The Wake: Invisible Gremlin Grabs Your Attention

As Ed, my safety pilot, was not rated in taildraggers, I asked him to allow me to take over—“My plane, Ed.” I was happy to have an excuse to take over as the conditions couldn’t be better. The air was still and smooth, and the fields of Michigan started the metamorphosis from yellowish green to dark blue as the sun was going down.

I got close to Jim, at his 5. The PT is a steady platform—and so is Jim. It was so easy to keep formation under these conditions. I flashed a wide grin on my face since this was one of those why-I-fly moments. The airport was in sight, and I heard Jim calling on the CTAF: “Niles traffic, flight of two, Fairchild and Cessna 170 entering left downwind for Runway 33.” Fairchild and C170—how cool does that sound? Grinning again.

I am well aware of the dangers of wake turbulence. We are constantly drilled about that in the airline world, and being based in Hong Kong, one of the busiest airports in the world, is something that is part of my daily airline life. I am also aware that any airplane can create wake turbulence.

I have seen the video of the fatal accident of a Robin DR400 that was taking off after the departure of an Antonov An-2. 

The Robin got into the An-2 vortices and flipped over to the right. He didn’t stand a chance—sad accident. The postaccident investigation included tests with smoke proving that the vortices of the An-2 were invisible killers.

With all that in mind, I started my prelanding flow, fuel selector on both, carburetor heat on, slowed down for flaps speed, and pulled the Johnson bar to the second notch, flaps 20. I could see Jim quickly starting to move farther from me. I allowed what I thought would be enough separation. He was probably a good 45 seconds ahead or more, lower, and turning to final. I started my base turn, keeping in mind to stay above his profile to avoid the possible wake turbulence.

So far, so good. From that moment, I didn’t think about his wake anymore. Instead, I was focused on enjoying my landing, forecasting a perfect “greaser” to impress Ed in the right seat.

Jim was already on the runway. He did a long landing as he didn’t know how close I was behind, which would be a key factor for what was coming next.

The needle on the speed indicator was pointing to the 60 mph mark. I am usually at 50 on final and down to 40 over the numbers, but I was flying without the door, and I prefer to come faster to compensate for the additional drag. That probably saved us from what happened next.

I am unsure about the exact height, but it was probably under 100 feet and closer to 50 agl. I had my eyes focused on the runway and ready to slow down for the flare when I felt it—the wake.

Suddenly in the perfectly calm afternoon, the air disappeared from under the wings. You couldn’t miss that feeling—we were being sucked down. I immediately punched the throttle full forward and pushed the nose down. One second later, the left wing dropped 45 degrees, and we turned toward the 50-foot trees surrounding the runway. I realized immediately that we were caught by the vortices of the wake turbulence of Jim’s PT, and things were not looking good for us.

It’s amazing how the brain switches immediately to survival mode in a situation like this one. Adrenaline kicks in, and suddenly you are processing multiple options in a fraction of a second. The first memory item for this kind of situation popped into my mind—“WTF!” And I am pretty sure I said that aloud. In automatic mode, you access your library of experience and training and run several options in less than a second, and that was all we had to correct the situation.

We were low in a hard bank to the left on a low energy situation. Already at full throttle, I knew that trying to pitch up for a go-around was going to end in a stall-spin situation. I could see the headline: “Another pilot goes into a spin after pulling the nose up and stalls his plane.” Push the nose down! Do you know how big a runway looks when your nose is down at 50 feet or less?

Second, hit the rudder first, not the aileron. Do not stall the wing. Luckily my survival instincts were kicking in the right direction. Full throttle, right rudder, and finally, full right aileron to the stop—keep it coordinated. To be honest, there was almost no aileron control. At that point, I thought we were going to bend metal, and I knew we needed to hit the ground with wings level—it would probably be a very hard landing but a survivable one.

We were not yet out of the woods. The invisible gremlin that was holding us decided next to drop our right wing. There I was again at full left rudder and aileron. Suddenly at 10 feet, calm. We were out! I could immediately feel the still air again under the wings. We were still on the centerline, wings level, and full power. I quickly pulled the throttle, leveled off, and held the elevator back. Next came that beautiful feeling of the slow-motion first turns of the wheels when kissing the asphalt. That sensation was particularly sweet this time.

Trying to not sound too shaky, I tell Ed, “Sorry about that.” He replies, “That’s OK.” I think he never realized how close we were to an accident.

While I was still rolling on the runway, my mind was already in debrief mode. How did this happen?

Wind calm, 50-foot trees on both sides of the runway, and a long landing by Jim with the PT. The trap was set. Those vortices were just floating, hanging on at 50 feet over the threshold, just waiting for us to fly into them.

I have been flying for over 20 years, 14,000 hours, and I never felt so close to making the news or having to call the insurance company. The whole event probably lasted less than three seconds—three very…long…seconds.

This column first appeared in the October Issue 951 of the FLYING print edition.