Pilots are more likely to have an accident when landing than any other time. Skids off the runway, collapsed landing gear, wing tip strikes, ground-loops… all are rooted in three fundamental mistakes. The relationship between these easy-to-avoid mistakes and their horrid outcomes is often quite subtle.

1. Three Worst Landing Mistakes
Pilots are more likely to have an accident when landing than any other time. Skids off
the runway, collapsed landing gear, wing tip strikes, ground-loops… all are rooted in
three fundamental mistakes. The relationship between these easy-to-avoid mistakes
and their horrid outcomes is often quite subtle.
As a brash young private pilot with more confidence than ability I landed a Cessna
172 with three of my friends at a small, friendly airport in Northern California. When
I landed I thought that I had performed like a thousand-hour pilot. I really felt cocky.
The glow disappeared a few seconds later when a gust picked me up and put me on a
taxiway. I will never forget the smirk on the face of the pilot taxiing in the opposite
direction as he held short for me to exit onto the ramp. I will always remember the
half-smile and shaking head of the other pilot as he waited for me to taxi clear. I made
up some half baked explanation for my passengers. Flying the approach, I had made
the three most common landing errors.
I could not think about much of anything else until I understood what I had done
wrong and what I had to do differently to keep it from happening a second time. The
NTSB tells us that 45% of all the meteorologically caused problems stem from
crosswinds or gusts. It seems like more to me. I want to tell you about some very
straightforward techniques, that, had I mastered them, would have kept me out of
trouble. Before I can do that, I would like to explore the causes with you.
If your plane’s nose it high enough or low enough, a gust cannot take you off the
runway. That was one of the mistakes I had made. When the wind gusted, the wing’s
lift put us back in the air.
You can place the wing at two different angles relative to the wind to keep it from
developing lift at any speed. A wing that is not pitched up at all produces no lift. If the
wing is pitched up so high that it is stalled, it cannot produce lift. If you keep your
airplane off the runway until it cannot fly any more, then the wing will be pitched up
above a stall angle and no gust can make it fly again. Once I let the nose down, the
angle of attack is too low for a gust to pick me up. But what about the situation when
the wind blows from the side?
A crosswind takes a plane off the runway because the pilot is not slipping into the
wind as fast as the wind is blowing across the runway or because the landing gear
does not have enough traction to keep the airplane from sliding sideways.
If you always cross control the airplane properly during crosswind landings, you will
stay on the runway every time. Keeping the airplane pointed down the runway with
rudder pedals, and keeping the airplane over the runway’s centerline with ailerons,
sets you up for a safe landing. This way you know that your airplane will always stay
in the middle of the runway. This is cross controlling.
Controlling the approach glide is essential in preventing landing too far down the
runway or landing too fast. The list of things that can, and often do go wrong because

2. of a botched approach glide is almost endless.
Anyone can control an approach glide very easily. Just remember two important
points and keep them in mind as you approach the runway. Changes in pitch attitude
impact airspeed almost immediately. Second is that the path an airplane follows
through space can be changed very quickly with a change in power.
You have no hope of flying repeatable, precise approaches if you do not maintain
constant airspeed by changing pitch and power at the same time. Just remember,
“Power up, Pitch up” to maintain constant airspeed.
Project your glide to your sweet spot on the runway at a constant airspeed by
adjusting power and pitch at the same time.
Let’s walk through an approach. We’ll say that your approach speed in landing
configuration is 60 KIAS. Looking out the window (as I know you do 99% of the
time during an approach) you notice that the point on the ground that appears to be
staying in the same spot on your windshield is one of the approach lights about 500
feet short of the runway. You know that the best place to glide toward is the base of
the runway numbers. You add 200 RPM to the engine and make a corresponding
pitch up to maintain 60 knots. You discover that you have over corrected. So you
reduce your power by 100 RPM and make a slight pitch down correction. Almost
unconsciously and very gently, you either add power and pitch up or reduce power
and pitch down to stay at sixty and on the glide path. You are at the right place and
right airspeed to make a great landing.
So the three things that you need to do are to control your approach glide precisely,
cross control before and after landing, and keep her flying as long as you can after you flare.