VIDEO-What crash? Harrison Ford saved his own life and demonstrates why good pilots make small aircraft remarkably safe to fly - NaturalNews.com

(NaturalNews) Flying a vintage aircraft that apparently lost power, Harrison Ford saved his own life by doing precisely what all pilots are trained to do in the event of a power loss: control the plane's descent to make a non-powered landing that you can walk away from.

And that's precisely what Harrison Ford just did, as this YouTube video clearly shows. Although Ford reportedly suffered injuries, he was apparently able to walk away from the accident on his own two feet, with the help of others nearby.

While YouTubers who have never flown small aircraft are quick to leap to false conclusions with statements like "Small aircraft are dangerous to fly!", the truth is that Harrison Ford just proved why small aircraft are so remarkably safe when piloted by someone who is adequately trained and experienced.

The FAA requires ALL small aircraft pilots to undergo extensive training in emergency landing procedures.

If you examine the photo of the aircraft, there are several very important things to notice:

• It's clear the aircraft experienced a loss of primary engine power. This is the most common emergency scenario for which small aircraft pilots are repeatedly trained. For pilots who are certified by the FAA, the process of gliding the aircraft into an emergency descent becomes second nature.

• Ford was able to control the aircraft's descent into what appears to be a narrow clearing in a public park dotted with many trees and fences (perhaps baseball backstops?). The skill required to pick out such a landing spot upon power failure -- and glide your aircraft to that landing spot -- is precisely what pilots gain when undergoing FAA pilot training.

• The airplane shows no apparent damage whatsoever to the wings, ailerons, tail or elevators. This indicates Ford was able to maintain aircraft pitch, roll, yaw and air speed in a very narrow window of relative safety. Once again, excellent training pays off. The photos shows Ford did all the right things and controlled the aircraft while throwing off kinetic energy at a slow enough pace to preserve his own life.

• The only apparent damage to the plane is noticeable on the engine cowling, and this is entirely expected in an emergency landing where the landing gear are stripped off by the soft ground, causing what's called a "prop strike" to occur, where the propeller digs into the ground. This prop strike causes a strong forward pivot of the entire engine, which is likely what caused the apparent damage to the engine cowling. (This plane will likely never be certified to fly again, but Harrison Ford will!)

• Due to his training, Ford was able to avoid the plane digging its nose into the ground and flipping vertically, tail over nose. So-called "soft field landings" always present a risk of tail-over-nose flips if the pilot is not sufficiently trained or experienced in such landings. Once again, Ford did all the right things to avoid such a problem.

• Additionally, Ford was apparently able to guide the plane into a controlled emergency landing in a way that avoided causing injury to other innocent people on the ground. Again, this is due entirely to his training and experience. Clearly there were people nearby, yet Ford was able to completely avoid them, even though his cockpit position in the aircraft does not afford him much visibility at all.

• On the issue of visibility, notice that Ford's aircraft is a "low wing" plane, meaning the wings are mounted below the seated position of the pilot. This stands in contrast to "high wing" aircraft such as Cessnas which offer far better visibility of the ground during emergency landings. Successfully landing a low-wing aircraft on a soft field during an emergency loss of power requires considerable skill and strong command over the aircraft.

Above all, this incident reinforces two things:

1) Trained pilots make small aircraft remarkably safe to fly, even in emergency situations.

2) Harrison Ford's training paid off in saving his own life and preventing the loss of life for innocents on the ground.

In fact, having seen how he handles this controlled descent with such expertise and skill, I would gladly fly with Harrison Ford any day!

About the author:Mike Adams (aka the "Health Ranger") is the founding editor of NaturalNews.com, the internet's No. 1 natural health news website, now reaching 7 million unique readers a month.

In late 2013, Adams launched the Natural News Forensic Food Lab, where he conducts atomic spectroscopy research into food contaminants using high-end ICP-MS instrumentation. With this research, Adams has made numerous food safety breakthroughs such as revealing rice protein products imported from Asia to be contaminated with toxic heavy metals like lead, cadmium and tungsten. Adams was the first food science researcher to document high levels of tungsten in superfoods. He also discovered over 11 ppm lead in imported mangosteen powder, and led an industry-wide voluntary agreement to limit heavy metals in rice protein products to low levels by July 1, 2015.

In addition to his lab work, Adams is also the (non-paid) executive director of the non-profit Consumer Wellness Center (CWC), an organization that redirects 100% of its donations receipts to grant programs that teach children and women how to grow their own food or vastly improve their nutrition. Click here to see some of the CWC success stories.

With a background in science and software technology, Adams is the original founder of the email newsletter technology company known as Arial Software. Using his technical experience combined with his love for natural health, Adams developed and deployed the content management system currently driving NaturalNews.com. He also engineered the high-level statistical algorithms that power SCIENCE.naturalnews.com, a massive research resource now featuring over 10 million scientific studies.

Adams is well known for his incredibly popular consumer activism video blowing the lid on fake blueberries used throughout the food supply. He has also exposed "strange fibers" found in Chicken McNuggets, fake academic credentials of so-called health "gurus," dangerous "detox" products imported as battery acid and sold for oral consumption, fake acai berry scams, the California raw milk raids, the vaccine research fraud revealed by industry whistleblowers and many other topics.

Adams has also helped defend the rights of home gardeners and protect the medical freedom rights of parents. Adams is widely recognized to have made a remarkable global impact on issues like GMOs, vaccines, nutrition therapies, human consciousness.

In addition to his activism, Adams is an accomplished musician who has released ten popular songs covering a variety of activism topics.

Click here to read a more detailed bio on Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, at HealthRanger.com.

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