Posted on 04/03/2021 8:33:33 AM PDT by UMCRevMom@aol.com
When Marine Corps Capt. William Mahoney took off for a routine training flight on June 7, 2014, he was probably just expecting to fly a few hundred miles and use some missiles to shoot down alien spacecraft (…because we get our entire understanding of Marine Corps aviation from Independence Day).
But what Mahoney didn’t know was that his AV-8 Harrier had a landing gear problem that wouldn’t become apparent until the jet alerted him to it in the air.
VIDEO
He flew past the control tower on the USS Bataan and asked the people there to take a look. They let him know that his front landing gear wasn’t down.
For those who aren’t aware, the front landing gear is very important on all aircraft. Jump jets are less susceptible to problems from landing without gear than other aircraft are, but it’s still a very dangerous gamble.
Luckily, the other pilots on the Bataan had a bold idea.
Wait, “crazy” isn’t spelled B-O-L-D.
The crew ran a very nice, custom stool out to the deck and chained it down. Mahoney then flew his jet very slowly toward the stool and bounced the nose of it.
Yeah, he bounces the nose of his multi-million dollar jet on a what is basically a well-dressed stool.
But it worked. Mahoney took a second to breathe and remember how to turn his jet off, and then climbed out to the general praise of his shipmates. You can see the whole landing and an interview with Mahoney in the video at the top.
Harrier jet lands after landing gear malfunctions
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p4JG9Ri_wHc&t=152s
I was expecting something like this...
Same here. I would call it a stand or a rack.
Prolly for maintenence, but what skill!
As for the maneuver, it is clear the catch rig is designed for exactly that and the pilots no doubt practice it. But still not easy and well executed.
I just watched the video interview of the pilot and he did confirm that the “stool” is kept on hand for just this emergency. It’s great somebody planned ahead like that. That was quite a bounce the jet took off the stool — I wonder if there might be any structural damage to the jet from that impact and bounce. It’s interesting that the pilot does not remember that bounce.
It’s not really a ‘stool’.
It looks almost exactly like the ‘jack stands’ we used to support the front of F-4 Phantoms when they were working on the front gear.
Believe me, any kind of regular stool is not going to support the weight of the front of a Harrier.
I just watched the video interview of the pilot. He says that they keep that the stool was made for just such an incident. I wonder how often it gets used.
Great skill, indeed.
Watch the video — it’s very interesting and informative. The jet took a good bounce when it touched down on the stool. The pilot doesn’t remember the bounce!
Landing a jet on a stool bump!
(Another sentence that would only exist on FR) ;)
Good thing the rear landing gear was down or he would have had to land on three stools.
Harriers have to be about the loudest jets I’ve ever heard.
Most any ordinary man would be headed toward one of these.
*Bar stools not included....
Why are they landing a Harrier on the streets of San Francisco?
“Improvise. Adapt. Overcome.”
Semper Fi, Marine!
This is the kind of Marine this country needs, not the ones that the Birdbrain administration wants to replace them with.
Actually that was called a stool about 200+ years ago...
:)
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