OT : Flying a Powered Plane Backwards?!?!

[mungee]

Although this is not directly related to Il-2 Sturmovik/1946 etc, I thought that this audience would find the following true story AMAZING.

To put it all into perspective I can thoroughly recommebnd you reading the background to this - I've detailed it on Ubi.com's IL-2 forum - here's the link:

http://forums.ubi.com/eve/forums/a/t...3/m/9711000897


For those of you who haven't read the background (see above), I've recently had the privilege and honour of meeting a WWII Glider Pilot by the name of Trevor Francis (a veteran of Arnhem etc) and he told me the most incredible story (see above link - I can really recommend that you read it).

Trevor recently gave me some old copies of "The Eagle", the magazine for "The Glider Pilots' Regimental Association") and the following was written by Trevor Francis in one of the issues:

“… the following day I was asked to see if a Halifax could be used in the low tow position without turning the Horsa upside down. I did it and it was no difference to the Lancaster. This was an RAF request.

“Using my favour to them, I asked permission to prove you could fly a power plane backwards, I remember reading it could be done but most of our chaps would not believe it. When we had a 70 mph wind, I took off in a Tiger Moth which took a long time to reach the end of the field where upon doing so, I throttled back to just below 60mph finally reaching where I had taken off from and just landed."

Extract from “The Eagle” – the magazine of ‘The Glider Pilot Regimental Association’

Amazing chap!!! What stories to tell!

[Letum]

Remember when you could exploit the FM in IL2 to land the I16 backwards?

[airmalik]

Great story!

My instructor told me about the time when he took off almost like a helicopter in a strong headwind. I don't think he landed behind the spot he took off from though.

A few weeks ago I was flying into a stiff headwind and tried to see if I could go backwards. My ultralight stalls at 29-30mph. I tried to hold it just above 30mph and looking down I could see myself hovering over the same spot for a while. It seemed like I was going backwards at times but I couldn't be sure. The slowest ground speed my GPS displayed was 9mph. It took me a few moments to realize it was backwards!

cheers!

[Azimech]

The Antonov An-2 is famous for being able to do this. Not only that, it's stall characteristics are a real life saver.

[PeterPanPan]

Talking of wind assisted take-offs and landings, you have to see this video of a Twin Otter landing in a very strong head wind. Incredible ...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JwMlg...eature=related

PPanPan

[mazex]

He he, when I was 16 and taking my glider license back in 1986 we had to do a tow from a nearby field where we had been flying on a "camp" for a week even though it was a storm. Both my teacher and the tow pilot where 60+ and had thousands of hours and said it would be good practice for me as an apprentice I have in my logbook with the entry:

1986-07-12, 50 min, Bergfalke 2/55 "Towed from boras in 90 km/h headwind at 700m, tow speed was 135 so it took ages! Landing circuit was performed by reducing speed to 70 km/h and reversing to end of field at 500m. Then fix the shadow at 90 km/h and descend until the ground effect caused a very unpleasant speed drop while still not moving relative to ground. Stick forward to get relative speed and landing with a roll out of maybe 20 meters..."

This was a school flight (my 14:th start) and my teacher who started flying in 1935 told me stories from the finnish winter war where they hovered the biplanes down on lakes in a similar manner. Reduce speed until the shadow does not move and be prepared to apply throttle when the ground effect kicks in...

[RAF74_Winger]

Good stuff Mazek, I assume that by ground effect you mean the transition into the slower moving air close to the ground, is that correct?

W.