Got back in the air after installing my Gearbox. At about 2000 ft climbing to 2500 ft into the flight I had a Canopy latch failure. Noticed wind and light on the sides of my canopy. After a quick inspection, I saw a 4-5 inch opening at the back on the sides. First thought was I forgot close the latch, then looked up and the inside portion of the latch dropped out. Immediately started thinking and the only thing I could remember was “fly the plane” which I did.
I did not declare an emergency, just turned back and started slowing down and loosing altitude. It was a non event. Not sure if the set screw came loose or sheered off. I did have lock tight on the set screw. I checked the outside surfaces for damage after I landed with no damage
David wrote: ↑Sun Apr 04, 2021 7:46 pmAt about 2000 ft climbing to 2500 ft into the flight I had a Canopy latch failure. Noticed wind and light on the sides of my canopy. After a quick inspection, I saw a 4-5 inch opening at the back on the sides. First thought was I forgot close the latch, then looked up and the inside portion of the latch dropped out. Immediately started thinking and the only thing I could remember was “fly the plane” which I did.
I did not declare an emergency, just turned back and started slowing down and loosing altitude. It was a non event. Not sure if the set screw came loose or sheered off. I did have lock tight on the set screw. I checked the outside surfaces for damage after I landed with no damage.
Agreed, great job David. Keep calm and "fly the airplane". Be sure and share what happened to the latch itself, I'm sure other RV-12 owners will want to learn from this incident. Thanks for sharing your experience.
When I had my “pucker moment” back in 2010, I recall complete tunnel vision, but like you focusing on flying the airplane remained front and center throughout.
Last summer I was flying with a transition student in a glider (Schleicher K-13). We were practicing for a commercial glider add on to his ATP certificate. We were practicing slack rope. On the previous flight I tried , but was not getting enough slack rope for him to demonstrate recovery. I talked with the tow pilot who is an old time glider instructor, and he told me to put in lots of slack if I wanted. So the next flight at a safe altitude I took the controls and put in the slack, and it was a bunch. One of the ways to remove slack from the rope is to momentarily pop out the airbrakes to slow the glider a little. The applicant panicked because of the amount of slack that was present, and grabbed the canopy release instead of the airbrakes. He opened the canopy while on tow. It flopped over and broke the retaining strap. Now we are still on tow with an open canopy and still have slack rope. He then reached for the tow release and pulled it. Now we were free from the tow plane with an open canopy. I had him slow the glider, and I was able to pull the canopy closed and latch it. We made an uneventful landing after that. The tow plane didn't feel us release because of the slack, and continued to climb on out until we called him on the radio. We both lost our favorite glider flying hats.
