Its a Cross Between Landing on a Carrier Deck and Landing Uphill- Then Lots of SLOW Flight
You’ve seen them before; when you were at the beach, at a game, on the water, or just driving around running errands. Aerial banners have been observed from the ground for about 70 years. A pilot towing one of these banners needs to perform some precision maneuvers just to pick the banner up.
Once the banner is in tow, the tow aircraft is flown very slowly to maximize the exposure of the banner message. As any pilot will tell you, slow flight requires a fine balance between aircraft power settings, wind direction and speed, AOA, and flap settings. And that’s all before the pilot drops the banner off at the end of the flight!
The video was originally uploaded by Dez Rosswess.
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The Pawnee Might Be Slow but It’s Ugly
The aircraft in the video, a Piper PA-25 Pawnee, is an ideal platform for aerial banner towing. The Pawnee has plenty of power, good slow flight handling characteristics, excellent outward visibility for the pilot, and low stall speed.
Also used for crop dusting and glider towing among other utilitarian tasks, the Pawnee is exceedingly not fast (VNE is 107 KIAS), but its low stall speed (53 KIAS) allows it to pick up aerial banners without damaging them and drop them off with relative precision.
Other Tow-Worthy Banner Pullers
Other aircraft used for towing include Stearmans (in the old days anway), Cubs and Super Cubs, Citabrias, and Cessnas. While aerial banner advertising may not be as prevalent today as it was in the 20th century due to airspace restrictions and regulations, there are still plenty of companies ready and willing to pull your message across the sky behind an airplane.
If at First You Don’t Pick the Banner Up…
In the video the pilot misses the first attempt at pickup but nails the second try. Flying in Europe out of Breda International (EHSE), there is a fairly strong crosswind component to deal with.
The ground crew directs the approach to the pickup using paddles reminiscent of the type used by old-school US Navy landing signal officers.
Who Needs a Norden Bombsight?
The banner, advertising a local bookkeeping concern, is dropped off using similar signals from the ground. The pilot appears to have dropped the banner right on target.
Notice how slowly the pilot is flying when the banner is dropped off! Once the tow pilot turns to enter the pattern, a Robin R2160D commences takeoff on the active.
BONUS Video
Here’s a pilot’s perspective of the entire process. This’ll get your attention! Thanks to YouTuber RevMatch26 for uploading it.
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It is not a Robin R2160D, but a Saab 91.