Panache Aviation

SACAA Annual Industry Awards 2023 – Research & Development Award

Pilots use Panache Aviation to provide them with tools and training to help them become better pilots!

Simply put, Panache Aviation products and services are designed and developed to enhance the safety of both pilots and their passengers. For this reason, pilots choose Panache Aviation products and services in their role of flying passengers and cargo safety to their destinations.

After many decades of studying aviation accidents, John Comley, both pilot and engineer, decided to conduct research on the use of trees as a means of absorbing kinetic energy when conducting an emergency forced landing.

Surviving an emergency forced landing is more about managing the energy of your aircraft, from flying at altitude at a given safe airspeed, to being on the ground, at zero ground speed, and, as far as possible, without rupturing the aircraft fuel tanks in the process.

It so happens that trees are the most prolific as well as the best energy-absorbing ‘obstacles’ that can be used for absorbing the kinetic energy of an aircraft, when in a largely horizontal orientation and flying close to stall speed!

FLIT: Forced Landing Into Trees provides pilots with multiple additional potentially life-saving emergency forced landing options when traditional emergency forced landing options are few

With all the modern instrumentation available in light aircraft today, the one thing that does not exist is a glideslope indicator, providing pilots with the correct glideslope in order to land in the optimal position on the runway.

A correct glideslope for landing in the optimal position on the runway requires that obstacles, such as overhead cables, buildings or trees, are cleared whilst flying the approach, and that the earliest position on the useable runway is utilised, thereby maximising runway length, which allows for optimal stopping distance.

Besides the extremely expensive equipment and instrumentation required for the ILS (Instrument Landing Systems) found at large airports catering for large commercial airliners, traditional ‘visual’ glideslope indicators for smaller GA-type airfields take the form of PAPI and VASI lights, both of which are extremely expensive, require electricity to operate, and need to be regularly maintained to ensure the accuracy of the glideslope projected to pilots on the approach.