What is drop a plane straight on?

It sounds a bit horrible. It was from a novel, written in this way.



Whatever you didn't like about that lad, and I didn't like much, you had to admit he could fly. The turn was tight and economical and he didn't need to put on any power at all. His flaps were half down. All he had to do was to put down full flap and he could drop her straight on.



You know, after I read this I feel it is horrible if he'd drop her straight on. Doesn't it sound like suicide? straight on??? it is not a helicopter, it is a one engine plane. It is totally above my head.



From the context, you can see that this lad is pretty good one, skillful. Doesn't it sound like against the final sentence?What is drop a plane straight on?It sounds like an approach to a bush airfield with trees on the near end.



In that case you want the steepest approach possible, with full flap for drag and no power. Once you have cleared the trees you pull back to arrest the descent and lose some airspeed and plunk the plane down firmly. If there is a head wind the plane won't roll far in the sod or dirt, so it is 'dropping her straight on'.What is drop a plane straight on?Er no .... dropping straight on to the runway is the ideal way to land. Taking off is easy, its going from the soft stuff to the hard stuff which matters more.



Edit, OK. So landing the plane is all about getting the wheels smoothly onto the runway without bouncing or swerving as the forces on the plane change from wind speed and direction to tyres and the "road" beneath. The trick is to get speed, direction, power and lift all balanced so you fly the plane under full control, not stalling, until the moment your tyres touch and when you nose down the lift on the wings decreases a lot and your quickly driving on tyre. Sometimes I have had landings when the wind is a bit gusty and turbulent and the pilot flies quite hard into the runway and hits the airbrakes as soon as tyres touch. Trick as always is to kill the lift as soon as tyres touch. A new thought though, if this is landing on an aircraft carrier there is less room for error as the hard bit is sandwiched between wet places. Landing on an aircraft carrier they need to pick up an arrester wire stretched across the deck which quickly catches the plane and stops it before the end of the deck



And please nofunone, never "knots per hour" knots are already miles per hour.What is drop a plane straight on?the flaps are the trailing edge of the wings of your one engine plane. with them half down it can land at a much slower speed then if they are straight, in the flying position. if he put the flaps all the way down it creats much more lift, which means it was descend the same feet per minute at a much slower knots per hour or miles per hour might be how you understand it. so if he has to fly 90 miles an hour to land with flaps straight, then he can land at 75 with flaps half down. and if he puts the flaps straight downthen he can land at 55,, which means he would be able to be right over the ship or airport before starting his descent. which from a distance would look like setting the plane straight down on the deck. hope this helps.What is drop a plane straight on?
one manouever I had to do when taking my flight test for a PPL. was to simulate an engine failure at low level we picked out a football field with tall poplar trees all around it heading for the foot of the trees with no power then about 50 yards or so, did a steep climb hopping over the tree tops where most of our forward motion was used up and literally flopped down then putting on full power so as not to make a complete landing or we would not have had enough runway to take off again