User Guide
Flight Simulator
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Microsoft
Tutorial 7: Landings
You remember how to get to the homework, right? Click the Help menu, then
click Homework. There. No excuses.
Landings are to a pilot what a beautiful painting is to an artist. When you look at
Leonardo’s Mona Lisa (or its famed counterpart the Mona Larry), you see a
beautiful work of art. To pilots, a good landing offers the same satisfaction. I
intend to show you how to paint that beautiful picture on any runway of your
choice.
I always tell my students that airplanes will land themselves (well, almost). All
the pilot has to do is nudge the machine toward the runway and twiddle with the
throttle a bit. But who believes that? So, let me prove it to you. Close the door,
strap on that seat belt, and let’s go to where the rubber meets the runway as I
show you how to land an airplane.
Landing Setup
From the Flights menu, click Select Flight and choose Tutorial 7, Situation 1
in which we’ll land at the Mojave airport. To aid you in these examples, I’ve
activated the wing leveler. This is just like having me on board to keep you from
overbanking the airplane while on final approach (a common problem for
students). Nevertheless, you can still make shallow banks while it’s active.
On your first try, you’re going to land this airplane by doing absolutely nothing
other than maintaining 65 knots in a power-off glide. Once the simulation starts,
simply adjust the pitch to maintain your airspeed and fly that speed all the way
to the ground. Yes, there’s a runway ahead of you, but don’t worry about landing
on it. Remember, this is a simulation. No one’s going to get hurt, except for a few
simulated groundhogs who picked a bad time to raise their little periscopes.
We’re going to
approach this tutorial
a little differently
than I would in an
actual airplane. I
plan on teaching you
how to land before
teaching you takeoffs
and flying the traffic
pattern. That way,
when I teach you to
take off and fly a
traffic pattern, you
can actually land,
instead of dropping to
earth with all the
grace of a butterfly
overdosed on caffeine.
Besides, something
tells me that if we
don’t do landings now,
you’ll be out there
practicing them
yourself. So let me
help you put your hand
in the cookie jar.