If you’ve been around the business world for any length of time you’ve probably heard some variation of the phrase putting the landing gear on during flight or building the plane while it’s in flight. Many years ago I was on a plane that had landed in the Bahamas. We got stuck on the tarmac for about 45 minutes because the plane that took off before we landed blew all of its tires. They were trying to figure out whether they could return safely to land at that airport. They decided that there was a better chance that they would be able to land effectively by going on to I believe JFK or Miami.
Losing your landing gear is something that has happened to many planes over the years. Doing a belly landing is not realistically possible for many aircraft. And for those that try it, the act is not always survivable. If you aren’t completely flat, you may find yourself doing cartwheels or worse. Most pilots would agree that they will work with whatever landing gear they have and try for the best landing possible. Here’s an example of a 737 landing without part of it’s landing gear. It wasn’t pretty but any landing you can walk away from is a good one.
Over the years many people have sacrificed trucks or other vehicles to fill in for missing landing gear. As long as you can get up to speed and match the plane perfectly, you may just both survive the experience.
Not Just a Metaphor
Until recently I never thought that this was even the idea of putting landing gear on during flight was even a remote possibility. That was until I watched a video from the 1920s of a woman named Gladys Ingles. She was a member of a barnstorming troupe called the 13 Black Cats. They were helping a plane that had taken off and had lost one of its wheels. The video shows her starting from the ground with a wheel strapped to her back. She goes up on one plane, walks down the wing and jumps onto the other plan plane with the missing wheel. Gladys then climbs under the undercarriage and replaces the wheel while in flight. Not only did Gladys survived this experience, she did the whole thing without a safety harness or a parachute. Gladys lived to the ripe old age of 82
it’s amazing what you can do when you put fear behind you.