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Thread: Pancaked

  1. #1
    Starting to feel at home
    Join Date
    Mar 2010
    Location
    West Sussex
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    47

    Default Pancaked

    Can anyone tell me what "pancaked" meant on landing? I thought it might have been landing without the undercarriage down but it crops up very frequently in the squadron records and may just refer to landing.....any ideas????

  2. #2
    Colin Rowledge
    Guest

    Default

    My understanding of the term is the same as yours - but --------- we'll see what the 'experts have to say!!

  3. #3

    Default

    When a aircraft crashed, with it being level, i.e. not nose/tail first.

  4. #4
    Reputation beyond repute
    Join Date
    Oct 2004
    Location
    Kent
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    16,792

    Default

    The Oxford English Dictionary is available online thanks to our local library services

    pancake, v.

    intr. Aeronaut. Of an aircraft: to descend vertically in a level position (e.g. as a result of a stall); spec. to make a pancake landing. Of a pilot: to cause an aircraft to descend or land in this way.

  5. #5
    Coromandel
    Guest

    Default

    A 1918 poster provides this definition:

    'Pancaking consists of stalling the machine just above the surface of the ground and dropping the remaining 3 or 4 feet with as little forward speed as possible. A pancake landing is made on rough ground, standing corn, water etc. where an ordinary landing would result in a somersault. The illustration is intended as a warning against pancaking from too great a height or "landing above the ground". The opposite error of "landing below the ground" is of less frequent occurrence, though it may be disastrous in its results.'

    The text, with accompanying illustration (depicting the consequence of the pilot misjudging where the ground is), can be found here:

    https://www.
    warmuseum.ca/CWM/EXHIBITIONS/GUERRE/photos/2800/19700043-008.jpg

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