Landing Difficulty
One of the tasks during their flight training that students often encounter the most difficulty with, is landing the airplane. This skill
obviously needs to be learned (and must be reasonably consistent) before a student can be sent solo - an enormous and unforgettable
milestone in a pilot’s career.
When I worked at the Large Fruit Company, there was a pilot discussion channel and I vividly remember one engineer describing
his 100 hours and 500 landings which were required, in the San Francisco Bay Area, to achieve solo in the mighty Cessna 172,
which costs around US$350/hr in the very pricey Bay Area. No one else found this disturbing, but I sure did. A super-bright guy
with a graduate degree from a prestigious college spent US$35,000 to achieve solo - not Private Certificate, just solo - in a docile
nosewheel 172. Where I come from, at least, that’s pretty bizarre.
I mentioned that in 1951 my father’s RCAF flight training class all went solo in 10-12 hours on the North American T-6 (actually
a license-built Harvard, but same thing - a supercharged R-1340 with a constant speed prop and a tailwheel) and none of those
kids had graduate degrees from prestigious colleges. In fact, I would wager that the engineers at the Large Fruit Company
spotted the kids in the RCAF at least 20 IQ points. So, why was learning to fly a gentle 172 so difficult for this collection of
incredibly highly-paid, well-educated self-described geniuses? It seemed pretty obvious to me - their flight instruction was
really terrible. At least, compared to what the RCAF provided in 1951, with their instructors whom were veterans of WWII.
Oddly, the above was not well-received. I guess no one wants to hear that their CFI’s are awful. But I blame the parents. These
super-bright engineers with graduate degrees from prestigious colleges should not be having this much difficulty mastering such
a basic aircraft!
Which brings us to the point of this article. If you’re a student and going around and around in the pattern, getting frustrated because
your learning has plateaued and you cannot land a 172, the problem isn’t you. The problem is that the guy in the right seat doesn’t
know how to help you. Or, doesn’t care. He probably doesn’t have a lot of flight time, doesn’t know much about flight instructing
and is interested in moving on as quickly as he can.
If the student has sufficient basic aptitude at operating motor vehicles (can he drive stick shift? A motorcycle? Can he safely push
a gas lawn mower?) I can generally solve this problem in one lesson. First we need to establish the procedure for flying the pattern
in his trainer in normal wind. A recipe of power and flap settings and airspeeds that result in a consistent approach on final, which
results in a consistent flare, which results in a consistent touchdown, which results in a consistent rollout.
This is super-important: Please don’t be afraid to go around. I see this so often, even in highly experienced pilots, like the 7500TT
guy that ran a Boeing freighter off the end of the runway in Miami and killed 5 people. Don’t push a bad approach into a bad flare.
Don’t try to push a bad flare into a bad landing. Don’t try to push a bad landing into a bad rollout. Yeah, if your last name is Hoover
or Holland you can probably salvage any of the above, but most pilots can’t.
Ok, once we have established “the numbers” for him, it’s time to go flying. But instead of bashing landings, I tell the student we
are going to go low-flying today. Yes, I know, low flying is bad, but we’re going to do it over the runway. I want him to fly down
the runway at one foot and try to STOP the aircraft from landing. I don’t want him to try to land today. No pressure. We’re
going to have some fun, actually (learning factor of effect).
To unload the student, I tell him that I am going to handle the power and flaps and radio and traffic and checklists. All I want him
to do, is fly the aircraft with his hands and feet on the flight controls, and to only LOOK OUTSIDE.
I apply full power, he takes off, turns crosswind and downwind and base. I handle the power and flaps and and do the radio work
and look for traffic. I just want him to fly the aircraft. We turn final and I don’t want him worrying about the power or even airspeed -
just put us on the correct glide path using the PAPI/VASI and drive down final, aligned with the runway. All he does is LOOK OUTSIDE
and flies the airplane with his hands and feet on the flight controls. Pure aviation.
I ask him for a very slow, gradual flare approaching the runway, so he doesn’t get behind the aircraft and starting pitching up and
down. I call out the height in feet as we get close, and ask him to level off at ONE FOOT over the runway, driving down the centerline,
and to try to stay level there - don’t pitch up and down - and NOT LAND. I will add power as required to maintain altitude in ground
effect, with a reasonable pitch attitude.
We do that several times around, and hopefully the student is having a more enjoyable lesson, being able to concentrate on just
flying the aircraft. He is able to concentrate completely on the flare, which in my experience improves remarkably. After he gets
consistent flares, I play a dirty trick on him. When he is nicely established at one foot over the runway, trying to NOT land, I pull
the power, and he will naturally try to gently pitch up to maintain one foot, but with decreasing airspeed we have decreasing lift
and the aircraft sits down in the most beautiful landing, and rolls down the runway. I grin at him.
And there’s the lesson. Teach the student that you don’t land a little airplane - assuming it’s not on fire. You place the aircraft in the
landing attitude at 6 inches above the runway and reduce power and try to STOP IT FROM LANDING.. Airspeed decreases, lift
decreases, and you get a beautiful mains-first landing (in a nose wheel aircraft. In a taildragger, this results in a three point landing).
Once the student masters the flare (without PIO in pitch) and a consistent landing (as described above), then you can start loading
him up with other tasks, that I handled during the flight, as he is able to take them on. From the simple, to the complex. After this
you can probably send him solo very soon afterwards.
—
acboyd@gmail.com Oct 2026