I was a new captain at Northwest Airlink, with a fresh type rating in my pocket and a license to fly! I'd been flying the Saab 340 for over two years as a co-pilot, and this move was something I'd been looking forward to for a long time. As a Captain I was careful and meticulous, but I was also young, with the anything-to-get-the-job-done mentality. I was based in Minneapolis and had plenty of experience flying in the frigid land of the north.
On this night we were flying to International Falls (INL) with a full load of passengers and bags. The weather was bad- lots of clouds with icing and plenty of snow. We began our descent from cruising altitude and started making preparations for landing. The weather was sky obscured, one half mile visibility in blowing snow, temperature in the teens. The wind was blowing ten knots out of the southeast, which meant we'd have to fly the ILS with a tailwind. No problem, the tailwind limitation is ten knots, so we're good. As we got vectored onto the final approach course, we called the airport and Thor, the son of the airport owner, reported the runway had just been plowed but had a hard packed layer of snow still on it. Roger that. We talked about how this would make the runway quite slippery. I almost wished they hadn't plowed it. The snow plow had taken several inches of snow and turned the runway into a skating rink. Autopilot all set up, we started down at our maximum landing weight. Our Vref speed was something like 126 knots with the required corrections, with an approach speed of 136 kts. We barrelled down the glideslope, needles centered, right on speed, making minor power corrections to keep everything stable. At minimums we got the approach lights in sight, and moments later the runway threshold appeared. At 70' I disconnected the autopilot and concentrated on holding the glideslope right to the runway while slowing to Vref. With little flare I flew it on right where the glideslope meets the pavement. On snow, you can't make a hard landing. It's like jumping on a bed.
It was immediately obvious- We were moving! With the tailwind, we touched down doing 135+ knots across the ground, or 155 mph. On a tricycle, on polished slippery snow. I immediately pulled it into max reverse, stepped hard on the brakes and said to the co-pilot "Get on the brakes, get on the brakes.." which he promptly did too. As we went racing by the midfield point, past the terminal, I remarked with surprising calmness, "Boy, you can really feel the anti-skid working, can't you?" "Yeah, you can," he replied. And we were still going over a hundred miles an hour.
Meanwhile, Thor was sitting in the fuel truck on the ramp, trying to keep warm, waiting for us to arrive so he could give us some fuel. Suddenly he hears this loud roar of engines in reverse, and looks over to see "a giant ball of snow with a red blinking light in the middle racing by me on the runway." It was obvious to him we were not going to get stopped so he began to drive down the taxiway to give us a ride back.
Still rushing headlong down the runway, we had gotten slow enough that several things started to happen. Below eighty knots the props in reverse begin to have a dramatic effect on the rudder as they begin to pull air from around it. It'll begin slamming one side to the other, so at eighty knots the co-pilot usually reaches down and engages the control lock. Which he did, as the runway end lights loomed brightly ahead and I switched to nosewheel steering. The reversing propellers are now blowing snow ahead of the cockpit, ruining visibility. Which wasn't a bad thing, considering the proximity of the runway end fast approaching. As we came within a plane length of the end of this 7000' runway, we finally slid to a stop. Back to idle, the blizzard within the blizzard settles away and there, not fifty feet in front of us were the red end lights, bright as can be. I turned off and we started to taxi back when we saw Thor turning around on the taxiway. "What's he doing out here?" I asked.
At the gate, after the passengers had deplaned, our flight attendant came up and said "Now Dave, I know you're a new captain, but you can't leave it in reverse that long. Makes the passengers nervous." The co-pilot opened his mouth to reply but I touched his arm and said, "Oh, OK Sahrie. Thanks. I'll remember that." The co-pilot looked at me quizzically. "If you tell her why, she'll not understand, think we're dangerous, and tell all her flight attendant friends that we're dangerous. Best to just leave it be."
Later I reviewed the manuals to try to figure out why we took so long to stop. Ah, right here, buried in the winter ops performance section, a little side note. "When braking action is reported as poor, maximum tailwind component is 1 knot." New Captain indeed.
