AEROBATICS

 
 I was up practicing aerobatics on this beautiful summer afternoon when it happened.  My engine died and the propeller stopped.... Everything got quiet...... deathly quiet......  Even the wind noise became silent .....That had never happened to me before......There I was.....where just a moment ago everything was peaceful and under control I was now in a life threatening situation.  The nose of the little Cessna I was flying was pointed straight up at the sky. I was about to start falling... tail first... toward the trees and rocks five thousand feet below me.
The problem was that I was caught in the middle of an aerobatic maneuver called the Hammerhead Stall. If you fall tail first the reverse flow of wind over the rudder, elevator and ailerons could tear those control surfaces right off the hinges.  I would loose all control of the airplane. I had to do something....fast... before the unthinkable happened.
     I have loved airplanes since I was a child. I have loved the sense of freedom you get when flying.  Even before I was grammar school age my sister had had to pull me from in front of a landing airplane.  A barnstormer had landed in the field across the road from our house.  We climbed the fence to watch.  When the pilot came in to land they say I was so excited I ran right out in front of the still rolling airplane  I like to loop and roll and dance in the sky. It always put a grin on my face that would last a week .  Even the worst problems I encountered could not wipe that grin off my face.
     Now all airplanes are designed with certain limitations, design limits. This was a light airplane designed for mild aerobatics; loops, barrel rolls, lazy eights, etc. No inverted flight, no high G maneuvers and certainly no hammerhead stalls with the possibility of an inadvertent  tail slide.
     The trick with a Hammerhead Stall is to dive to get up to entry speed then pull up into a vertical climb.  Watch your wing tips to keep them vertical to the horizon.  As the speed falls off you wait until the air speed indicator drops below forty miles an hour, then just at the right moment, get on the right or left rudder hard!!!
If  you do it right the airplane will rotate around it's longitudinal axis in the still air at the top of the climb and head nose down following the same path you used in the climb.....I had waited just a second or so too long. When I hit the rudder nothing happened - it just hung there before starting to slide backward toward the earth....I pulled the control column all the way back to the stops causing the nose to fall back and drop over the top into a vertical dive.  Luckily I still had enough forward speed for that.  Not pretty but it got me out of that problem.   I let the speed build up enough to spin the prop and the engine started again. Needless to say, I flew back to the airport and landed safely.  I lived to fly another day but it was close.
     Some people are fatally attracted to risk in some form or another.  Once in a while they have to have that shot of adrenaline just to feel good about themselves. Some of us have have good enough judgement to avoid such risks. Some people are simply too stupid and take unnecessary risks when there is no chance of succeeding.    Most of us, I suppose, have some combination of the above and  have learned to control our urges most of the time.  It's those gaps in good judgement that get us into trouble.  There is an old saying that's been around airports since the Wright brothers.  "There are old pilots and there are bold pilots but there are no old bold pilots."
Work out a good plan - Stick to that plan - Resist sudden urges.