Down... Three Green

Braniff International Airlines had three interchange agreements with other airlines.  Western Airlines (now Delta), Alaska Airlines and Air France.  Interchange meant the airplane from one airline might continue on a route with a crew from another airline.  For instance an Alaska Airlines aircraft and crew might start a flight in Anchorage and go to Seattle.  In Seattle a Braniff crew might take the flight over and continue on to DFW and then on to Houston.

ALASKA AIRLINES INTERCHANGE
During my first year at Braniff I picked up an Interchange aircraft that was doing that very thing.  We flew the Alaska Airlines aircraft to Dallas and in Dallas my crew got off to take the early morning flight to San Antonio... this was a redeye flight.  The airplane was continuing on to Houston.

My Captain and Co-pilot packed up their things and left and I was finishing up all the paperwork... The flight attendants left also.  I gathered up my stuff and was about to exit the airplane when I realized everyone was gone except for the passengers going on to Houston.  I didn't want to leave the passengers alone on the airplane and I had a couple of hours until my San Antonio flight so I just milled around... at about 5 AM.  I visited with the first class passengers that wanted to chat and I asked one man how he was doing.  

He replied: "I'm doing well, except I have a little heartburn... Airline food... haha..."

I asked if he needed some medical help and he said no.  But, the more we visited the more I thought he was really in pain.  I went out into the jetway and called EMS.  They were there within 2 minutes.  I watched as they questioned him and took his vitals.  It was a humorous interaction between the EMS guys and the passenger.  They laughed at the airline food comment and were leaving when the man said the pain is coming back.

The man went unconscious and they carried him out into the jetway where they had more room to work on him.  This was in 1979 and they had great equipment.  They had portable EKG, paddles and respirator.  They used all of that equipment on the man and were unable to revive him.

Eventually, the next crew showed up and I explained what happened and went searching for my crew.  I wrote a very long detail report with the family of the man very fixed in my mind.  I expected to hear more about the sad event but I never did.

WESTERN AIRLINES INTERCHANGE
Early one morning in San Antonio it was just barely daylight as I went out to pre-flight my airplane and was surprised to find a brand new Western Airlines Boeing 727.  As a Flight Engineer one of you duties is to walk around and inspect the airplane.  This includes pulling the landing gear safety pins... with long red banners attached to them.  If you forget to pull them the landing gear will not come up when you get airborne.

So... you can guess what happened...  We got airborne and the landing gear didn't come up.  I instantly reached for the pocket in the back of the Captain's seat... and grabbed the 3 landing gear pins and showed them to the Captain... "Not my fault it ain't working"... that's what I was happily thinking to myself.  

We had a little discussion about the indicator lights being right or wrong and it was decide that I should go back in the cabin and check.  About 23 rows back in the 727 cabin there is a viewing port.  It is under an aisle seat and you have to pull the carpet up and get down on your knees and look (some airplanes have mirrors to enable this look into a tough to see area) to see if 3 red stripes line up in a straight line... on this day they did line up.  I managed to get my fat head all the way under the seat and I could actually see the landing gear were if fact shiny and new and perfect.  Of course all of this brings a lot of eyes your way...

I went back up to the cockpit and said everything is down and locked so we turned around and landed.  There is a speed limit on flight speed with the landing gear down... the planned flight would have been very long and there wasn't enough gas to make that flight with all the extra drag from the wheels being down.

Fast forward and years later and I was on an airplane where all the landing gear did not come down.  So I went through the same ordeal with checking to see of the gear was down or not... in this case the right main landing gear was still up and locked in position.  We tried raising and lowering it several times and there was no change.  3000 pounds of hydraulic pressure didn't get that one gear down.  That was very unsettling. 

There is an alternate method of getting the gear down.  You de-pressurize the hydraulic system and pull on a handle that is in the floor of the cockpit... one for each landing gear.  We did that and we heard a solid thunk and a vibration each time we pulled it.  We got three green lights.  Just to double check, I wandered back and looked through the inspection ports again... I considered myself a real pro at this point.  All three were down and locked and we landed just fine... with the fire trucks waiting for us.

I had landing gear problems about 3 more times in my career and they always ended well.  

A little note about the red stripes that have to line up. Sometimes they get grease on them so on preflight I would have a tissue or paper towel in my pocket to wipe them clean.  One time I was cleaning up the stripes and they almost completely came off !  The airplane was grounded... kinda... There were no mechanics at this time of day.  I borrowed some red fingernail polish from a flight attendant and renewed the stripes and away we went.  I have seen mechanics do that very thing when I told them we needed better stripes.  On preflight you also make sure to clean the mirrors that are in the belly so you can see the stripes.

CHECKLIST
Once you put the landing gear down and have all of the flaps out you run a checklist named the "Before Landing Checklist".  The checklist is challenge and response.  The pilot not flying reads the checklist and challenges the other pilot and waits for him to check the item and say the correct response.  In the case of the landing gear the correct response is "Down, Three Green".  There are times the light bulb burns out for a green light.  One of my habits was to check the landing gear light at 1000 feet above the ground... I would say... "1000 feet, Three Green Lights" ... was a common habit that many pilots had... to double check.  

At least 5 times in my career I had a green light bulb burn out between running the checklist and 1000 feet above the ground on approach.  That means the light bulb burned out during that roughly 2 minute time period about 5 times in my career.  I went missed approach twice and the other 3 times I changed the light bulb really fast.

Those light bulbs were about 1/8" wide and less than 1/2" long ... very easy for my fat fingers to drop on the floor and not ever find...  There were plenty of extras.

There is a storage compartment on the captain side and the co-pilot side of the cockpit that has lots of different sizes of light bulb... there are many sizes...

You can "press to test" almost all indicator lights to confirm they are good bulbs.