 45
minutes, the Cessna "took off" again.
I watched and waited, wondering why it was taking so long to
start hauling the airplane away from the runway. I was a long
distance away (these photos were taken at my max. zoom), so I could
only guess that maybe they were defueling. Then, lo and behold...
they put the airplane back down...
... on its wheels! Our local SC owner, Kenny Scherado, had pried
the gear doors open, disconnected the hydraulic lines, and lowered
the gear by hand. By then, he'd also diagnosed the original
problem, which was a failed hydraulic selector valve - that
explained why pumping didn't do anything.
A short while later, I was able to get a close-up shot of the
belly - truly remarkable, given the circumstances.
Finally, this is a shot of Larry, my pilot-hero (shown below),
looking at his baby's almost unblemished bottom.
Hats off to a fellow pilot for remaining cool, calm and
collected, and dealing with an emergency so very well!