1978 Cessna 310 lands short in Pacific

Ace of Spades.

Glad to see the guy got out OK. Being out over the ocean, out of sight of land, in a small aircraft is a pretty unique feeling…….even with modern avionics. It certainly allows one to appreciate the magnitude of what some of those pioneer interwar aviators achieved, in less reliable a/c, with little or (More usually) nothing in the way of communications or navaids.
.
This guy had the C-130 to formate on him and the knowledge the heli’ was a few minutes away. One can only imagine how it must have felt for Earhart & Noonan failing to find the tiny dot of Howland Island in all the watery vastness of the Pacific….:(

Ace of Spades.

Glad to see the guy got out OK. Being out over the ocean, out of sight of land, in a small aircraft is a pretty unique feeling…….even with modern avionics. It certainly allows one to appreciate the magnitude of what some of those pioneer interwar aviators achieved, in less reliable a/c, with little or (More usually) nothing in the way of communications or navaids.
.
This guy had the C-130 to formate on him and the knowledge the heli’ was a few minutes away. One can only imagine how it must have felt for Earhart & Noonan failing to find the tiny dot of Howland Island in all the watery vastness of the Pacific….:(

Of course you would need ferry tanks to fly to Hawaii. that’s why I said no GA aircraft could do it without them.

“Pop a Falco into a container”? Do you know how they come apart, how they’re disassembled? Apparently not. The numbers were run, including those for a container large enough to hold an intact Falco full-span wing and center fuselage (one piece). Not that I cared, since I’d already sold the airplane to a new owner in Oregon. I was simply an onlooker.

I can’t think of a conventional GA airplane, single or twin, that could make SFO-HNL without ferry tanks. My Falco–not that it was particularly long-range–had to go from Oregon to its new owner in Melbourne via the Atlantic, Europe, North Africa, Middle East, India, Malay Peninsula, PNG and then all the way across Australia because it couldn’t make Hawaii even with extra tankage.

Stepwilk……….

I guess a 310 with tip tanks (I know they all had them) would have had a better range than a Falco.

Just as an aside, would it not have been simpler and cheaper to pop the Falco into a container?

I am not a pilot but if I was and taking on the Pacific I would want ferry tanks and a refuelling probe too……….!!!

Planemike

I can’t think of a conventional GA airplane, single or twin, that could make SFO-HNL without ferry tanks. My Falco–not that it was particularly long-range–had to go from Oregon to its new owner in Melbourne via the Atlantic, Europe, North Africa, Middle East, India, Malay Peninsula, PNG and then all the way across Australia because it couldn’t make Hawaii even with extra tankage.

Is this 310 likely to have been fitted with ferry tanks or were they just relying on the aircraft installed tanks………..??

Planemike

I don’t know about this recent one…not sure of his total flight distance.
Doing the Northern route , we fuel hopped, with standard fuel (including tip tanks), from Alaska to Greenland (Sonderstromm)-Keflavic (Iceland)-Stornaway (Scotland)- ect ect.

Is this 310 likely to have been fitted with ferry tanks or were they just relying on the aircraft’s installed tanks………..??

Planemike

Flew the Pacific in 1983 in my B-25. No GPS in those days. We hit bad weather and wound up down at 1500ft to remain VFR. Add to this a wind issue and we landed with less than 80 gallons which is not much in a Mitchell. Flight planned for 11hrs 20min and took more than 13 hrs..

Is this 310 likely to have been fitted with ferry tanks or were they just relying on the aircraft installed tanks………..??

Planemike

[QUOTE=Stepwilk;1810662]I did it twice in the other direction, in Beagle 206s.

AsI remember–it’s been awhile–the fuel-use sequence is not so much that doing it wrong leaves you with unusable fuel, it’s that if you start using the tip tanks too soon, the fuel-return flow goes to the mains and, if they’re too full, then overboard. So you can “use” substantially more fuel than the engines actually burn.

Quite right Stepwilk, rusty brain now back in memory gear, however we were always into headwinds and accuracy concerning fuel supply was critical.
In the late ’80’s and early ’90’s, around a dozen ferry pilots of various nationalities, were lost crossing west to east in various aeroplanes, including jets. Many of these had fuel problems.

I did it twice in the other direction, in Beagle 206s.

AsI remember–it’s been awhile–the fuel-use sequence is not so much that doing it wrong leaves you with unusable fuel, it’s that if you start using the tip tanks too soon, the fuel-return flow goes to the mains and, if they’re too full, then overboard. So you can “use” substantially more fuel than the engines actually burn.

I think the deal was that you had to burn at least 45 minutes’ of gas out of the mains before touching the tips. Not a big deal.

Keflavik, by the way, is in Icelend, not Greenland, but I imagine that was simply a brain fart.

The successful ditching shows a pilot of competant skill and relative calmness.I have flown ‘the pond’ via Greenland and Iceland in a similar a/c with two on board, and there is a sequence of fuel usage from the tip tanks to the mains which must be strictly adhered to, or you can end up with quiet engines and fuel still in the tanks.
That first sighting of Iceland after leaving Sonderstromm, Greenland, is a very welcome sight. The fuel gauges have had constant tapping, the standard navigation backed up with an early anologue sat/nav are well tested, and the mud baths at Keyflavic airport hotel, Iceland, prove extremely relaxing….still bl..dy dangerous !!!

🙂 Thank you for the answer 🙂

OK, not being a pilot i ask this because i don’t know

Assumedly he was at least at some point at a reasonable cruise altitude–8,500 feet, say–and I’m guessing that he had such a miserable headwind up there that he realized he’d never make it with the fuel remaining. (I read in a U. S. paper that he first admitted the problem when he was 500 miles out.) So maybe his best choice indeed was to slowly drift down with the mixture set at long-range cruise (which he almost certainly had as his setting all the while) and get into ground effect. Ground effect–i.e. within about half a wingspan of the sea, though certainly not necessarily “inches,” as the Daily Mail had it–would reduce drag and therefore let you fly farther on the same amount of fuel.

His fuel flow would have been substantially less at altitude, but his headwind would have been substantially more. So maybe flying in ground effect was the best idea. After all, he came within a comparative hair (13 miles) of making it, while at 500 miles out he figured he wouldn’t.

I have about 500 hours of C310 time, by the way, in a variety of 310s.

Maybe he had read E.K. Gann’s ‘The High and the Mighty’ and thought it might be worth a try.

RB

OK,Not being a pilot i ask this because i don’t know and would be interested in knowing.
Why fly so long so low,one and a half hours .
Does the “ground effect” keep him in the air longer?,
Would climbing use too much fuel compared with the time height would give him to glide and distance able to be covered.
Fuel mixture better at that height ?
Thanks 🙂

Good old Mail, somehow doubt he flew that amount of time at that height lol, no woder he ran out of fuel 😉

Succesfull ditching though, as for text book? I thought you were supposed to land parallel to and not across the swell?

Alls well that ends well, well, all bar for the insurance company and the planes owner.