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On the 590th landing, I bent a landing gear leg. I took off from I22 and climbed to about 750 feet agl when the engine dropped to an idle. A split connector for the throttle cable had come unscrewed. I was too low to return to the airport so I elected for a crosswind landing in a cornfield that was close to a house and a main road.
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I landed with the cornrows. It did not seem like I hit that hard but the up wind landing gear (right) leg was bent back and up about 4 to 6 inches. There was no damage to the tail feathers.
I caught a ride to the airport where I gathered up some tools. Then I drove home to enlist the help of my wife and son-in-law. The FireFly was pulled forward about fifty feet to a back lawn. |
Each wing was placed on a small pickup truck with the bow toward the cab and so the aileron rested down along the outside of the box. To protect the bottom wing surface, a couple of rugs were used over the tailgate. One strap was put over the bow end and a second across the wing next to the tailgate. A third long strap was hooked onto the middle of the bow strap and ran back over the end of the wing and down to the bumper hitch hole. This kept the wing snug against the cab and prevented the front cross strap from sliding forward off the wing. A bungee cord was used around strut and up to the main spar attachment hole.
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After taking the wings to the hangar, the fuselage was pulled through the back yard to the driveway. The tail feathers were folded. Then the tail was placed in the pickup bed. Two straps were run forward from the tail wheel assembly to the front corners of the box. A third strap as run backwards, over the tailgate and to the bumper trailer hitch hole. The straps forward were made equal length and then the slack was taken up in the trailing strap.
No problems trailing it back to the airport.
Total flight time about five minutes. |
With a little help from Google's map program, this is the approximate path for FireFly flight 590. Green represents normal conditions, and red indicates engine at idle.
The top green dot is just in front of my hangar. The red dot is the final resting spot in the cornfield. After reflecting on this event, I will change my departure procedure. On take off I have been retracting the flaperons at 500 feet agl and reducing the throttle to cruise rpm. And then I would cruise climb to the desired altitude. In the future I will raise the level to 1,000 feet. If I had done this on flight 590 and had continued to climbed up wind, I could have returned to the airport. Also, I would have had a little more time and I might have gotten my flaperons lowered before landing. A few miles slower may have made the difference between bending or not bending a gear leg when landing in a corn stalk field. |
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