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Reminds me of the question I asked of an ex-Air Force, United Airlines training pilot: "Can you barrel roll a 707?"

Answer: "Uh, I would rather not say."

by asdf on Tue Jun 25th, 2013 at 12:18:43 PM EST
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Well, I once wrote a short story in which a passenger took the commands of a Boeing 777, after hijackers killed both pilots. He had extensive experience with MS Flight Simulator, you see, so he knew exactly how hard you could push it without tearing the wings off. He flew it down into the Grand Canyon, then under the Golden Gate bridge, then headed for a disused airstrip in Kamchatka.

But he had never bothered learning to land the thing.

It is rightly acknowledged that people of faith have no monopoly of virtue - Queen Elizabeth II

by eurogreen on Tue Jun 25th, 2013 at 12:40:00 PM EST
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A barrel roll is supposedly  a stress free manouevre, so it should be okay.

Concorde could barrel roll.

keep to the Fen Causeway

by Helen (lareinagal at yahoo dot co dot uk) on Wed Jun 26th, 2013 at 04:03:51 AM EST
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Exactly. But the only way to find out is to try it.

My experiences with perhaps a dozen ex-military pilots who went into the commercial airline business makes me think that passenger jets were routinely rolled. Back in the days before every single thing that you do is recorded. Probably not any more.

http://clickamericana.com/eras/1950s/passenger-jet-does-a-double-barrel-roll-1955

by asdf on Thu Jun 27th, 2013 at 11:56:34 AM EST
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