You sure are right about short and soft takeoffs and landings as the "revealing item" for examiners and CFIs. Often the problem is an inexperienced CFI who teaches these maneuvers the way they learned them (in school) with little further study or real life experience. These are usually acceptable for training and testing (maybe not suitable for the "real world" without some tuning-up). The new FAA Airplane Flying Handbook (FAA 8083-3A) has great information on these maneuvers and gives excellent guidance and a common standard to follow.

Unfortunately, the more common problem I've seen in short and soft takeoffs and landings come from experienced instructors who teach a "very unique" cowboy technique that fails to meet the FAA standards and is often borderline hazardous. These maneuvers are called "maximum performance" for a reason.  We are usually at the edge of the aircraft performance envelope and the margin of safety is thinner. (I bet you know where this is going)

I recently had an applicant demonstrate the famous "stall-down" decelerating landing but misjudged it by about 5 feet. We landed so hard I thought the wheels were going to go rolling in each direction. In this "maneuver" the nose is progressively raised as the power is increased to climb the induced side of the drag curve. The aircraft keeps descending of course but this must be done exactly right to keep a massive sink rate from developing. 

Once you are committed to this event in a small plane you can neither power out of it nor lower the nose to get energy and recover....don't try this! (It was a physical illustration of the old Navy CFI axiom: "the fastest and slowest speed you can fly an airplane are with full power.") He said his instructor taught it this way! Stabilized with a safety margin is the key. Personally, I never get to the point in the power curve or with terrain where you absolutely "have to make it".

David St. George, MCFI, DPE
Ithaca, NY
david@myfbo.com

Click HERE to return to the current issue of "Over the Airwaves"