Mooney in Oz

Congratulations Sean. A beautiful machine. Jack Pelton was the owner of a C195 when he was the CEO of Cessna and he may still own it. That in itself says a lot about the aircraft. Shame you can't have both - one an efficient A to B machine and the other a fun machine. I easily recognise Fredericksburg airport. One of the best places I visited while in the states some years ago.

I see you also have a Department of Stupidity running the show as we have.

What an impact Mike. So glad you are still here and with us to talk about it.

I have been away with work for the last couple of weeks and just catching up with the latest posts when I came across this very sad news. I have never met Bob, but enjoyed reading his insightful posts and his great contribution to the forum and could tell he was a decent human being. I had no idea of his illness and therefore quite shocked to read of his passing. Sharon, I am so sorry for you and your family's loss.

Your pics are stunning and you have a heart of gold.

What can you see as his logic? Why? I've never heard of this before. Maybe @Cody Stallings can help here.

All this talk of landing Mooneys in up to 35 knots of crosswind; please don't forget our Mooneys are only light, single engine aircraft and don't have the inertia of a max landing weight, 650,000 lb Boeing 747. 35 knots is about the same crosswind limitation recommended by Boeing for the 747. A phenomena that has not been mentioned that can be associated with gusty winds from any direction of even less than 35 knots is either overshoot or undershoot sheer. Unless you are landing at a controlled airport, you won't know it's there. Get caught in either, particularly strong undershoot sheer, you will at least be in for the shock of your life if not worse. I'm not exaggerating. Undershoot sheer is also dangerous during the take off phase, as once you clear the tops of the trees or buildings, you are initially battling to climb with our measly powered engines. A slick airframe won't cut it. Ask me how I know. If you are caught out and have a choice, land elsewhere. If you don't have a choice and have to land, good luck and well done if successful. Some days it's better to be grounded.

We immediately lost lift and declared an emergency with ATC who had us on a basic service, lucky we were within distance of a 770ft grass / gravel strip between some solar panel farms. Other than the damage to the elevator and hatch looks like we were extremely lucky to walk away unharmed............With the debris on the wing and the new hole in the fuselage I could feel the extra drag (you can see me fighting the yoke with two hands in the video) the AC wanted to roll right and pitch nose down, it was a challenge to keep her level It reads to me like he did assess the flight characteristics and acted appropriately.

What is DLC?

I've grown to like the white panels you see in 252's.

Very well presented Brad and thank you for sharing. How did the autopilot handle the pitch changes during both stages of flap selection? I particularly like the position of the MCP - ergonomic and easy to reach. A nicely flown approach followed by a smooth landing in rough conditions. Well done!

Looks nice Eli. Love those very late model J's.

Hello Hank. When flying my WX500 equiped Mooney, my idea of navigating around cells in IMC is a 90 degree turn away from the strike area and if that doesn't work then it's another 90 degree turn (180 degree turn back) or land until it passes. When you say between cells I assume you mean when VMC as you have no way of knowing that is where you are heading for in IMC without a real time radar picture. There is also the risk of a lightning strike when between cells if they are active enough. One of only a very few occasions I experienced St. Elmos Fire around the windscreen area at night when tracking between two active cells in a radar equipped airframe. I could just about feel the static electricity. I hated being in that position, but luckily there was no lightning strike event. For those who may not know what St. Elmos Fire is:

The Mooney Service Instruction (M20-93) that authorises removal of the ram air system is only applicable to J models. https://cdn2.hubspot.net/hubfs/4147179/technical_documents/service_instructions/sim20-93-1.pdf

In my experience oil temps or any gauge indication that suddenly springs past its limit and pegs itself is usually a short or grounding issue, although at first it can be unnerving if you didn’t notice it until it was past the end limit and then watch it fluctuate. Years ago I was flying a Piper Chieftain when the left engine oil temp started to slowly creep up as the oil pressure crept slowly down. I was able to keep flying for about another 10 to 15 mins before landing without the need to shut the engine down. Turned out be a major oil leak.

Thanks Toto. Because the Daily Mail is such a trash news outlet, I didn't bother to click the link.

Does anyone else think the guy without the hat looks like HF? I thought it was him when I first saw the pic. The controller definitely contributed to the incident. A telephone conversation should have been the end of the matter.

I did that as part of the engine failure procedure, but the engine did not restart until I was out of the freezing level.

Hello John, Victor here. Hope you are well. Back in 87 when I didn't have much experience in Mooneys, I was flying a 201 from Lightning Ridge to Bankstown at 9,000 feet and above cloud with an OAT of +5 degrees C. I was about 5 minutes from over the top of Mudgee flying along fat, dumb and happy when I entered cloud and had not noticed for a few minutes the OAT drop to -2 degrees C. About to descend, I switched on the pitot heat, but forgot the Ram air was open. After another couple of minutes the engine suddenly stopped when I was directly over the top of Mudgee. I started a shallow spiral descent over the top of Mudgee airport using the NDB as guidance, in cloud with no power and not having a clue what the cloud base was. The grid LSALT in that area is 5,000 feet. I was still in cloud and about to declare a mayday when descending through 6,000 feet the engine suddenly came to life with full power restored. I managed to descend below the freezing level. The experience frightened me so much that I did the VOR approach into Mudgee and landed. I cannot remember whether the Ram Air light was illuminated on the annunciator panel or whether the light even worked. I was reluctant at first to continue to Bankstown but after regaining my confidence and realising I left the Ram air open as the cause, I departed and later landed at Bankstown without further incident. Apart from entering cloud in icing conditions, the three lessons I learnt from the experience is, 1 - it is very easy to forget the Ram air is open, 2 - unintentionally having the Ram air open in icing conditions is highly dangerous and 3 - it is the most useless system on the 201. It makes not a micro of difference to enroute performance and even if not in icing conditions, with it open dust particles or other contaminants can enter directly into the induction system, so I've been told. Those days I flew a number of 201's and since that incident the first item I checked before flying any 201 was the Ram air is closed and it was never, ever again opened in flight. After I bought my own 201 at the first opportunity, I had the Ram air removed in accordance with the SB. Give my regards to Tim and Warren.

You just beat me to it

I hope you do Bill. I'm so sorry to see that your beautiful looking bird was impacted by that tornado.

A sudden and unexpected gust of that magnitude would be quite a handful in a much larger airframe. In a Mooney, it would be near horrendous and I thought you did well to maintain control. Thanks for sharing and a lesson for us all.

Exact same way as you did, Tom.

Like a rooster one day then a feather duster the next

All that is needed as a final defence is to make it habitual after doing a GUMPs or whatever is your preferred memorised flow or even if you don’t have one, is to use a Landing Checklist that includes Gear - Down.