Flying_Monkey
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- Sep 22, 2014
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On the way back from a great trip to Sedona this morning...during taxi I ask my wife if she has shut the front door. She says yes but then I point out it is not latched. She latches it. I guess she didn't fully close before latching...I JUST last week re-rigged the door with new eyebolts and clevis pins and washers and it shuts very nicely now with almost no air leak- so much better than before. I looked at the door after she latched it and it looked ok. We took off and then she tells me the door is open a little. We argue a bit about returning to the airport to land - I want to, she doesn't. I decide we are going to. She tries to put a jacket between her body and the air leak and a few minutes later the jacket is mostly sucked out the door.
I did not see it happen and all of a sudden the plane starts vibrating and buffeting and I think we are maybe losing the engine. I scan instruments and realize everything is fine and see her struggling to hold the jacket and she is now audibly struggling to hold on to it. I quickly realize the jacket is likely the source of the strange aerodynamic situation. I stay clam and slow the plane down- we are at this point close to the airport to return to land anyway. The plane is handling strangely with the shaking. I think for a minute that maybe I missed clearing away some snow or ice or something is happening with the control cables but it is just too coincidental to the moment the jacket went out the door and I did a super thorough pre-flight after clearing snow off the plane. She hangs on to the jacket and I land the airplane and walk around to inspect and see nothing damaged or wrong. We take off and fly 3 hours home and all ok except her very rattled nerves.
I'm home now and reviewing some footage from cameras I had rolling. The moment the jacket flies out the door I can see the stabilator vibrating. It remind me of that video of stabilator flutter that maybe some of you have seen. It begins immediately when the jacket enters the slipstream and flaps around. The vibrating stabilator does not appear before this moment or after we depart again once the door is properly closed and there is not a jacket flopping around at 100 mph.
So...I feel like I need to have the stabilator inspected. What do you all think? I will be putting together a video in the next couple weeks. Hoping to cut a clip of it to show here first. Just nervous about the integrity of the stabilator.
I did not see it happen and all of a sudden the plane starts vibrating and buffeting and I think we are maybe losing the engine. I scan instruments and realize everything is fine and see her struggling to hold the jacket and she is now audibly struggling to hold on to it. I quickly realize the jacket is likely the source of the strange aerodynamic situation. I stay clam and slow the plane down- we are at this point close to the airport to return to land anyway. The plane is handling strangely with the shaking. I think for a minute that maybe I missed clearing away some snow or ice or something is happening with the control cables but it is just too coincidental to the moment the jacket went out the door and I did a super thorough pre-flight after clearing snow off the plane. She hangs on to the jacket and I land the airplane and walk around to inspect and see nothing damaged or wrong. We take off and fly 3 hours home and all ok except her very rattled nerves.
I'm home now and reviewing some footage from cameras I had rolling. The moment the jacket flies out the door I can see the stabilator vibrating. It remind me of that video of stabilator flutter that maybe some of you have seen. It begins immediately when the jacket enters the slipstream and flaps around. The vibrating stabilator does not appear before this moment or after we depart again once the door is properly closed and there is not a jacket flopping around at 100 mph.
So...I feel like I need to have the stabilator inspected. What do you all think? I will be putting together a video in the next couple weeks. Hoping to cut a clip of it to show here first. Just nervous about the integrity of the stabilator.
