“I’ll see your gliding A330 and raise you a gliding 767:”
Pants down!
According to http://www.casa.gov.au/fsa/2003/jul/22-27.pdf
the 767 wasn’t able to reach Winnipeg airport from 28,500 ft at a distance of 65 nm.
Glide ratio reported 12:1.
According to http://www.moptc.pt/tempfiles/20060608181643moptc.pdf
the 330 was able to fly 78 nm from FL345.
Glide ratio 13.7:1
Another “more”:
“GEN. LICHTE: Well, I — from a warfighter’s perspective, and I know the team looked at a whole number of things, but from my perspective, I can sum it up in one word: more.”
http://www.af.mil/news/story.asp?id=123088862
While Pearson is modest about the piloting skills he used to bring Flight 143 to a safe landing, his experience as a gliding and aerobatic instructor was essential when it became apparent that the aircraft was travelling too fast to land on the runway at Gimli airbase near Winnipeg.They had excess energy, and who knows if they could have made a glide ratio of 13.7:1, and if it were an Airbus the landing might well have been a little more messy.Pearson needed to lose altitude fast. The only way was to sideslip the giant aircraft on the final approach so it would touch down close enough to the beginning of the runway that it wouldn’t run out of tarmac. This manoeuvre was unprecedented. Fortunately, it worked, and Flight 143 touched down safely.
But Pearson is relieved that he wasn’t flying an Airbus. “You can’t sideslip an Airbus aircraft, the computers won’t let you,” he says. “Boeing aircraft are capable because they’re a hydraulic-controlled aircraft and you can cross control.”