Soft Landing

[+Fates]

 

To quote the guy whos showed the pics:

 

"Basically, the nose landing gear wouldn't come down. Fortunately the Harrier has a 'backup' system that uses a nitrogen bottle to blow the gear down in this event.

 

Unfortunately the pilots "boss" ordered him not to blow the gear down (which is the specified emergency procedure) because (by the bosses reasoning) if the nose landing gear still didn't come down, there was a risk that the aircraft would break its back by having all that weight on the long nose of the aircraft. The boss, apparently having jumped on a lot of beds as a kid, arranged for a pile of bed mattresses to be collected and strapped down to support the extended nose of the aircraft, and the pilot then landed on the mattresses.

 

'Normally' a Harrier that cannot get it's gear to come down will select U/C up and do a vertical landing on the strakes/gun pack, they'll jack the aircraft up, fix the landing gear, and it's back to flying rather quickly. In this case, the jet engine sucked in some of the mattresses and was trashed by mattress springs and everything else being sucked in. This has since become a legendary event in the Harrier community (rather small community) and is laughed about often.

 

The best part was, when they jacked the aircraft up in the hangar and pulled the gear handle to blow them down, all 4 came down and locked in place

 

Always trust your emergency equipment...its there for a reason.

[Silverbolt]

well, somebody is watching too much cartoon....why put mattress under the harrier?

lol

[+76.IAP-Blackbird]

if my emergency procedure says bomb the landing gear I would do it... It`s there for a reason

[+Fubar512]

Ah! The old SPS (Serta Perfect Sleeper) backup landing system.

[Nesher]

ohhh my god LOL :)

at least he survived!

[ONETINSOLDIER]

A harrier jump-jet....$40,000,000,000,00,00

Training for fearless pilot....$12,000,000,000,000

A motel6 next to the base with a bunch of extra mattresses......PRICELESS

[MAKO69]

I'm sure the pilot in command had to write a pretty interesting IDC on that wonder thought.