I spent some time observing my own landings after flights in IF, in particular A350 landings. After some time observing, analyzing, altering techniques and then refining, I’ve come up with what I believe is the optimal techinque to land an A350 smoothly. The observation and analysis comes from witnessing landings in real life and quite a bit of digging through FCTM’s. Do bear in mind this is an unorthodox technique but I have observed landings in real life and tried to implement certain features from real life landings. The landing technique is as follows:
Speed: 140kts IAS
Trim: 0% but subject to personal preference
Flare: Around or just after the 20’ GPWS callout. The flare here is perhaps the most challenging maneuver. The flare consists of a gentle “check” or pitch change at or just after the 20’ callout, bear in mind only tiny pitch change is required, approximately one to three degrees. Be sure to look at the end of the runway in order to assess descent rate and to “hold” the pitch attitude. How will this arrest rate of descent you may ask? This leads on to my next point: applying thrust until after touchdown. This may seem counterintuitive but in some videos of landings conducted in real life, the engines seem to idle right after touchdown, plus from analyzing past landings in IF, I realized that when you cut the throttle, the aircraft simply quits flying and drops out of the sky. Therefore, maintaining thrust application in the flare is important for alleviating rate of descent.
The four videos are from two separate occasions. The first two videos display two perspectives of a landing after a short haul flight from KSAN-KSFO. The second two videos display two perspectives of a landing after a long haul flight from UUEE-KLAX. The purpose of having four videos is to prove that the smooth landing is not a “one off” but rather a technique that can be implemented repeatedly.
KSFO:
KLAX:
Feedback and opinions are welcome.