Incredible videos of Tu-154 with control stability problems

Sorprendente!, No puedo ni imaginar que hubieran pasajeros ahí! Los pilotos sí que se lucieron.

For the landing: search YouTube for "посадка ТУ154 RA85563 29.04.2011".
It looks like the nose plopped down kinda hard, but otherwise a really nice landing.

Man, the Russians can fly can't they... That was amazing...

All I can say is God must have been on their side that day to land that plane in one piece.

209flyboy, sorry if I lead you wrong. I said 727ski, by that I meant the Tu 154. The Ruskies tried to copy the 727, but it is hard to get it right when you are using a spy picture to produce plans of an A/C. sorry if I offneded anyone.

Good analysis Gary.
The flight looked like an RC model trainee!

I would be willing to bet that since this aircraft was coming out of maintenance they hooked up the yaw damper backwards. Any natural yaw moment would be amplified and not damped and lead to the large oscilatory behaviour seen on the video. My first reaction would be to turn off the yaw damper. I bet this pilot tried the same and for some reason it didn't work. Awesome recovery to the landing, pity it was blocked by the trees.

The negative dihedral didn't help any.. Like sitting on top of a pin...
Not stable right from the gitgo...

The Boeing 727 was one of the most stable and reliable aircraft ever built. It handled well and I never had a CG problem, even when it was loaded to capacity.
I will say that the pilot of the Ruskie ship did a great job of getting it on the ground safely. I only hope he had a clean change of underwear with him.

I had the displeasure to ride in a 727ski in the early 90s from Moscow to Murmansk. This machine has a serious CofG problem from the getgo. They had a POGO stick under the tail during loading of PAX. The front folks got on first and then the rear was filled so it wouldn't fall on its tail. The exits had no slides. Baggage was piled in the doorways. We only flew with them once. Never again. To say the least, it was a memorable flight.

After the 5th bottle of vodka was dead and buried some one said " Hey lets make a video for You Tube, any ideas?" The pilot raised his hand.

This also showed up on Yahoo UK news;

"A spokesman for the aviation authorities told a Russian news agency that the plane’s steering had malfunctioned, and praised the pilot for landing the plane."

So maybe some 'Adverse Yaw' and 'Differential Thrust' involved in trying to get it pointing the right way for landing.

That took skill to keep it right side up. Gives new meaning to being on the edge of out of control. I, too, would have loved to see the touchdown, or crab, or whatever the new term the pilot gave to this landing. Bravo comrade. !! If my corporate CJ3 ever did this, I'd have to shoot it.

wow.. would love to see the touchdown. The videos however need new soundtrack - every second word is a swear word :)

NAHHH! this was an old Braniff 727 sold to the Ruskies. That's how they fly.

Roll the equipment!

Great candidate for the Sullenberger award.

Looks just like the way if fly in FSX :(

Maybe vodka in the tanks instead of jet fuel?

I thought that roller coaster was a popular amusement ride only developed for amusement parks.

I seem to remember this aircraft is the fastest airliner built. it is also really WELL built like a lot of Russian kit, I flew on one from UK to Bulgaria some years ago. The flight would seem to be a bit of a check ride for the plane and pilots, just a different way of doing things over there.

I didn't think of that actually. What 'psgroshong' said as well as sparkie624 does raise questions as to what really happened. I'm an Airline pilot of 9,000 hours, but since psgroshong has seniority over my own experience I would have to second what he said. It does make more sense, especially since the oscillations continued the exact same way up until the landing which was "normal". Pilot input fits.

theschoolofchuck - To answer your question on a wing and a prayer, and by looking at the wings, I would say it was mostly prayer. psgroshong good point. Not exactly smart flying, but another thought, if this plane just came out of long term storage as the article suggest or Heavy Maintenance, maybe the controls were crossed I have seen that before, but they were always cought before take off. If he did not do the proper preflights and the such. From that plane, he probably cannot see the control movements, they are free moving, not knowing they were backwards. For that length of flight, it would be hard to troubleshoot in the air, and I am sure he was too busy at the time to talk to their maintenance control... Just a thouht from a 27 year commercial/part 121 mechanic.

Has anyone considered that thses could have been pilot imputs. As long as the aircraft is not overstressed and the airspeed is kept under control the aircraft will not be damaged. These motions are very smooth and repetitive, maybe auto pilot gone nuts, but my bet is on pilot imputs that lood very spectacular from the ground. Just a thought from a 27,000hour commercial pilot.

Pilots were damn good, that's amazing airmanship. The design might have failed, but these guys sure earned their pay with this flight.

Nice landing but you'd never get me on a Russian built aircraft. Never.

No yaw damper at all? That looks like a very weakly damped dutch roll.

I guarantee the Capitan's chair had to have the bottom replaced after this. That is serious Pucker Factor right there. Nice work!

Looks like they had a bad case of Dutch Roll, at least.

How they were able to bring that thing in is beyond me.

In former Soviet Russia, you not fly plane, plane flys you!

This is not the way it should fly...just wow. Immagine what these Pilots went throught.