Darn animals crossing the rwy on takeoff!

[Meatwod]

Safety is the number one concern in my profession. The term we use is Operationl Safety, Suitablility, and Effectiveness (OSS&E). I am not that fimiliar with emergency landing procedures. I deal exclusively with emergency engine procedures. I would think that the USAF landing procedure puts the safety of people above the aircraft. Often (most recently in Virginia) a pilot has to make a split decision about what to do during an emergency. In Israel, they take off fulled loaded with live ordance and the airports are surrounded by residential areas. There was a significant operational problem with the F-16 PW220 engine that caused low thrust during transfer to SEC mode, which necessitated the pilot drop stores on takeoff in order to maintain altitute. This problem was later corrected, but this just shows how accidents like this lead to changes in operational instructions for pilots and systems design.

[Jedi]

Thank you gents for the comments, very interesting stuff!

[Yassy]

Only thing is you should have landed wheels up. Real would we never land with mains down if the nose is damaged/won't drop. The GAU-8 would dig into the runway and cause the jet to potentially flip.

Yes I was suspecting that would have been the real life procedure. If you look at the size of the 'rod' sticking out of the nose, its not hard to imagine this might cause serious problems upon landing. Hence my remark in my post.
Thanks for confirming!

From my experience with failure management you will often end up in a situation where either more than one checklist might be applicable (often with contradicting steps) or no checklist or procedure has been written at all.
Common sense, also (incorrectly at times) called Airmanship, is what is expected of you in those times.
If there is no time pressure, look for a suitable spot away from built up areas or other hazardous areas for dropping ordnance. Look for lakes or sea. Rural areas with a lot of room, etc.
If there is time pressure or immediate danger for the safe continuation of the flight then you need to react quickly. Hopefully able to asses the situation quick enough and choose the best option in the given situation.

Nobody talked about why my incident happened, though. Is this the old 'rwy vs nosewheel'-bug rearing its ugly head? Or do you think something else happened?

[Rat.NL]

We had a special drop zone on the airfield, but that was just for fuel tanks...

a few years ago i witnessed a birdhit during take-off (F-16) this was during an airshow so the plane could not use the drop zone to drop his tanks.... he did it somewhere over a grass field.... drop not visual on video....
pilot did multiple engine starts and was able to get back safe.... during this sight i really thought he would egress due to the low alt .

after the incident i talked with the crewchief and he was telling me that when it was e rookie pilot he would ejected... the hero of this flight did more then 3 engine starts at traffic pattern alt

[Jedi]

Not trying to hack Yassy's topic but now we're talking birdstrike, is this really simulated?

[Baxter]

Just did a wheels up landing yesterday in IQT, pretty much a non event, the nose never touched the runway. Blew both tires, but with the emergency brake handle pulled I think that can be expected. At the low angle approach called for in the checklist you don't get a tail strike either. Its actually really impressive to see everyone should try at least one gear up landing

[Stuka]

Not trying to hack Yassy's topic but now we're talking birdstrike, is this really simulated?

Yes it is. You can encounter it at low altitudes.
It has to be enabled in the mission. And yes, it is enabled in the Senaki map.

[Jedi]

As real as it gets then, nice!

[Yassy]

Yeah about the blown tires; I was wondering wether the main wheels can still turn inside their bay once they are retracted? Are they being braked by snubbers or are they just winding down?
If they are braked by snubbers I would say they will pretty much always blow up when doing a gear up landing due to the friction and heat buildup.

Birdstrikes; yes they are simulated, but there is a slider in the options where you can define the amount of birdstrikes. No visible birds in the sim, though. Just the incident.
I have it at 0% as a precaution, because I believe the amount of birdstrikes you get are unrealistic (or so I've read).

EDIT: Stuka, is the mission setting seperate from your clients global setting? In other words, if you enable it on the server client will get it no matter their setting? Could it have been a birdstrike then, this afternoon? Must have been an Eagle or so.. shearing off the nosewheel like that.

BTW, Birdstrikes are not something you only encounter on low altitude only (at least in real life). There have been reported birdstrikes as high as FL250 in western Europe.
In the NOTAMS of the Amsterdam FIR you always have two references to birdstrike hazards:
Soaring storks up to FL250 and migrating geese (usually lower level).

[Stuka]

EDIT: Stuka, is the mission setting seperate from your clients global setting? In other words, if you enable it on the server client will get it no matter their setting? Could it have been a birdstrike then, this afternoon? Must have been an Eagle or so.. shearing off the nosewheel like that.

Mission file settings overrule your local settings.
I doubt that was a birdstrike. Never saw it happen on the ground. Had it already a few times shortly after takeoff.