Forum: Mishaps

EDWARDS AIR FORCE BASE wrote:

Courtesy of 95th Air Base Wing Public Affairs

3/27/2008 - EDWARDS AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. -- An Air Force A-10 Thunderbolt II made an emergency landing here without its landing gear at 5 p.m. Tuesday.

The aircraft was participating in a Green Flag sortie out of Nellis Air Force Base, Nev. The plane, which had one person aboard, was assigned to the 75th Fighter Squadron at Moody Air Force Base, Ga.

The pilot safely exited the aircraft unharmed and was evaluated by flight surgeons here before being released.

"Edwards is uniquely suited to handle these kinds of in-flight emergencies," said base officials. "Not only do we have first responders who are well-prepared and equipped to work these incidents, Edwards has the benefit of an enormous lakebed, which can provide a soft landing for any aircraft in distress."

Although a lakebed landing was an option, the A-10 performed a landing on the base's primary landing strip, Runway 22, officials said.

A board of officers will investigate the incident.

Source: http://www.edwards.af.mil/news/story.as ... =123091878

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Is there an airplane better suited for a wheels up landing than an A-10? Especially with the wings full of empty pylons.

Back in the late 70s, with F-16s being built in Fort Worth, Belgium, and the Netherlands, General Dynamics had a Convair 880 for weekly shuttle service to all three factories. On a refueling stop in Newfoundland, the right main gear wouldn't extend, so the landed with it up. Then jacked the airplane, dropped the gear, pinned it, refueled, and continued on to Fort Worth. Shocked

Wheels on an A-10 protrude from the well/sponsons when retracted for this very reason.

Some photos of the incident.

CAPTION: An A-10 from the 75th Fighter Squadron at Moody Air Force Base, Ga., sits on Runway 22 after making an emergency landing here Tuesday. The A-10 landed at Edwards with its landing gear in the up position after declaring an in-flight emergency. (Air Force photo by Brad White)

How the hell did that gun get jacked but nothing else?

Looks like wheel chocks on the right main.

Oh yeah....gotta chock it. Wouldn't want that mammajamma to go rollin' off all by itself now, would ya? Laughing

Salute!

Another great plane to land gear up was the A-37.

We had two like that in 1968. Was there for one at Pleiku and it was a piece of cake.

When the dude couldn't get one of the mains down, raised gear. As in the Viper, if the air bottle couldn't get all the gear down, you were stuck with nose gear down and one or none of the mains down. Could not retract the nose gear once you used the air bottle. He then did the "belly landing" trick.

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Short war story:

When I tried re-cycling the gear in my Viper incident, nose gear came up, but one main was still stuck down. So put handle back down and nose gear came down, but now the other main was stuck up, and the original problem main was still down. This was the worst case for a landing attempt, versus mains only or nose only. I quit when ahead. Then got the offending one down pulling gees.
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Anyway, the A-37 guy landed real easy on his drop tanks and the speed brake (just ahead of nose gear). Ground down the speed brake and drop tanks. Plane flew a day or so later, once they got a new speed brake panel. you must realize our touchdown speed was 70-75 knots, so a gentle touchdown and firm rudder application to keep nose st ahead were the only requirements.

later,

Those are wheel chocks Smile

akruse21 wrote:

How the hell did that gun get jacked but nothing else?

Does anybody else see the gun damage?

T-37s do a good gear-up landing too. Intentional or otherwise. Laughing

One day at Carswell about a million years ago, an ACES T-37 from the friendly ATC Det was in the pattern with a B-52 guy in the other seat.

They were deciding on if they wanted to go around again or land, and they decided to land. Somehow in the cockpit workload scenario the gear didn't get put down. I'll scan in the photo and post it when my household goods arrive. Laughing

akruse21 wrote:

How the hell did that gun get jacked but nothing else?

Does anybody else see the gun damage?

Yeah, seems a little weird doesn`t it? Could have been the result of the bumpy landing! Does the whole Avenger cannon get pulled out through the front for maintenance? Looks like it is further forward than it should be, could it have been jolted forward?

With a load of internal ammo, maybe so.

While firing the gun, the word is that it blew up, and this led to the events of the gear up landing. So I heard...

Man, that whole flight wasn't any fun!!! Embarassed

Forum: Mishaps

A-10 makes wheels-up landing at Edwards