Indicated Airspeed Rudder Tail 
Air
MAY 21, 2025
Pilots must use specific techniques, applying rudder and aileron inputs, to maintain directional control and keep the aircraft aligned. Can cause sudden losses or gains in indicated airspeed (IAS), directly affecting lift. Headwind component (Vf), either on the face or tail, is calculated with the cosine function.
Plane and Pilot
SEPTEMBER 20, 2024
Missing its tail, pointing almost straight down, a Van’s RV-7A single-engine, two-seat homebuilt plummeted out of the blue and into the rocky ground. Alongside a nearby highway, some recognizable bits of airplane, the vertical stabilizer and rudder, a horizontal stabilizer and elevator, fell separately to Earth.
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Plane and Pilot
SEPTEMBER 20, 2024
Missing its tail, pointing almost straight down, a Van’s RV-7A single-engine, two-seat homebuilt plummeted out of the blue and into the rocky ground. Alongside a nearby highway, some recognizable bits of airplane, the vertical stabilizer and rudder, a horizontal stabilizer and elevator, fell separately to Earth.
Air Facts
OCTOBER 7, 2024
It was a beefed up, militarized version of the Beechcraft Bonanza with a narrowed fuselage and conventional tail, seating two pilots in tandem cockpits with controls and indicators configured similarly to tactical aircraft of the period. Dropping like an inverted dart tail first, Morris, from his aft cockpit perch exclaimed,“Wheeeee!”
Chess In the Air
JUNE 24, 2022
The Rifle ASOS recorded a gust of 43 mph from the south: a 100-degree shift in direction, putting it right on his tail. Without knowing the horizontal wind direction and speed at this point it is impossible to say what his indicated airspeed was. I immediately pushed in the spoilers, hit hard right rudder, and hard right stick.
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