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MY FS FLIGHTS
Flight Score
Monitor your taxi speed
See Arrival Taxi
Twenty knots on a monitor produces the visual sensation of about ten. The advice to "taxi at a walking pace" cannot fix this, because your sense of walking pace is exactly the thing that's broken. Put the groundspeed readout in your scan and obey it for the next fifty flights, the way a student pilot leans on the airspeed indicator before learning to read attitude.
Read more in How to Taxi AnywhereStart to finish · 17 stages, 15 in the score
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Taxi out
The roll
Rotated late, and slowly
The nose came up at 160 kt, 7 kt after the 153 kt rotate speed, and rose at 1.9° a second, slower than the 2 to 3 airliners use.
The pull started after the rotate speed and was then slow. Start it on the rotate speed and make it one positive, continuous movement at the normal rate for this aircraft.
Liftoff and climb
Plan view the roll down the 10,112 ft runway.
Rolled from the start of the runway, never more than 3 ft off the centreline. Airborne 33 % of the way down the runway, before the 75 % line.
The roll from above, with your left at the top. The line is where the wheels went, and "widest" is the furthest you drifted off the centreline. Lifting off before the amber 75 % line gets full marks for the roll length.
Side view from the start of the roll to the end of Climb 3 at 881 ft.
Reached 35 ft with 5,428 ft of runway left; gear up at 77 ft, inside the 400 ft that gets full marks; then climbing at 2,300 fpm on average to 881 ft.
The takeoff from the side: the height above the runway against the distance along it. The numbers along the runway are the speeds reached at each point. Lifting off in the amber last quarter of the runway costs marks for the roll length. The dark stretch of the roll is the run with the nose up and the wheels still on, with its length and time under the runway. The gear-up ring is coloured by its mark. The shaded stretch is Climb 3, scored on its average speed against the target.
Speed and pitch from brake release to the end of the climb, against time.
Two traces from brake release: the airspeed on top, and below it the pitch, which is how far the nose is above the horizon. The dashed green line is the speed to rotate at for this aircraft at its weight, and the green dot is where the nose started to come up. The grey band is the run between the nose coming up and the wheels leaving the runway. The figures at liftoff are the pitch then and how fast the nose came up, in degrees a second. The rotation detail below draws the rotation against the rates for this aircraft and its tail-strike pitch, where the slope reads properly. The grey dashed line across the pitch is the attitude held from 35 ft to the end: a nose held steady is a climb speed that holds, and the airspeed trace sits directly above it to compare. The shaded stretch is Climb 3, the part of the climb scored on holding the climb speed.
Rotation detail the pitch over the seconds from rotation to 35 ft, where the slope reads properly.
The pitch over the seconds from the nose starting to come up to 35 ft, stretched so the slope reads properly. The green dot is where the nose started up, the grey band runs to the wheels leaving, and the figures at liftoff are the pitch then and how fast the nose came up. The two dashed green lines rising from the rotation point are 2 to 3° a second, the rates airliners are rotated at: a trace steeper than both is a faster rotation, one shallower than both a slower one. The red dashed line is 9.5°, the pitch at which this aircraft's tail touches the runway with the wheels still on it, drawn from rotation to liftoff only: once the wheels leave, every foot climbed adds tail clearance.
One stabilised approach gate: seven checks where the approach path is 500 ft above the runway. The 1,000 ft gate was not assessed, because the approach did not join final that far out. These checks are the approach's score.
When the approach was stable
Every check met from 1.8 to 0.8 nm, then not again: low from 0.8 nm to the threshold.
Each line is one of the gate checks, run along the whole final rather than only at the gates: green where it would have passed, amber where it would not. The glideslope, centreline and speed lines use the bands in the charts beside this card. The sink rate is allowed what the glideslope needs at your ground speed plus 600 fpm, the wings 10° of bank, and the gear and flap are read from when you moved the levers. The bottom line is green where every check held at once, ignoring blips shorter than 0.2 nm, and the sentence above it says from where it held to the threshold. A ring is a stabilisation gate, where the checks in the table were taken.
The final from 4 nm, with the stabilisation gates on it.
Profile height against the 3° glideslope, with its 1° band in green.
On the glideslope from 3.0 nm, where the final began, to 0.8 nm, then low to the threshold (up to 100 ft under).
Your height above the runway against the distance still to go. The glideslope is the steady descent path to the aiming point, 1,000 ft past the threshold: 3° here, which is about 320 ft for every nautical mile out, crossing the threshold at about 50 ft. The row under the distances is the height it puts you at. Inside the green band your path is drawn green; outside it, amber. A ring is a stabilisation gate: green when every check there passed, amber with the failed checks named beside it.
Plan distance off the extended centreline, your left at the top, with the 1° band. Sideways distances are drawn 3× larger than distances along the final.
Joined 3,390 ft left of the centreline at 3.0 nm, then inside the band from 2.1 nm to the threshold.
Looking down from above, flying left to right towards the runway: up the page is left of the centreline, down is right. Sideways distances are stretched so that small drifts show, so a line that looks wild here may be only a few tens of feet. The labels are how far off you were at each distance, amber when outside the band.
Speed against the approach speed. The green band runs from 5 kt slow to 39 kt fast at the 1,000 ft gate, closing to 23 at 500 ft and 10 at the threshold.
Inside the speed band all the way, between +3 kt and +5 kt on the approach speed of 154 kt.
Your indicated airspeed down the final, against the approach speed for this aircraft at its landing weight. The band allows 5 kt slow and more on the fast side further out, closing as you get lower, because the speed is expected to come off on the way down. The figures are knots above (+) or below (−) the approach speed.
Over the threshold
Excellent landing flare
It lost 1.7 points, mostly for taking only 124 fpm of the sink out.
Touchdown
Rollout
Taxi in
Side view — the last 5,000 ft of the approach.
Began the flare at 16 ft, 14 ft before the threshold; crossed the threshold at 15 ft, 35 ft below the 50 ft target. Touched down 840 ft in, 160 ft short of the ideal 1,000 ft.
The last stretch of the approach and the touchdown, from the side. The height is stretched so that the last few feet show: 80 ft top to bottom, against 5,000 ft across. The dashed line is the ideal, 50 ft over the threshold and down 1,000 ft in. The flare ring is where you began raising the nose, and "descent slowed" is where the sink came off; the figures beside them are the sink rate, pitch and speed at that point.
Sink and pitch — through the flare, lined up with the side view.
The sink went from 370 fpm at the flare to 260 fpm at touchdown. The pitch barely changed. Into the flare at 157 kt, 3 kt over the 154 kt approach speed, and 152 kt at touchdown.
Lined up with the side view above, so a point on one sits under the same point of the other. On top, how fast you were coming down: 0 is level, and −600 is 600 ft a minute down. Below, the pitch. In a flare the nose comes up and the descent slows towards 0. The figure at the touchdown line is your touchdown rate.
Plan view — the first 5,000 ft of the 9,000 ft runway, to the same scale as the side view.
Touched down 5 ft right of the centreline, and stayed within 10 ft of it down the rollout. Little crosswind (1 kt): nothing to correct for. Touched down straight, wings level.
Wind 250° at 2 kt · 1 kt head · 1 kt across
The runway from above, with your left at the top. Touching down inside the green bracket scores full marks for the distance. The shaded part is the rollout, up to where it ended. The arrow beside the runway is the crosswind, pointing the way the air was moving, so it pushed the aircraft that way. The wind is the one recorded at the landing, split along the runway (headwind or tailwind) and across it. To hold the centreline in a crosswind the nose points a little into wind - the crab - and is straightened with rudder just before the wheels touch, often with the into-wind wing lowered to stop the drift. The sentence gives the nose against the direction you were actually moving as the wheels touched, and the steepest bank as they touched, the figure the touchdown's Bank tile marks. The rest of it is shown for reading, not marked.
The 840 ft touchdown sits inside the full-score zone. The arrival was smooth.
The stop — touchdown to taxi speed.
From 154 kt at touchdown to taxi speed (30 kt) in 52 s, an average deceleration of 0.12 g.
Your ground speed from the moment the wheels touched until you were down to taxi speed, against the distance rolled. A steep line is hard braking, a shallow one a long, gentle roll. For scale, an airliner's lowest autobrake setting decelerates at about 0.15 g, a medium one about 0.3 g. Shown for reading; not marked.
The rest of the report
The MD-11 taxied from the parking area to runway 27L at KPHL for 12 minutes, covering 3 nm, and then departed runway 27L. Takeoff used 3,418 ft, 34 % of the runway, with rotation at 160 kt. The local weather was 49 °F, wind 2 kt from 260°, crosswind 0 kt, headwind 2 kt.
Initial climb to 1,000 ft agl took 20 seconds, averaging 2,349 fpm and reaching 198 kt at the top. The climb continued from 1,037 ft asl to 31,709 ft asl in 12 minutes, covering 69 nm, beginning overhead 9N2 Philadelphia Seaplane Base Essington.
The aircraft level-flew at 32,000 ft asl for 79 minutes, covering 596 nm, starting 1 mile south of Grantley.
Descent began from 31,586 ft asl to 717 ft asl in 20 minutes, covering 101 nm, starting 6 miles south-west of 9TN2 Meadowlark Airport Camden, with a brief level-off at 2,000 ft asl.
On final approach to runway 18L at KMEM, descent from 686 ft agl to -2 ft agl took 61 seconds. Stabilisation checks at 500 ft above the runway were all met: gear down, landing flap, sink rate, glideslope, centreline, speed, wings level. Configuration was gear down at 1,582 ft agl, 200 kt; final flap position 6 at 1,088 ft agl, 167 kt.
Landing on runway 18L (runway length 9,000 ft) had a good threshold height and a threshold speed of 157 kt. The flare was described as excellent. Touchdown occurred 840 ft down the runway at 152 kt, a little fast, with a touchdown rate of minus 266 fpm; alignment was very good and there was no bounce. Total landing distance was 4,324 ft, 48 % of the runway, and rollout alignment was perfect.
After landing, the MD-11 taxied to the parking area for 9 minutes, covering 2 nm. The flight covered a total of 776 nm in 130 minutes and used 35,667 lbs of fuel.
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