Two is better than one

Seaplane pilots get ratings in a weekend but must navigate a landing surface completely unfamiliar to land airplanes. The same goes for flying a multiengine airplane, which can also be learned in a long weekend. When both engines are operating, the training feels adequate. But as soon as there is a problem, those few hours will seem woefully inadequate.

Learning to fly a multiengine airplane introduces many new concepts and builds on some of those already learned. Almost all multiengine airplanes have retractable landing gear, constant-speed propellers, and other systems found on complex single-engine airplanes. But expect to learn more complex fuel systems, new environmental systems in the form of a dedicated heater, and possibly other new features, such as auto-feathering, rudder and aileron trim, and more. Regardless of the type of airplane you train in, new operational concepts will form the core of the course.

Minimum controllable airspeed

When one of an airplane’s engines stops working, it creates a dangerous situation called asymmetric thrust. Imagine sitting in the middle of a merry-go-round while a friend begins to push on one side and you get the idea. Rudder counteracts asymmetric thrust, but at some point the pedal is to the stops and the airplane still wants to yaw. That’s minimum controllable airspeed (MCA). When the airplane is flying faster and there is lots of airflow over the rudder, a multiengine airplane will fly just fine on one engine. But as that airflow slows down, the operating engine begins to win the push and pull, and the airplane will yaw, roll, and ruin your day. MCA is denoted by a red line on the airspeed indicator.

Identify, verify, feather

The mantra—identify, verify, feather—is something multiengine pilots can recite decades after their accelerated weekend training. When an engine quits, the pilot identifies the bad engine by noting which leg is just chilling while the other is hammering on the rudder pedal. She then verifies this is the correct side by pulling back on the throttle of that engine (dead leg, dead engine), hopefully noting that nothing changes, and finally, feathers the propeller on that same engine by pulling the propeller control all the way back. It sounds easy, but imagine doing it at 100 feet above the ground looking up at rising terrain.

Staying sharp as a multiengine pilot is challenging, given that most of us will never have to shut down an engine and there are many areas to train. Time spent with the manual, in the simulator, and watching safety videos online will quickly refresh those skills you learned over an uneventful long weekend of flying around a multiengine airplane on one engine.

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