Scott, I’ll push back on this.

The overhead break is absolutely more efficient for getting a formation of airplanes landed, and it’s a lot safer for the flight.

2-4 planes in formation, then splitting up into single ship to fly a traditional pattern is simply unsafe, especially if it’s not briefed (ie if the tower denies the break which I’ve seen happen).

Since planes in formation can share the runway, clearing the flight for the break (and clearing for landing) can get them all on the deck very expeditiously.

Robert

I'll give you an example from this summer. Our runway is 34. Two aircraft in formation approached from the west. First call about 5 miles out announcing they were a flight and would be setting up for the overhead. Since I was at home and near my radio I told them on the radio the wind was calm. They fly to the field and cross midfield west to east. They fly a couple miles past the strip and do a 180. They then fly back over the field westbound and turned south about where you would normally turn a mid field downwind for runway 34. They then fly about 3 miles south of the field so they can turn and start their initial. They then fly 3 miles back to the field and break at midfield, normal landing from there.
Had they just entered a midfield downwind when they first got here they would have been on the ground fully 5 minutes before they actually did land. Each succeeding aircraft simply has to extend their downwind slightly to follow the one in front of them. Should they choose to be on the runway at the same time that distance can be pretty short. Simply unsafe? Hogwash. Tower or no.
Now had they approached from generally south of the field then most of the maneuvering would not have happened.

I'll give you an example from this summer. Our runway is 34. Two aircraft in formation approached from the west. First call about 5 miles out announcing they were a flight and would be setting up for the overhead. Since I was at home and near my radio I told them on the radio the wind was calm. They fly to the field and cross midfield west to east. They fly a couple miles past the strip and do a 180. They then fly back over the field westbound and turned south about where you would normally turn a mid field downwind for runway 34. They then fly about 3 miles south of the field so they can turn and start their initial. They then fly 3 miles back to the field and break at midfield, normal landing from there.
Had they just entered a midfield downwind when they first got here they would have been on the ground fully 5 minutes before they actually did land. Each succeeding aircraft simply has to extend their downwind slightly to follow the one in front of them. Should they choose to be on the runway at the same time that distance can be pretty short. Simply unsafe? Hogwash. Tower or no.
Now had they approached from generally south of the field then most of the maneuvering would not have happened.

Scott, there are so many things wrong with this.

If I understand what you're proposing, the flight would come up downwind as a flight then the first would break, and each succeeding airplane would wait a set amount of time and then break.

This ends up with the last airplane with a very long final, which isn't smart (especially in warbirds). One of the reasons for the break is to maintain altitude and energy until you're in a position to land (also, it helps if people are shooting at you but that's thankfully not an issue at the airports I fly into).

Another reason for the break is to go from being fast to landing configuration speed quickly. For example, in the T28 we come into the break around 180kts and our gear/flap speed is 140. Putting the plane into a 45-60 degree bank will quickly bleed off speed down to 140 where we can drop the gear and flaps.

The maneuver you propose is also non standard - While people who don't participate in formation flying may not realize it, formation flying is a highly structured and disciplined form of aviating. It's highly scripted and we're all trained to a similar standard so we know what to expect when flying in a flight. Flying "the break" is the standard way for a formation flight to transition from being a welded group to landing. It's what we do and what we train for.

Finally, flying up downwind means that you're in direct conflict with other traffic on the downwind and have to manage speed appropriately. I'm typically flying the pattern at 180-200kts and coming up behind a 152 ends up badly. Trying to slow down a flight from 180+kts to 100kts, especially when unplanned, is going to be a goat rope. Please believe me, you do NOT want to be dash-4 in that flight.

When I come in for the break I often have to work in with other traffic in the pattern. I'll work to get SA by listening to the Unicom a while out and set up my arrival to time it well - Sometimes that means I have to do a 360 or two to get spacing right. If I bring my flight in when there is traffic on short final or upwind it works out great - Lead breaks over the numbers with a 3 second interval and we're all on the deck before the traffic is even turning crosswind.

I will repeat what I said earlier - Breaking a flight up as they are coming into the airport can be flat out dangerous. Sure, if you brief it before hand you can manage it, but I personally witnessed one flight be denied the overhead at a controlled field and it turned into a fur ball that would have been avoided if tower had simply let them do the break.

Robert

[youtube]https://youtu.be/aE9oOHrRMJI[/youtube]

Well, I've seen GA pilots call themselves a "flight" when they were a mile in trail of each other and -2 and -3 were asking for individual landing clearances. I've seen tighter formations of B52s.

I've spent time in HMN Tower and watched them work the morning flights of T-38s and F15s back in. Everybody is doing the overhead, and they were using non FAA approved separation in some cases. Still had to send a few around, and that was with well trained crews and controllers.

I worked formations of all types for 31 years, and there is a LARGE variation in aptitude and experience between the active military and 3 random Cessna drivers returning from the fly-in. And at a busy facility,finals has to build a hole in the approach sequence for an overhead, they don't just fit in, unless they plan to break and touch down with 10 ft separation. I turned down overhead requests made too late to sequence properly, sent them back to approach for re-sequence to the initial.

Nine pages of gnashing-of-teeth. Fun read!

When I'm in a Cub where my top speed and pattern speed are only a few knots apart, I don't see a need for the overhead... except when 3-4 of us want to show up to an airport BBQ and look "cool"... in which case we are judicious on how we do it.

However, when I'm in a warbird doing 250-300 KIAS, I can arrive, sequence and get on the ground a lot quicker using the overhead. One reason is that I can keep my speed up all the way to the field, and then immediately bleed off a lot of knots quickly so I can lower the gear and get to my pattern speed. Obviously not an issue in the Cub (so I don't do it).

Most of my overhead flying is done at a tower that does a lot of newhire controller training. The vast majority of the sequencing "issues" I get with said tower are self-induced by tower "over controlling" my flight of of two instead of simply letting us do what we do best. If Tower cut their radio calls to us in half, things would improve. But I digress...

One quick story: I led a flight of two into the overhead at Sac Exec (KSAC) about 10 years ago. The Sac FSDO is located right by the field. Apparently, a FSDO inspector saw us in the break and lost his mind. He was upset with our bank angle in the break. Fortunately, I had built a good rapport with a couple of the FSDO guys I had given rides to. One of them called me to give me a head's up. The issue went away... but I got the distinct impression the angry FSDO inspector wasn't pleased. And yes... to get a 4G level turn in the break is going to require more than 60 deg of bank.

The overhead is an effective tool. Don't believe me? Go to Nellis AFB and watch a Red Flag recovery. But like all tools, it's not "one size fits all". It's simply an option that works well in some cases... and not so well in others.

I suspect that the majority of pilots opposed to overhead breaks to landing have no idea what the difficulties would be trying to get a group of four or more airplanes flying in formation into an airport by any other means.

I bet it'd be more exciting if the airlines landed using overhead breaks. You know....they could land more airplanes faster and safer.
I suspect that the majority of pilots opposed to overhead breaks to landing have no idea what the difficulties would be trying to get a group of four or more airplanes flying in formation into an airport by any other means.

The KC-46s (767) come in as two ships all of time and utilize the overhead at SJAFB. C-17s do it as well. No big deal.

Yup…..I was in a B29…..an we did the deed.

A group of B52s arrived back at Biggs AAF in the middle of the night during a big air defense exercise. They all elected to do overheads, right turns, with the noise amplified by the echoes off the Franklin mountains. I was not involved and Biggs tower was closed for the night. My phone rang for 1.5 hours, and the B52s were invited to leave and never come back.

I've never done an overhead. And I've not flown a warbird. Just a curiosity question: when I flew big-block piston twins, a lot of attention was given to protecting the engines by slow power reductions and avoidance of shock cooling. Do large radial engine warbirds have issues with shock cooling? I would assume that planes in the overhead get down pretty quick so maybe it happens so fast that power reduction is followed almost immediately by slow to taxi speed so it doesn't matter, but flying an overhead seems to require going from cruise power to idle really fast. No issues?