J35 Bonanza Power-On Stall / Spin 

For a while I owned a Bonanza of the same series. It was during a period when I was getting about 200 hours of flying time per year, so I was pretty well on top of my game. Not long into my ownership I decided to take her through a stall series at altitude, probably at 5000 feet or above. For power on stalls I recall a significant nose up attitude and probably above half throttle . I'm sure that my ball was centered. With little or no warning, the aircraft broke steeply to the left and entered a spin within a quarter turn. My reflexes served me well: keep the yoke in my belly, stop rotation with rudder, then nose down with elevator and recover smoothly. I did it several times, same result. My training had ALWAYS been to keep the stall going with elevator, to get the rotation stopped, and recover gently enough to avoid overspeed and not trigger a secondary stall. In all cases, I lost five hundred feet or so, maybe more. My first impression of all that was to recognize that Bonanzas happily gave up controlled flight. The break was surprisingly abrupt. I had done countless such maneuvers in a wide variety of Cessnas, Pipers, and other Beechcraft. This stall break, on the other hand, was frightening. I guess that's simply a characteristic of Bonanza wings. Live and learn. A year later I recreated nearly the same scenario with a passenger on board. I was flying formation with a Cessna 182 skydiving plane to my left. As the jumpers got out of the 182 and momentarily paused, the 182 slowed down. I did too and subconsciously added some rudder to keep a clear view of the jump plane. Then I was looking up at the wheat fields, and I won't relate what the passenger said. I had inadvertently cross-controlled the Bonanza very close to its stall speed and entered a spin before I could react at all. BUT, my reactions were perfectly reflexive and recovery was as described above. No harm, no foul. But a flat version of the power on stalls described above, at least insofar as the recovery. It ain't mushing around during slow flight practice where you get half a week of warning and virtually no break. After a lot of thought, I speculated that this characteristic gave hint to a death trap. Picture turning base with a strong crosswind that is now behind you. As you turn final at maybe 400 feet, the crosswind pushes you past the runway centerline. Reflexes are triggered, and in addition to banking back toward the centerline, you add just a little too much rudder, add some turbulence as that crosswind bounces over the terrain, and you are riding a death trap. Cross controlled stall at low altitude. A tiny mistake at the worst possible time, I would argue, in the worst possible airplane. Practice, practice, practice and know YOUR airplane.

I have a P35 Bonanza, V-tail. If-470 260 hp. Owned for 14 years and 1100hrs in type. About 2 years ago practicing stalls. Decided to try a power-on stall with an instructor. Had perhaps 60% power and planned to put nose down just when plane felt like it would stall. Let me tell you not to do that in a Bonanza. The usual buffet is very brief and plane snapped to the left and went nose down in a heart beat. Holy. Sh-t. So fast and probable got 1 or 2 rotations in less than 5 seconds. Pulled power, pushed yoke and neutral ailerons and did recover easily but I will never do this again in my Bonanza. I can definitely see a full power take off stall being deadly in a heart beat for a Bonanza.

This is why I have pilots recover from power on stalls at the first stall indication (usually stall warning horn, 5-7 knots above stall AoA under current conditions including G load), especially when the airplane is in the dirty go-around configuration. Another excellent discussion, Gunny.

Thanks for the physical demos on your aircraft..!!!

Thanks Scott for the excellent explanation about power being a pro-spin input.

Wow, great discussion. I wouldn’t have believed it, but learnt something new after 46 years since I first flew. Thanks Scott, fascinating.

Great video Scott! I haven't done any stalls since flight school. I need to fix that.

My instructor took me out to do some spins b4 he turned me loose... And I'm so thankful he did!!! This was back in the early 90's and even though it wasn't required by the FAA, he thought it could save my life if I ever got in a bad situation out practicing by myself. Should be mandatory training for ALL pilots!!!

When I got my PPL in the early 80's we trained on all the stall/spins and practiced them a lot even solo. I added 15hrs of aerobatics to make sure I knew what to do in all unusual attitudes.

You have a way of cutting rigtht to the meat with your safety vids, Scott. Power on stalls and spins can be pretty darned exciting in a 172. I imagine they get really sporty, really fast, in a Bonanza. I'm with you 100% with the pneumonics...power on stall/spin recovery is not the time or place to be reciting a poem. Thanks, Scott.

Very good advice on how to recover from spins. 👍

Excellent primer on stalls and spins Scott, best I've seen, heard or read and a nice add-on would be some in-flight demos. I also appreciated you mentioning your preference for flow over memonic cues, in a busy or high stress situation I believe flow is the better default and mnemonic cues more suited for lengthy procedural tasks. I was also adverse to power on stall practice and mentioned that to a friend (Carl Deitz) who who did some of the FAA recertification like testing on the twin Comanche. At the time I was flying an old 205hp B35 with the flatter V-tail and Carl insisted that I work out my apprehension about Power-on stalls in the Bonanza, and what Carl had me do was cross-controlled departure stall entry with full Aileron and input and raising the nose until a yaw moment was detected, and then lowering the nose until the yaw stopped, avoiding a stall break. Carl's training point was not to actually perform power on stall, but to emphasize awareness even slight Yaw divergence in departure climb, and make lowering the nose as the preeminent action to advert a spin . As Carl used to emphasize, spin avoidance is foremost a matter of awareness of when you are at risk and taking immediate actions to mitigate that risk, rather than out of unawareness, becoming an inadvertent test pilot. On subsequent flight reviews, I Practiced cross-controlled approach to a departure stall with Carl in a B55, Mooney and Twin Comanche, and from then on, my awareness of Yaw and preparedness to "lower the nose" became second nature. I had a Decathlon for a while, and did departure stall and spin practice with an old AF aerobatic instructor, and on my first attempts I did just what you said, over-pitched and ended up inverted. From then on I became an advocate that any serious pilot get some proper stall stall spin training and recovery training in a real aerobatic aircraft, from a real aerobatic instructor like you Scott, who understands it, and understands how to teach it. Also, a side note on V-tail Bonanza's, and especially the early models with the lower dihedral V-tails. A veteran Bonanza instructor once asked me if I had ever done a forward slip in my old B35 Bonanza, I admitted I as never found a reason to slip a Bonanza, with flaps extended and it was prohibited anyway. He indicated that in an off airport emergency landing I might have to, and I should be familiar with the characteristics. We practiced forward slips with flaps up and extended, and I found that with flaps and gear extended, with even a light forward slip, elevator authority was greatly reduced or eliminated. When I pressed a forward slip beyond the point elevator ineffectiveness, the old B-model abruptly lost all vertical stabilizer control and pitched down nearly vertically, with a simultaneous, rapid and extreme kick back on the yoke that almost knocked the yoke from my left hand. I tried this in a later 'P' model Bonanza with the taller v-stabs and found better control with flaps extended, and experienced no sudden departure from controlled flight in an extreme forward slip.. As such, I came away with a better understanding and respect for why not to slip Bonanzas.

Thank you for what you do Scott. This is invaluable information, and the visual explanation of everything that is occurring on the outside of the plane in a power on stall/spin makes it so much easier to visualise what the plane is doing from inside the cockpit, which really helps to enhance situational awareness and the steps required to recover the aircraft. I think being able to picture in your mind the outside of the plane from the inside of the plane will help to save lives.

I learned how to spin an airplane at 6 years. Really!, you say? Really. My father was a WWII vet and former B-29 pilot amongst 24's 25's and trained in PT-19's Vultees BT-13's. T-6's. On the back steps he set up a seat, stick and pedals for the lesson or lessons...been 66 years. Lesson: Stall, kick left or right and depart..."Pop the stick" full forward and mash the opposite rudder against the spin to stop the rotation...ease it out of the dive into a smooth recovery. Why the comment then? Well, the aft stick thing. I have a CMEI and been a pilot since I was 26. Now 73 and haven't flown for many years but I was taught, never, let me repeat, never, unless in an inverted spin is the stick pulled back."Lost in translation" issue is this statement.... "Pop the stick." What I presume, since Pop left on his final mission long ago, is that what he really meant was, neutalize it from full aft post haste, yet never had I heard of the aft stick technique. Not even in WWII training films. Thanks Scott!! It all makes sense and to quote a famous old Aviation writer, " I learned about flying from that."

Excellent teaching moments as always Scott. Thanks so much for putting all the time and effort into your videos to help us pilots stay safe. You are very appreciated!

I learned to fly in a C150 in 1969. Not much of a fan of power on stalls (especially in a turn), but it was "mandatory". On one hand I agree- how irrelevant are they to a cautious pilot. BUT- I did have a pretty wild (for me) experience in an AA1 Yankee during a checkout ride. Coming from Cessnas and Cherokees, this was like a sports car. At 5,000 AGL (and gross weight) the instructor told me to do a power off stall. When it buffeted and seemed to stall I added power and dropped the nose to below the horizon to gain airspeed. He thought that I lost too much altitude and said to try it again, but just add power and lower the nose to level. That worked great for about 2 seconds, then BANG- it spun to the left (my first and last "real" spin)-no C150 Cherokee ever bit me like this!. We both applied right rudder and I think I neutralized elevator(already looking at a lot of ground) but left on full power. Spin stopped, leveled out maybe 2,000 ft lower and we both decided I would be flying very conservatively after that! (2 more solo flights after that, partly to "get back on the horse". Lesson from this- a poor recovery from a power off stall in a less forgiving airplane can get you into a power on stall.

Really good analysis of a power on stall, far better than when I was getting my PPL. Thx so much. There seems to be two problems in GA under trained pilots and often less than current on top of that. A lot can go wrong with these two factors in place

Isn't the secret to avoiding the spin in a power on stall using rudder to keep the nose straight? Not letting the nose go one way or the other?

Fantastic stuff. In beginning aerobatics at our club the instructors will try and let you recover from upset/spins/unusual attitudes power on. Not simple and not always successful, power off you can fly out in fairly short order. The tufted wing is outstanding and settles the debate I think.

Morning Scott , this was by far the best analysis I have seen on power on stalls. When I started out in a 150 my CFI a WW2 fighter pilot then on to the airlines was big on stalls , even power on , I enjoyed doing them even knowing the danger albeit having someone like you in case of a spin next to me .My take away is Training Training Training . Thanks

I have not done a full power on stall in 35 years ago Bonanza in flight training. What I remember is not only does it happen fast your airspeed goes from stall speed to max speed very fast almost instantly. Stay Safe in that nice looking Bonanza Scott it looks like it should well taken care of !

Hi Scott, can’t tell you how much I appreciate and learn from your videos. I really appreciate all the work you put into them!

First time I've seen a tufted vertical fin. Also never thought about lift potential of the VF. A very informative video.

Nicely done. Best video yet!

Scott, I love your videos. I am way old and have always loved things that fly. Childhood dream was to be a naval aviator. Never realized that dream. One thing I have come to realize from watching lots of aviation videos is that Im not near smart enough to have ever become a pilot! Thank you for the videos you post.

Well explained, Scott.

Excellent video Scott. I watched it before but needed a second look. Nice teachable situation.

My instructor was a super high time pilot, and let me tell you, we did spins and recovery till I was blue.

Thank you so much Scott for such an amazing video (as you always do). I have not done spin training yet. I was taught power to idle, neutral controls, let the spin stabilize before I apply the opposite rudder and slowly pull out of it and bring the power back. You took that and broke it down with such incredible detail and visual representation. Now I understand the aerodynamic principles and the “why” of what is done to recover. The full aft thing is new info and I greatly appreciate any and every minute life saving piece of information you provide.

Thanks Scott...need me some upset training!

Tou·ché! “I’m not going to spin one to find out!” LOL!

Absolutely one of the best descriptions of spins. I didn’t do spins in flight indoct. I did do many spins in the t37 back in the early eighties. The Bold Print EAC still stays with me today. Working on ppl after not flying for 14 years and want to practice spin training again. It should be part of the ACS, but sadly not yet.

That was a great learning lesson for me. Thank you!

Great video, very helpful. I just lost two dear friends to stall/spin.

I learned a lot about The power on stall. I practiced one a week ago.

Thanks for the refresh on stall and spins. The only stall/Spin I did during trading was on a C150 aerobatic. Just like you said, power idle, and neutralize controls. It would come right out. The Bonanza V tail might have a bit more complicated airflow on the tail. It would be really interesting to see it in a video with all the airflow indicators like yours. Great video. Thanks again

Love the clarity of your explanations thanks.

Great stuff Scott, thank you and as always….the learning never stops. 👍

G,day Sir from Sydney Harbour Australia. * Thankyou for the enlightenment of the presentation (position) of the plane structure following impact with terrain at various degrees Power on stall: and recovery I liked your reminder about the rudder being a source of lift and the visual aids (demonstrating relative airflow over the vertical stabiliser and rudder) to cement your point. 🌏🇦🇺

Only other thing I can think of that happened is that the pilot in question was practicing slow flight; not so much power on stalls. It may well have inadvertantly developed into one, but practicing slow flight that has gone bad is i.m.h.o. a realistic option. especially because he was "less current" (and probably "less proficient" because of that), and he went out to do some airwork to re-acquaint himself with the airplane. If you take the region of reverse command a touch too far... Great analysis and aerodynamics explanation, Scott. Thanks for that! :)

Thanks Scott! Good stuff as always!

Thankyou Scott.

Thanks for doing this video. There is a lot of good info presented here.

What a wonderful presentation Scott. It's packed full of very valuable information! I wish I lived closer, because I would love to do some upset training with you. I'll be honest, I've never heard the full aft stick after you pull the power and neturalize/center the ailerons, but after watching the demonstration, it makes perfectly good sense. I assume every aircraft has it's own tendencies, so it may depend on the aircraft your flying? I've always been taught, pull the power, center stick, opposite rudder, then break the stall with just enough elevator.

I just bought a G35 a few months ago. Since I haven't flow for a few years I got my instructor to go with me to pick the plane up and ferry it home. I spent 12 hours (logged) with him learning to fly the V-tail. They are great airplanes to fly and I have been really enjoying mine.

I just understood so much stuff from this video and I'm not even a pilot. Thanks!

In west Phoenix we flew thousands of hours of RC aircraft, gliders, pattern ships and all kinds of configurations. Our favorite tail feathers were V-Tails!

Great information! When I was training for my private, I made it a point to my instructor that I wanted spin training. He was more than happy to do it. He demonstrated one to the right then the left. Then it was my turn. It should be part of PP training.

Excellent video! Thank you.

wonderful video! Awesome discussion..thanks

Thanks Scott . . . with Respect . . . Bob

Very informative. Great airflow videos thanks

Great analysis.

Thank you for teaching me.

Great lesson... What is needed for most pilots should be brought to understand some basic acrobatics and spin training as soon as they get the license to carry passengers! Plan a few more hours in a camp about stopping a spin and some more of the upset training for the low and slow practice, like being in a traffic pattern when it goes bad, and when planning and practice will be the most useful skill to have!

Great video! Thanks Scott! Your the best. You have proven it again we (me) are always learning. Thanks again you may have saved a life! Maybe mine. Thanks Again👍

I should add to my previous comment that I learned to fly in a Grumman AA1B… big dashboard placard that says “spins prohibited” Maybe why I didn’t have any spin recovery training? I now own and fly a 172 on floats, and did intend to practice power off and power on stalls… I agree with you about the power on stalls … not very practical… so I’ll not be doing those…. All the same,Thank You Scott for that life saving information I didn’t get in my training!

I had never thought of forward elevator as a pro-spin input. The Cessna 172M manual says to hold full aft elevator for the spin entry. But interestingly, if you follow the instructions, full aft elevator is held until just after the opposite rudder is applied. Technically, recovery still starts with IDLE NEUTRAL AFT. "The normal entry is made from a power-off stall. As the stall is approached, the elevator control should be smoothly pulled to the full aft position. Just prior to reaching the stall ''break", rudder control in the desired direction of the spin rotation should be applied so that full rudder deflection is reached almost simultaneously with reaching full aft elevator. A slightly greater rate of deceleration than for normal stall entries, application of ailerons in the direction of the desired spin, and the use of power at the entry will assure more consistent and positive entries to the spin. As the airplane begins to spin, reduce the power to idle and return the ailerons to neutral. Both elevator and rudder controls should be held full with the spin until the spin recovery is initiated. An inadvertent relaxation of either of these controls could result in the development of a nosedown spiral." .......... "Regardless of how many turns the spin is held or how it is entered the following recovery technique should be used: (1) VERIFY THAT THROTTLE IS IN IDLE POSITION AND AILERONS ARE NEUTRAL. (2) APPLY AND HOLD FULL RUDDER OPPOSITE TO THE DIRECTION OF ROTATION. (3) JUST AFTER THE RUDDER REACHES THE STOP, MOVE THE CONTROL WHEEL BRISKLY FORWARD FAR ENOUGH TO BREAK THE STALL. (4) HOLD THESE CONTROL INPUTS UNTIL ROTATION STOPS. (5) AS ROTATION STOPS, NEUTRALIZE RUDDER AND MAKE A SMOOTH RECOVERY FROM THE RESULTING DIVE."

Awesome!!

Excellent

Wow. Never come across that before. I can see the logic of the aft Elevator for more rudder airflow. Right, I'm off to practice that. On my flight sim.

I am with you on actions. I want to memorize what I need to do in a given situation not what the acronym is. Thanks for bringing that up. Great report and breaking this down.

Thank you for the information.

That was an excellent visual

I’m not usually fond of mnemonics, but I like PARE, mostly because it’s so well known and so important for extricating from a spin in almost any GA airplane. It’s the same steps as you describe, but much better known in the GA community. Power off, Ailerons neutral, Rudder opposite to stop the spin and then neutral when the rotation stops, Elevator forward to break the stall and then gradually back to level off. I suggest that the Bonanza pilot, whether he knew PARE or had any spin knowledge or training at all, undoubtedly panicked and froze when the airplane flipped into a spin. As anyone who has done any spins knows, that first time is pretty scary, even when it’s being demonstrated by a competent instructor. When I was instructing back in the 80s, I had a private pilot freeze at the controls of a 182 when a power-on stall broke into a spin. It was my fault-I’d taught him in his private training to “walk the rudders” (falling leaf) as a means of demonstrating how the rudder retains authority during a stall, even when the elevator and ailerons have lost their authority. We’d done that both power off and power on in a 172, and he had no trouble. After he obtained his private certificate, he wanted to check out in the 182. At altitude, we were doing the usual air work including stalls. I had him do a falling leaf, and he was impressed with the additional authority that the 182’s rudder had compared to the 172’s. I then said not to try doing that power on, because the additional power made it too difficult. I think I said “nobody can do it”, my student said “I bet I can”, and like a dummy, I said “OK, smart guy, try it”. Of course, the deck angle was extreme. As the airplane oscillated to the left, he pressed the right rudder, it oscillated to the right, he pressed the left rudder, and suddenly the airplane flipped over to the left and fell into a spin. Because I’d also taught him spin recovery, I expected him to react, but he didn’t. He froze, still pushing the left rudder and with the yoke still back all the way, with full power. I first tried to talk him out of the spin, but when I realized I couldn’t get any reaction from him, I pulled the throttle off, used all the strength I had to push the opposite rudder, and I had to hit his wrists with my arm to knock his hands off the yoke. I don’t know how many turns, but we lost over 3000 feet, from 11,000’ to below 8,000’ MSL. It was not until we were flying straight and level that he “woke up”-he didn’t remember any of the spinning. So that’s why my guess is that the Bonanza pilot either had no idea what to do, or he simply froze and left the controls however they were when the airplane entered the spin. That the throttle was still at full power supports my guess, since pulling the power is the first step in recovering from a spin.

very nice coverage

Thank you! 🛩

Wow, I have never heard of elevator aft in spin recovery before. Thank you so much for explaining.

I always learn when I watch Flywire

I guess I was one of the lucky ones because my instructor did teach me to reduce power. Hope I can pull it off if the time ever comes.

Such a great point on on flows/actions vs mnemonics. Implementing that with all students now. IDLE NEUTRAL AFT

Very useful rundown Scott. Thank you. I too, eschew acronyms and mnemonics. Understanding is the key, not following rote acronyms or mnemonics.

Thanks Scott!!! Would love to see you do this type of in depth analysis on a modern M20P Mooney and other airplanes!

Very good

P - power off A - ailerons neutral R - rudder input E - Elevator

Here's a place RC models teach you to do it wrong. The models have so much power, the prop can just pull the airplane out of the spin on neutral controls. Many models can pull up and out of the flat spin by using power. (impossible for full scale) While the models can teach you some good things, they can teach you bad habits.

hated power on stalls. scared to death of them but I did em. Never did a spin either. My airplane was not going to get to any angle past 30 degs turn lol.

Great job!! ERAU 80 CFIA&I ret.

Thanks!

I think you'd like the tail of the Zero!

I did then even on Tomahawks. Neutral, Push, Pedal, Power. Neutral or release the wheel, Push it then, Pedal to opposite, and power off. Done all in 2 seconds.

My own experience with my F35 I will not follow through with a power on stall . The nose gets to a very high angle of attack and still is not stalling. I tried a few times with an instructor and it just not something I wanted to follow through on. When I instruct in the Bonanza I don't do full power on stalls. You have made good points.

Something interesting I learned years ago is that what is the number of possible different spins there are on an aircraft. Add complexity and the number multiplies to well over a hundred thousand different spins. Think about all the possibilities of changing the longitudinal, lateral and vertical centers of gravity a tenth or half an inch at a time. And in fuel moments for different fuel loads, power settings, rpm settings and flap and landing gear positions. Does a manufacture who must demonstrate recovery in a single engine, explore all of these possibilities? The answer is no they don’t. For one the costs and time required to investigate all the possible spins is prohibitive. The field certification branches know this and will hear arguments from the manufacturer on why 6, 8 or 10 configurations are thought to be the worst and will approve the study to be on that groups. The flight test program might show early on that the prototype to be recovering easily without deploying the spin chute and the amount of required spins can be cut down. By the time type cert comes around, very few spins from the vast possibilities of different configurations have been deeply investigated. It can go the other way where a spin test program can go poorly and drag on for ever. My point is that no one has don’t all the spins in an aircraft. When you spin you very well might be the first. Hopefully your aircraft and the humans on board will be equipped like a well run flight test program with easy egress and parachutes. Even then you will loose now and the. Let remember Art Scholl where the weight and moment of a video camera on a cable added to the list of configurations possible in a pits and one that no one had ever explored before.

I've owned 3 Bonanzas including a deb and I can't think of any occasion where I got near a power on stall and most of my flying was in the mountains.

Thanks Scott. This part 103 lunatic really appreciates the lesson. I've got 15+ hrs with CFIs and never learned about this recovery technique.

Scott your a Rockstar, In My Opinion Worst thing the FAA did was removing "required spin training"

Kudos to you. I learned something having never really considered what happens if a practice departure stall turns into a spin. Likely I would have reduced power but now I know why that’s a good idea. I find your videos the most instructive of the Dan/Juan bunch. (Dan will give me….for saying that.) One caveat - you could use an editor. There are many grammatical errors - to when you mean too, loose when you mean lose. But, he’ll, you’re a pilot not English teacher! Keep ‘em coming.

👏👏👏

Had a flight instructor do full power stall when I was learning to fly and (yes I had to recover it a PA28-151because he did not know how )I did power all the way back controls neutral full rudder to beak spin then elevator pulled back then the airplane was flying again olé yes was praying to God like no other less than 200ft from hitting grown It sounds like I did not do it quite right but it worked this is 100% good solid INFO You are at the top of your game thank You.

Why would a 167 hour pilot, that just wanted to get current, go out and practice power on stalls solo. Doesn't really make sense.

Very well explained. My memory thing is to stomp the rudder on the side the horizon is 'leaking' out of, hence stopping the 'leak'. Your videos should be required viewing for everyone in 'basic' initial training. Thank you.

Scott, excellent as usual. In the late60's there were a number of Twin Commanche accidents which were attributed to stall spins during training. The aircraft received a bad reputation as a result. Likely these occurred during single engine training. Have you looked at the departure and recovery scenarios for light twin aircraft?

♥️

This one is really good! Another point to remember, when your anti-spin input is working, i.e. the nose dropping the yaw rate might actually increase momentarily as the masses realign around the spin axis like an ice skater pulling the arms in to increase rate. (actually the axis is relocating but with the same effect) I only really flew gliders, so at least there was no power setting to worry about :)

Scott, as always, I learn so much from your videos. I fly a J35, and I am a RU-vid contributor. I'm not sure how your extensive knowledge helps me understand this accident because most of the information and demonstration relate to conventional tailed aircraft. As you said you are not sure how any of this relates to the V-Tail. Clearly, the down input won't affect airflow on a vertical surface because there isn't one. My first response in my airplane, would be to pull power and neutralize control input. After that I would fly the airplane based on how it responds. Your thoughts?

Great video thank you for doing it. I was thinking about a spin accident I witnessed years ago in a Ryan pt-22. I was just learning to fly in a Aeronca and had completed spin training. A older friend at Van Sant had just bought a Ryan pt-22 by older he was 24 I was 14. My Dad was teaching me to fly the Aeronca and he insisted on spin training. Ok back to the Ryan. My Dad’s friend had taught in the Army Air corp in the T-6. Mac was his name. He was also a captain with TWA and owned and flew a Stearman he had just upper to 300hp from 225. Anyway Mac was going to check out Kent in the Ryan. We were sitting on the fence at the Pennsylvania country airport and watched the Ryan take off with Kent in the back seat and Mac in the front. We watched them climb to altitude and do various maneuvers. They did one spin entry and in 3 rotations recovered and climbed up to altitude again. Then they purposefully entered another spin and it kept spinning 5, 6 , 15 rotations and then disappeared behind the trees. Mac & Kent were both killed. We found out later the rudder cable between the front seat and back seat had snapped. Making it such that Mac the instructor had no rudder control. Kent had frozen on the controls with his feet pressed hard against the rudders. Kent had frozen in flight on a number of flights in the Stearman. The both had parachute but Mac turned the fuel off before impact and never bailed. Remember that Ryan was at 45 degrees spinning. Mac had no place to put his feet to push out of the cockpit. The reason I bring this whole traumatic story up was Mac had told me to recover the Ryan pt-22 you need to first stop the spin. Neutral controls and rudder to stop the spin. Then push the nose down getting airflow over the wing. That unless you stopped the rotation first in the Ryan it would not recover from the spin.

At 9:44, you stated; "...we don't teach spin recovery..." Is this now no longer a part of pilot training? When I was working on my pilot's license in 1971, I clearly remember practicing spin recovery. My instructor spun and recovered the plane and then had me do it three times, while he coached me into the spins. About a week later. while practicing stalls, I spun and recovered the plane. I was shaking like a leaf and headed back to the airport and planned on giving up, but then realized what I had just accomplished.

So you are so correct that we don’t teach this way. What about a T tail? Would you go forward instead of aft to increase airflow over the rudder?

Great video Scott! I have taught spins in 5 different aircraft and owned two different V tail Bonanzas. When I did my last flight review with my BPPP instructor he told me that spins in a V tail Bonanza are mostly un recoverable. Surely when they were certified they had to do testing. I’ll bet that when they changed the V tail to be more vertical that they RE tested spin recovery. Does anyone out there know what happened?

Could you explain that visual using the V tail configuration which seems more compromised ?