Emergency: Unsafe Landing Gear - Debrief + Takeaways
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 30 พ.ค. 2024
- We're mostly happy about how we handled this situation, but some things could have been better
Thank you to Katie for being willing to share this one!
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I recently had the honour of flying with Chops in FCGA (after this incident). He is just as detailed on unscripted briefs and debriefs as he is in these videos. Perhaps one of the best flying experiences I've had to date (including experiencing a solid hammerhead). I'm an RG plane owner, so this video brought some great insight into having a gear emergency... which is an experience I have yet to have. Thanks for breaking this down Steve!
As a former airport firefighter, I can confidently say that we never felt put upon to roll on an incident like this. It's our job and we like doing it.
Working as a controller, you can just tell that fire crews enjoy finally getting to respond to something other than faulty terminal smoke detectors
Retired fire, I concur! We love to work!
As A Retired Structural FF and Pilot. That is always good to hear.
Well done! That was me working Ground Frequency at 7:29 and I remember when this happened. Great lesson for everyone
i work in emergency services and we are never upset when we roll resources and it turns out to be nothing, we get grumpy when people don't call in the first place because they think something isn't a big deal
Real time practice is always a good thing!
Great to see an old school Flight Chops real debrief video! In retrospect there's always going to be things you could have done better, but I think y'all did an amazing job. Kept your heads and worked the problem. I'm glad that the outcome was positive!
This is a good reason to know your systems. Mooney's are a linking system and that between the seats lighted flag is actually connected to the linkages. So it is proof positive that the gear is down. The other important part, and could be a reason for a collapse, is the triangular cams that lock the gear into place. It takes a specialized tool to adjust and a torque spec. But those are two different types of problems. The flag between the seats is proof positive that the gear is down. Making sure that the proper torque pressure is on the springs is what "locks" the gear in place. This is why you want to go to a mechanic with Mooney experience.
My Mooney has the one piece belly. Which makes it easy to take off and expose all the control push rods and linkages. I just spent the last two days cleaning and lubing all the connections. Also getting my head around what all the linkages go to.
I think you were ok with not declaring; everybody was very well informed and handled it just right. Your thoughts about not shutting down were valid, but count yourselves very fortunate that this was the biggest issue to come out of the debrief. And I have to say that in my opinion, this is one of the best video productions you've ever done, on many different levels. 👍
Good job! Thanks for the video - it’s good for all of us to think this through
I recently had my first emergency last Friday over at KBIL and it was a great learning experence for me. I made some good choices but also some incredibly poor choices . Plane had just come out of maintenance and after a 1.4 hour test flight i deemed everything to be working correctly. Decided to take a trip back to where my family was so took off from KVUO to KFSD with a stop at KBIL for fuel. First leg of the trip was uneventful and the plane seemed to be working great. After eating lunch and fueling up for the last leg i started the engine and noticed it was running a tad rougher then it had when we left but in my ignorance i chalked it up to us being at a higher elevation "KVUO is at sea level and KBIL is at 3400 feet". During the run up the plane seemed to be running as expected and no issues where detected, we were cleared for take off and started the takeoff roll. We had a 20 knot head wind and were able to get up to 60 knots pretty quick however this is when I noticed things weren't right. My Turbo Arrow's rotation speed is 70-75 knots depending on weight and after getting to 60 pretty quick it was struggling to get to rotation. In hind sight i should have aborted takeoff but i tried to justify it as an elevation issue even tho my plane is turbocharged. I eventually got to VR and got off the ground but i was getting incredibly poor performance of 400-500 feet per min climb. Tower had us turn to 330 and handed us over to Approach, as we checked into Approach the engine experienced a hiccup and power loss mixing this with the lack of performance for take off and climb performance i knew this engine was no longer trust worthy and i needed to get back. I turned back to the airport and contacted approach saying we needed to come back to the airport . KBIL declared an emergency on our behalf and cleared us to land on any runway and shut down the airport for us and even rolled the trucks. Luckily i was able to get the plane back on the ground safely and with no other issues. Once on the ground we asked to go to an area to try and troubleshoot the issue. They gave us Taxiway J and after some testing it was determined that we were not getting anywhere close to enough fuel at full rich for take off. For context I should see from 23-26 gph and the plane was only getting 14-15 gph.
Part of the maintenance was the upgrading of my TSIO-360 FB to a KB and bump the HP from 200 to 220, this required a replacement of the entire fuel system. Turns out the engine fuel pump with less then 6 hours on it partially failed and caused the issue.
Lucky for me I was able to get back safe and sound but i should have never taken off. The signs were there that the plane wasn't performing and I ignored them. It was a valuable lesson to learn and i wont make the same mistakes again.
Out of the luck bucket, into the experience bucket!
Ya I’m a pretty low time pilot at 139 hours and was a valuable lesson to learn.
Did you send this writeup to the AOPA? I'd guess they'd like to have this as a good example of how things can go wrong.
nice recovery! It can be hard to scrub a mission, but when your airplane is talking to you in the run-up, it pays to listen!
@@realulli I have not but that would be a good idea.
Great vid as always!! Curious, were you able to check the gear horn? Reduced power/full flaps?
Absolutely 100% agree. Work all possibilities away from the ground as far as in cockpit troubleshooting, flyby was good then declare, roll the trucks and shutdown on runway. Another thing to think about is pop the main cabin door open just prior to touchdown in the event the gear collapses and tweaks the airframe so ur door doesn’t possibly jam shut and you can’t get it open.
I own a 1967 M20E with the Johnson bar so mine is purely mechanical with no guesswork. 😃😃😃
Always better to have the trucks and not need them then to need them and not have them.
Glad it all worked out! Again, been following for a long time. Absolutely stellar channel. Thank you for all of your hardworking and bringing us quality content!!!
I think you guys handled that well for somebody who flies, Mooneys and Arrows frequently.
Appreciate you sharing this. Really good stuff to think about.
I had this happen in November at CYTZ. The tower controller was great. Trucks rolled. Did emergency extension. Landed successfully. Had to fly home gear down and needed maintenance on my gear.
Was taking off a few mins after you landed this day. You guys did a great job!!
I actually landed in my Arrow flying back from CNY3 about 20 minutes after this all happened. I obliviously taxied right by these two on the apron (my hangar is nearby) and DIDN'T EVEN NOTICE THEM.
She is an awesome scientist and I love listening to her stuff. So cool to see this side of her world.
Another great lesson in not being afraid to declare emergency, glad the airport treated it as such. It's made me think of it a bit like calling in sick to work if you've got a cold, but you feel like you might be ok to work. YOU might be ok, but you also might be contagious, and thereby cause issue for colleagues who will then be sick, making the overall situation worse.
Slightly different emphasis here, you MIGHT be ok, but if you're not, and have a gear collapse, the airfield has to then react to that and start diverting, rolling trucks etc. Declare, trucks are there, traffic is holding. When everything is fine you may end up having a call with tower to give more detail, but ultimately what happened? The Airfield was a little delayed due to sequencing and the trucks got to roll the tyres.
Emphasis should be put on caution, and the potential outcome if something goes wrong, rather than this feeling of embarrassment or shame if you declare and everything is a-ok. Reading through comments like this and @airplaneian stands out - they don't get mad at having to roll trucks and do nothing, they get mad when they debrief a situation they had to respond to as it's happening when they could have been notified before.
Solid communication, task saturation during situations like this can make things difficult quick. You guys did a pretty solid job
Had a similar gear scare in a Seminole. Had 2/3 lights on a normal extension and then 1/3 on emergency extension. Tried the usual procedures and tricks, talked to our dispatch and maintenance to come up with a plan and all the lights eventually turned on while flying back to the airport. Planned to do a low pass as well and potentially declare but after talking to our maintenance again they were fully confident it was a microswitch issue and if the lights were on, the gear was safe. So we did a normal landing with no issue. Never hurts to be extra cautious though, and the fire crews usually enjoy the practice!
Yeah, my thought would be to PAN-PAN, PAN-PAN, PAN-PAN when you identified the issue, make sure tower knows you are declaring. Given you got a light, take Bravo well-clear of the active so the airport can operate normally, but then park it and shut down.
Easy for me to say in hindsight and not being up there, though. You both handled it well, and so did Tower and Ground!
YKF is an extremely high traffic airport. Most of the other callsigns you are hearing are student traffic from the school on field. Their controllers have to deal with a LOT on a screaming VFR day... which it was on the day of this incident. The school flight status was "No Restrictions" at the time of their approach, meaning that any student pilot of any license and skill level could be flying in and out of the zone from the school. Those controllers do a bang up job of keeping track of us and all our shenanigans... which are a frequent occurrence.
Right. PAN-PAN... should have been the first words out of her mouth on the initial call about the gear issue. You have to get attention first. Then you won't have to repeat everything.
First off, well handled Katie and Steve.
I at a major airline in Canada. Our training department has been stressing the use of ICAO standard phraseology in emergency situations.
Instead of saying “declaring an emergency” and “roll the trucks” saying “PAN PAN/Mayday” and “send crash fire rescue”
This really helps flying outside of North America to cut through any language barrier and correctly express the gravity of the situation.
Something to consider going forward.
Glad you all are on the ground safe :)
I put on the Antisplaat oil separate with the exhaust augmentation setup.. pretty happy so far.
I can sympathise with the shyness in declaring an emergency, I recently had an alternator failure on climbout and was debating in my head whether to declare it an emergency. It was on the climbout so I was pretty confident I would have no issues returning within the battery life we had remaining, but it is technically an emergency in the checklist. Ultimately I did the same as you and essentially let the tower decide, which they did treat it as such.
First, I'm glad everyone is safe and the only consequence was lessons learned.
I'm glad you got the emergency extension to work, and that you were able to restore everything after that. I've heard that the backup extension mechanisms can be fiddly in those early Mooneys.
My editorial assessment of the indications: I *think* the window in the floor is considered a definitive indication that the gear is as down as it can be. There's only one motor in the center of the plane that drives all three gear legs via pushrods and linkages from a central jackscrew. I think the linkages are almost identical to the Johnson bar manual gear (I owned a J-bar Mooney for 9 years) in that it's all actuated from a central point. Now the observation light not going on is a separate problem, of course; I don't know if you can shine a flashlight in there.
As far as risk management, you didn't say if you deliberately flew around to burn off fuel. That might be something to consider.
However, I absolutely don't fault anything either of you did. If you're uncertain, stay safe. As you pointed out, you'd just as soon have a nice comfortable conversation with the firefighters about how nice it is that nothing happen, to be on fire and wishing you'd asked them to roll the trucks. And every responder I've ever heard talk about false alarms is always happy to do them. It's great to be able to go out and NOT have to risk your life because someone was being cautious.
I would consider your statement of "the landing has to be good" as perfectly appropriate to someone who's been through the ringer a bit. She has her instrument rating and a fair bit of experience. I think that would be a good tension reliever. I probably wouldn't say that to a student, unless I knew them really well.
Thanks for the video, this is great food for thought! Maybe I'll run into you two again at Oshkosh.
I assume inspection is standard procedure for exactly what you describe; bits of the airplane fallen off, or a big fluid leak, or some such.
Great video, nice job. I have a few takeaways, the one that stood out most is that in my opinion, you were too nice with tower, almost asking permission to get the trucks, not to slam on the breaks and take up the runway. I agree that an emergency should have been clearly declared, but regardless of the declaration, you do what you need to for safety. Letting the tower know is great situational awareness, the polite question makes for ambiguity, and even a remote option for tower not to approve. You are taking up the runway, period, nothing wrong with it, nor would tower have any say in it.
What would I do differently? First of all I would panic, lose my mind, lose control of the airplane and crash into the terrain.
I think it would have been better to stick to the checklist as some actions might cause some damage that I might not know might happen. And also the time might run out in some situations. So it would be nice to think about checklists first. Oh and declare emergency! Better safe than sorry.
Glad you were able to upload this video!
The fact you were so hesitant on declaring the emergency is really interesting, considering Dan invited you for that workshop where this exact issue was a topic (you did a video and you guys coordinated with the airfield to have the emergency equipment responding as part of a training session)
So I guess the answer to that is twofold.
First off I wasn’t pilot in command, so I really was doing my best to be a helpful crew member while differing to Katie as the primary decision maker.
And secondarily I assessed the situation and at no time did I feel that declaring formally would’ve changed anything.
If there was a case where it wasn’t certain trucks would be available to us or if we were asked to do something we were not comfortable with, then I would have decleared to get priority.
All that said, yes, the correct move would have been to just declare early on to remove any ambiguity.
@@FlightChops oh i wasn't criticising it was mostly just a side note, really because in the video you mentioned yourself to not be afraid to declare and you commented yourself on how you danced around that topic while tower was coordinating in the background.
I do agree with you that Katie was PIC and thus it clearly is her decision in the end. I just thought it was curious / interesting how you indeed did dance around that topic of declaring and your final thought on it was don't be afraid while this is how Dan put it back in that video as well.
No criticism on how you handled it, clearly everyone involved did a tremendous job in handling it. My apologies if my phrasing lead to some confusion there.
I've been listening to Katie's podcast with John Green (and her book is on my shelf!) so it was WILD when it clicked she was making an appearance on this channel too. I love a good surprise crossover!
Wow. This brings home a flight that I almost got to do in a newly purchased 1970 mooney that a friend was wanting to bring back from Edmonton to NS in February. The deal fell through. I think I dodged a bullet. Neither one of us had any time in a Mooney. And I have no retract time. Although we were going to get some instruction in it before we left, I don’t think either of us would have been prepared for an incident like this.
On one hand, it felt like an emergency so unlike a practice you had real stress to deal with. If Katie or you have another emergency in the future this debrief and experience should go a long ways to making a successful outcome. Always a good day when you survive and can critique your performance.
Great, classic, Flightchops debrief video.. Loved this. Despite, the lack of visuals of course. Interesting learning point about continuing taxi. Hadn't thought of that. Been in a similar situation, and like you, after landing, concluded all good.. But as you say, it might not be. But I suppose the question would then be, what would you do after shutdown on the taxiway - give everything a good kick, or get an engineer out to the taxiway? Well done though.
Thanks. And yes, I'd thinking shutting down and inspecting before moving the plane further would have been in order. even if a brief inspection and then turning the prop sideways and towing it... that way if it did collapse, you'd not have a prop strike.
Thanks for sharing. Since you asked... declaring the emergency should have given you better priority. It was a bit frustrating hearing tower handle other aircraft ahead of an emergency craft. I had a gear issue years ago and also regret (as you do) not declaring. ATC did declare for us though. We all need a bit of an attitude adjustment when it comes to a hesitancy to declare an emergency. The next time I had an emergency, it felt much better to be able to tell ATC what I needed to do and know that they would do whatever they needed to make it happen. I personally do not like the idea of yawing the aircraft or pulling G's, etc. in attempt to get the gear down. It's just not THAT important. I think we need to handle any abnormal with as much normalcy as possible. Finally, when I had that gear situation (I ended up with three good gear as well), I told myself that this was going to be the smoothest landing ever and it was. It was a good idea to encourage Katie like that. All-in-all, good job guys!
Agreed, declare the emergency. It shouldn’t be something to be afraid of. You can always cancel later if it’s resolved. I don’t know your fuel state, but in bigger and heavier planes we would have burned fuel down or dumped fuel to get the plane to a slower approach speed and been lighter on the gear. Not sure if that’s a factor for the Mooney, but worth mentioning. And then yes, I honestly would have shut down on the runway. You can always hop out and push the plane clear. If the gear collapses with the engine off, that’s much cheaper and safer than a spinning prop going into the asphalt.
I’m not a pilot, but I am a recreational sailor, and head out onto the water all year round off of Vancouver. It always amuses me when people appear to have mic fright when it comes to taking on the radio. In our case, the closest approximation to we have to ATC is “Victoria Traffic” that controls all the commercial traffic in Harbour.
A number of years ago, we managed to hit a log, which jammed our rudder, making it impossible for us to steer. We were stuck in the outbound traffic lane from Vancouver and unable to steer. We got onto the radio with traffic and let them know the situation. They declared a panpan and held two cruise ships until c-tow came out and towed us into our berth.
We probably should have called the panpan ourselves.
@@nonenowherebye In aviation you are on the radio with controlling agencies a fair amount and I'm sure Steve is comfortable with that. There is a hesitancy among some pilots, especially in civilian aviation because that activates a lot of things. ATC will give you priority traffic and basically tell everyone else to get out of the way, crash recovery trucks will roll which means they are all geared up and ready to pull you out of a burning plane, it may even entail extra paperwork or an investigation. So when a pilot has a "minor emergency" it's tempting to just deal with it instead of inconveniencing all those people (or at least so we think). Usually, pilots are pretty quick to declare on the big emergencies like engine issues or electrical failures. It's the gray area of minor emergencies that we see a lot of hesitancy. It's not a bad thing, but good to debrief and make your decision for next time.
@@rourkebuechel yeah in our situation we were not in immediate danger. But had one of the cruise ships left and headed our way, there was a good chance they could have run us over. A 50,000 ton ship vs a 7000lb sailboat is no contest. We also carry AIS, the Marine equivalent to ADSB. That’s why traffic called the panpan, they could see that we were at risk from outbound traffic, even though we weren’t in immediate danger.
Sitting here on the ground in a comfy chair I think one of the things I would do different: Pan-Pan to start off the tower transmission. But I'm also self aware enough to know that I have absolutely no clue how I would handle it in the air. We train, we practice; but when the s%!t hits the fan? Who knows?
Just glad it turned out okay.
Nice job with the blurring of the tail number on the panel; I know how hard that can be when you have a non-fixed camera.
Agreed. It's easy to do with still photos, but awhile ago I had to do it for the fuselage numbers on a moving aircraft. It took some work to master it in Premiere, but I was happy with the result.
I have an uncannily similar story with my 1980 Mooney M20k 11 months ago. I cycled all of the electronics and got the gear to lock and indicate down without emergency extension. Maintenance never found an issue and its worked fine since. In my case tower declared the emergency for me, rolled trucks, etc.
I remembered that episode of Ice Pilots when they banged up one of the Electras, the pilot even tried a low speed turn down to stall buffeting to see if that would dislodge the gear. To do that with a 4-motor plane, with pax onboard... proper titanium balls on that guy. Good job getting it down in one piece.
Is that microswitch even available new?
I've started blurring out all n-numbers of other peoples planes in my videos- nobody has ever asked me to do it, but we live in a world where every movement of any airplane can be tracked online. I think it is just a good practice.
I think you both did a great job!! For some reason it's hard for us all to declare an emergency, even when it shouldn't be. Maybe it's somehow in our DNA. LOL Much thanks to Katie for sharing!! 8) --gary
This is obviously airplane specific but normally the down lock lights are wired in series. It’s been my experience if you have one light you can put your mind at ease that it’s usually locked.
👍well done all.
Not sure if Canada (or the States) uses the Urgency call of Pan Pan, Pan Pan, Pan Pan….? It’s used commonly in the U.K. and Europe and is there for the pilot to declare a state of urgency, one down on the excitement factor from a Mayday. Ideal for a gear issue, where there is no immediate danger to the aircraft continuing to safely fly, yet alerts ATC to the fact that you have a problem.
It’s also a heads up for all the other aircraft on the frequency to stop transmissions until ATC and the subject aircraft have had a chance to make a plan.
Nice trouble-shooting with your problem by the way, and agree probably best to stop the aircraft gently after landing, shut down and then inspect before further taxying.
I think after the gear indicated green , I would have considered it all good . Green is green , regardless how you got there . Definitely have a mechanic check why it was intermittent afterwards . Also when you knew you had a potential gear issue why didn’t you troubleshoot out of the zone before returning to land , including the alternate gear extension?
Work load management. Fully concentrate on the problem without the demands of the airport environment and ATC .
You did ask for comments 😉
Fair points.
But I did feel we had lots of time on downwind to deal with the gear extension, and there were two of us to manage the workload (which is why I was working coms pretty much from the go around onward)
You both did a great job and learned things . I’m still learning every time I fly with 42yrs and 23000hrs flying. Keep up the great content 😊
In the US, four parties can declare an emergency: the pilot, ATC, the aircraft owner, and the aircraft operator (airline). And it is a declaration of status, not a request for anything specific.
those bleeps make it sound like Dr. Katie is swearing her head off lol!
Did my discovery flight at YKF.
I've fueled that plane!! You can still see the November registration under the white Charlie sticker!! I didn't fuel it for her, but one of the other members. I saw red two in the thumbnail and thought surly not. If you're ever in Waterloo again stop by apron II it would be awesome to just casually catch you
4:08 That's the VOR the tower is just east of that
There are a few planes at YKF that have this November phenomena. Look closely at WWFC's FGJK and you'll see it too. You've likely fueled me as well. I usually stop at Apron 2 for fuel prior to tucking my girl into bed.
@@Peacewind152 I'll keep my peepers open for gjk
I can't say what I would have done differently. By definition: you have to be there, in the cockpit, making the decisions. Unsafe landing gear is a bona fide emergency and Tower recognized that even if you didn't say the magic word.
My one in-flight emergency was an alternator failure. WTF?! Ran the checklist. No joy. Considered my options. Since it was day VFR in uncontrolled airspace I turned the master off then turned on the bare minimum (one radio) on approach. Gave ATC a heads up that I had a problem but the plane still sort of worked (PAN PAN). Landed safely. The shop found a broken wire in the alternator wiring a couple of days later...
In the US, and I guess in Canada, the procedures for emergency communications are very clear and almost never used. The first words out of your mouth should be PAN-PAN or MAYDAY depending on the severity, and repeated three times. That gets people to listen so you don't have to repeat everything, and everyone else shuts up so you can actually get the call out. Fire and Rescue love the excuse to take the trucks for a drive.
Pan-Pan / Mayday is the international standard (and isn't just used by aviation).
The "declaring an emergency" phrase is a North American thing, the FAA rules state you can use either option but occasionally causes problems/delays when American pilots get into trouble in locations where English isn't a native language.
Possibly with no light, even with a good flyby, plan for a full stop on the runway and troubleshoot and / or get a tow. Oh course doing this with a low wing airplane will require some good knowledge and maybe a stand or two.
4:10 that's not the tower - that's the VOR. Tower is about 500 feet to the left of that (you can see the shadow cast by it).
Close enough. They aren't that far apart and the controllers should have been able to see everything without binoculars.
Haha - thanks - I should have looked closer - I assumed the 2-D image of a circle thing was the tower.
Interesting that there is another video out there from a guy who was intending to purchase a Mooney that the owner was flying and the gear collapsed on landing. Whole thing on video. You were right to take it that seriously! th-cam.com/video/olqQb8tp07g/w-d-xo.html
1:12 I've been following Katie Mack on twitter for a while and it's kinda weird to see her pop up now on youtube- like I think she did a podcast with John Green recently. I had absolutely no idea she was a pilot and sure didn't expect her to pop up here! that's awesome.
I only connected the dots from your comment, I just finished the first Mack+Green episode yesterday
@@maggus999 I have yet to listen- but I saw a short clip of it on one of the channels, vlogbrothers probably
Ha ha ha! Yeah; I feel that. I met Katie and Steve at Oshkosh last year. Granted, he was kind of stressed when I first ran into them, but he introduced her as "hey, this is my friend Katie", not "this is Katie Mack, world-famous astrophysicist, author, and science communicator". I glanced at his instagram later that day, and he'd linked to hers, and my head may have slightly exploded when I realized who Katie specifically was. (After the initial meeting, Steve was holding court with the 3 or 4 people who'd recognized him and/or his plane and come over to chat with him, and Katie was hammering in tie-down stakes, which I later found very amusing.)
I may have driven an hour to go get a copy of her book, so that I could ask her to sign it if I ran into her, which I managed to do at an event we were both attending. I managed to not completely fan-slobber all over myself, and she was very gracious, and we had a lovely chat about cosmology.
@@fsodn that's awesome
You should have let as many other pilots either get in or out so long as you had the fuel to do so AND THEN you should have stopped "on the runway" and got a mechanic out there to assess/verify that the gear was locked down before any turns were made. It was a mistake to not stop, shut down right on the runway in making ZERO turns.
Agreed about making zero turns, but no, I can’t think about other traffic during an emergency. With that in mind… the other pilots coming and going were pretty much non stop on that beautiful day, so it would have been a moot point to try to wait for them.
@@FlightChops Yeah it would depend on how busy an airport it is. Of note is that my instructor had a left gear "no light" so he landed in a left crab to maybe "kick" the gear locked upon touchdown. He taxied back and thought of how stupid that was or would have felt if the gear had collapsed during taxi back. Same though it was an inoperative micro switch and all ended well.
Cycling the gear up and down repeatedly after getting an unsafe or no green/down and locked indication could really do some damage, if it's actually a mechanical issue and not "just" a microswitch. On the plus side, it usually is something simple like that. Knowing the system and how the visual and electrical indicators work (or don't work!) is important and defines the plan of action. The American Bonanza Society has a 50+ page handbook on just the landing gear system; reading that and crawling under the plane to look at those key items sure helps one understand the system and how it works. Just knowing where micro switches are, and how their circuits protect the system is invaluable. You tend to do better preflights, too, when you know what to really look for! I assume there is a press to test feature on the Mooney to make sure the bulb isn't burned out?
Also, yawing or "pulling Gs" is pointless on a gear that doesn't "freefall" into position. Mooneys and Bonanzas have pushrods and direct linkages, and no hydraulics. In a hydraulic system that loses pressure, those tricks "might" work; again, it depends on the specific features of the plane you're flying.
I might have been tempted to say: "I _LIKE_ fire trucks, roll 'em out!"
No big deal to declare early and often! Ya can always un-declare. So strange why pilots hesitate or decisively do not declare. It literally opens up the sky for ya. Sause: 30 year pro pilot; declared enough times to know it's no bid deal. Maybe a 3 sentence email to the FAA. Never had any troubles.
'Acrobatics are done on a gym floor, aerobatics are done in the air' Don Burns--hang gliding instructor.
I don’t make the rules… but “acro” is widely used by aerobatic pilots as a short hand 🤷
It's that peculiar North American "declare an emergency" thing again. It sounds dramatic, so people are reluctant to say it. Even when they describe to ATC whatever disaster is presently befalling them, there always follows the question "Are you declaring an emergency..?"
Globally (including North America), it's really simple: something doesn't feel right, "PAN-PAN". Imminent danger: "MAYDAY". Let's lose this unhelpful "declaring" phraseology and be more willing to use the urgency call "PAN-PAN" when it could be nothing... But it could also be something serious.