Quote:
Originally Posted by il_martilo
About 6 years ago I was flying on a CRJ-60 from Tampa or something and the following happened.
We were taking off, reached full speed, the front landing gear began to lift off, and then the next thing I know the reverse thrusters are on, full breaks being applied, and the pilot just comes on and says some master system alert went off.
Any idea what this might have been? I've flown probably 100+ times and have never even heard someone else mention they've heard of an aborted takeoff.
If the airplane had begun rotation for takeoff, there is absolutely
no event that would justify this pilot's action. He was lucky he had enough runway left to stop.
We have some very important speeds we use on a takeoff and they vary depending on aircraft weight, temperature, winds and runway length and conditions (dry, slippery, snow covered) at the time of takeoff:
V1 - This is sometimes referred to as "Go/No Go" speed. It's the speed, past which, the aircraft is committed to flying,
no matter what.
VR - This is rotation speed, i.e. the speed at which the nose should be rotated up for takeoff (for heavy airplanes, the plane may not actually 'unstick' or takeoff for several more knots). In an RJ like the one you were on, V1 and VR may be identical.
In the 767, we will abort the takeoff role for almost any warning annunciation prior to 80 kts. After this speed, recognizing the inherent dangers in high speed aborts, we will only discontinue the takeoff role for very serious problems: engine fire, engine failure, windshear, or something that brings in to question the airplane's ability to fly. We will not abort for a "door open" indication, for example, or for a generator failure, or any of a dozen other less critical items.
When the non-flying pilot calls out "Vee One", we are not stopping even if an engine fails. We have flying speed and we know the plane will do fine on one engine, so we will get airborne and then deal with the problem. We
don't know if the airplane can actually stop on the remaining runway if we elect to stop after V1...hence the decision to fly and the reason we calculate V1 for each takeoff.
If this pilot had begun the takeoff rotation, he was obviously past V1 and should have gone flying.
Last edited by W0X0F; 06-18-2014 at 07:37 PM.