This takeoff was filmed in the village of Frijol, Venezuela, but I've known a few like it in parts of Africa. Definitely butt-clenching stuff!
The pilot describes it like this:
Because of the uneven strip at the end it is hard to get turned around and not get stuck in the mud. With a good size hump at each end I take off down hill and get in the air using ground effect to get out of the water and mud. Then stay right down in ground effect and get all the speed I can before the end. Most the time I can get all the way up to 65 MPH and that is 5 mph over stall speed and then you are never going over the mountain so I turn between the trees and head out. After you pull it out of there you have to keep nose down and let air speed build up and then you can climb. I had a C-172 in there a few times before aquiring the current C-182 and the first time it took me a while to figure out how to get back out of there. Did it the same way I take off now with the 182. Just lots better with the [more powerful] 182!!!
After experiencing that sort of thing a few times, no commercial airliner takeoff has ever seemed particularly challenging . . .
Peter
5 comments:
Yeah, that's an underwear eater of a take off.
Hell on the nose gear.
That'll keep you on your toes. I've never taken a 182 out of anything quite that tight.
There is a reason why I never ever hopped in an "avioneta" when I lived in Venezuela: The pilots are all nuts.
I had a pilot friend who said that in some areas, you could go collect spare 172 parts in the wild...where they crashed.
I remember working with a guy who had his commercial tag.
He flew some combine part out one time and got into a spot and the got part out. they put the old part on board and he truned around to take off. Dialed up 40 degrees of flap which got him in the air, but not able to climb. He dialed the flaps off as he gained speed and just missed the tree line at the edge of the field.
Functionaly he was at that point a test pilot as the manual did not ever want more that 10 degrees of flap on take off.
Cessena 140 was the airframe as I recall.
Little planes take a lot more risks.
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