Surviving a mid-air canopectomy

[gammaxy]

other pilots who have also experienced this situation are not available for comment

From reading the forum over the years, I'm pretty sure several pilots have survived. It seems high AoA and difficulty climbing is common. I'm really curious about your observations of a high IAS; not sure anyone else has mentioned that, but I think there is at least one video that might show it. Did you feel like you didn't have enough pitch authority to get the nose down, or do you think you were just being misled by the high IAS? It seems the advice to others in this situation would be to try to keep the sight-picture of the landing area well above the glareshield. I believe others have also ended up short of the runway or beyond the runway in cases where the canopy departed on takeoff.

Did the wind impact your ability to see or focus, or did the windshield protect you?

It seems pinning the canopy should be one of the most critical parts of the checklist. My pin is tied to the canopy handle and I never close the canopy without also pinning it, but it only takes one mistake. I didn't install the spring mechanism Sonex shows in the plans and I sometimes wonder if omitting that is a mistake.

[lakespookie]

Since she was still flying do you think gaining some altitude and doing a controlability check would have been a better option? or just maintaining a higher airspeed and landing fast because she felt that not flyable?

[GraemeSmith]

I’m told that the three other pilots who have also experienced this situation are not available for comment,

I'm still here!! (or am I a fourth?)....... Thought I had written about this before. Well here again:

Legacy Sonex
AeroVee 2.1
About 1,000lb at the time.
Warmish spring day. Density Altitude around 800ft
Solo Flight

My canopy went overboard in an interesting manner. I was straight and level and I felt a momentary pop in my headset (pressure differential) and then the canopy departed the aircraft. I was left sitting in an intact frame, still locked in place with jagged plexi edges all around. In otherwords the bubble failed.

My ballpark estimate was that the plane lost 20% of its airspeed for the same power settings. There was sufficient reserve power to still climb (checked before landing in case I needed to go around). I cannot say I noticed a significant pitch trim change.

I have no idea what speed the plane stalled onto the runway at. I was definitely flying "by the seat of my pants" in terms of keeping perfectly coordinated and watching out for the stall "mush". Never felt it. I did consciously only use flaps 20 on final (I usually use 30) in order to make sure I was not too draggy if I needed to go around. The plane landed "normally" (well it felt like that). As I fly power off 180's all the time - I just sight pictured that and know it was a tight and close pattern - so I guess I was sinking a bit more than normal. I basically considered instrumentation somewhat irrelevant. The stall speed was going to be wrong - so I just flew her by feel.

The biggest issue was comfort while flying to the nearest airport.

I had to lean inboard and duck down behind the windshield to stay out the breeze. So my sight picture was not normal and I was a bit cramped after 20 mins.
Summer it may have been but I was now flying open cockpit with no open cockpit gear. I was cold and by the time I landed my ungloved hands were barely functioning.
No leather cap to hold my headset to my ears. Kept blowing off my ears. I could hear that people were talking on the radio - but had no idea what they were saying. At least I knew when I could take a turn to transmit.
No muff on the mic - so wind noise might have been a factor - but I made pattern radio calls and indicated I was looking for priority in the pattern. People told me after they heard me fine.

The surviving plexi had some "lamination" characteristics to it - it looked like 3 plywood. No idea if a canopy normally looks like this after forming or if something did it harm in the past.

[13brv3]

Thanks Graeme! Great to hear another report.
Rusty

[cliffrunkle]

Also to survive a canopectomy was Brady from Kokomo Indiana who is no longer active. Very similar story, no locking pin installed.