FR 738 bouncy landing !

Gordo85

Hi,

Long time lurker, first time poster in this thread. Really enjoy following and have learned a lot reading same for the last few years!

I was just looking to get a bit of feedback re a flight I was on this evening - I flew back from the UK on FR this evening. Perfectly normal flight, weather conditions fairly light, all fairly standard.

On final approach and just before touchdown I thought I felt us traveling a bit faster than what I would normally be used to... (An observation from a lay person - I may be completely wrong & airspeed may have been perfectly normal - my gut felt we were quite quick though).

As we touched down, the main gear met the ground quite unsympathetically it felt like a very hard landing); we bounced back airborne for what seemed to be 1-2 seconds before returning to the ground. Once the gear met the ground for a second time all was fine and everything fairly routine after that back to the stand.

I'm just wondering if people could shed light on possible reasons for such a bounce, really just to satisfy curiosity on my part?

- are hard landings / bounces caused by issues such as airspeed too quick for touchdown, incorrect pitch / flare set for aircraft ?

- would a go-around be a better option than continuing to seek to land once the initial bounce has happened ?

- is causation attributable to pilots or could a sudden gust or up / down draft be the cause? (Though weather at DUB seemed fairly light)... Also could cause be linked to flap setting for landing (drag etc?)

- is bouncing dangerous - can damage be caused to the gear and fuselage from same?

-are these fairly regular occurrences? I fly fairly often for work and have never had a similar experience previously.

Genuinely curious on this - would love to receive feedback from the experts! Apologies if my terminology above isn't on the money - just an amateur observer educated by Wikipedia, YouTube and the discovery channel !! Thanks in advance ðŸ‘ðŸ»ðŸ˜€

Irish Steve

Others will probably give more details, the simple answer is that the 737-800 is a tricky aircraft to land with finesse because of the length, there is a very real risk of the tail end of the aircraft being damaged by ground contact if the nose is raised too high to reduce the descent rate, so it is an accepted fact that 737-800 landings will often be "firm". That also has the advantage that if the runway is wet, a firm landing means less risk of the wheels aquaplaning, and not getting a firm grip on the tarmac, which is needed to allow braking effect to be adequate, and there are systems on the aircraft that detect that the wheels are spinning, but they can be fooled by a very gentle touch down on a wet runway, as the wheels don't come up to speed, which then prevents some of the automatic systems from operating correctly.

If the pitch up to cushion the landing is a little late, that can lead to a bounce, which has to be very carefully managed to put the aircraft down again without the risk again of a tail strike. The other reason for "firm" landings is that if the aircraft is held off for too long in an attempt to make the landing less firm, there is only a small margin of speed available before there is again the risk of entering into the tail strike zone, which can do significant damage to the aircraft, so it needs to be avoided.

The 737-800 is not unique in this respect, there are other aircraft in both the Boeing and Airbus families that have to be handled with care to avoid a tail strike, due to the length of the fuselage.

A firm landing doen't cause damage, a very heavy landing can cause structural damage, but that would be very rare, and if you are involved in one, you will know about it, there's a good chance that things like the overhead bins may open, and the passengers will very much feel the effect of the firm ground contact.

IngazZagni

A bounced landing would not be the intended outcome but these things can happen for a variety of reasons. It's not a safety issue unless the bounce causes you to eventually touch down too far down the runway. Pilots are trained to deal with these situations.

It's most likely the aircraft was flying at a normal speed as these things are heavily monitored however depending on the wind the aircraft may be flying faster over the ground. So a slight tailwind on final approach will make the aircraft fly faster over the ground than normal.

It's too difficult to say exactly why the aircraft bounced so I won't speculate. However I will say that just because the weather seems OK doesn't mean there aren't unusual conditions that will affect aircraft. But Boeing 737 aircraft are tanks. They can withstand so much punishment. Most people haven't experienced a "hard" landing but rather a ' firm' landing. Or indeed a "Boeing landing" as many people like to say.