Power-On Stalls

The departure stall. It's practiced from straight climbs and climbing turns to build recognition of an accidental stall during takeoff, go-around, climb, or when trying to clear an obstacle (AFH 5-18).

AC 61-67C par. 104b adds the accident context you should brief: many stall/spin accidents have occurred in these phases, particularly during go-arounds, and the causal factor has been failure to maintain positive control due to a nose-high trim setting or premature flap retraction — plus short-field takeoffs. That sentence is why Tasks X.G and X.H exist.

1. Clear the area; entry altitude allows completion no lower than 1,500 feet AGL (ASEL/ASES) or 3,000 feet AGL (AMEL/AMES) (AI.X.D.S2).
2. Establish the takeoff, departure, or cruise configuration as specified (AI.X.D.S3).
3. Slow to normal lift-off speed while continuing to clear.
4. At that speed, set takeoff power or the recommended climb power — the ACS floor is no less than 65 percent power (AI.X.D.S4) — while establishing a climb attitude.
5. Smoothly raise the nose past the climb attitude to an attitude that induces a stall, and hold it (AI.X.D.S5).

Step 3 is the one students skip. The AFH gives the reason: reducing to lift-off speed before advancing the throttle avoids an excessively steep nose-up attitude held for a long period before the stall (AFH 5-18).

Heading ±10° in straight flight; in turning flight, a specified bank not to exceed 20°, ±10° (AI.X.D.S6) — compared with ±5° in the power-off stall (AI.X.C.S6).

The looser bank tolerance recognizes the reality of the maneuver: at high power, high AOA, and decaying airspeed, the airplane is fighting you with torque, slipstream, and P-factor, and holding bank to five degrees while feeding in right rudder is a different problem than holding it in a stabilized idle descent. The AFH practices these from 15° to 20° bank climbing turns (AFH 5-18).

Four left-turning tendencies all peaking at once — torque, spiraling slipstream, P-factor, and gyroscopic precession (AFH 5-22). At high AOA the descending propeller blade on the right side of the arc has a higher AOA and therefore higher thrust than the ascending blade on the left, yawing the airplane left (AC 61-67C, par. 109).

The instruction: "As the elevator comes back, the right foot goes in." The AFH says exactly that — in most airplanes the pilot moves the elevator progressively further back while simultaneously adding right rudder and holding the climb attitude to the full stall (AFH 5-18).

AC 61-67C names the consequence of getting it wrong: insufficient or excessive rudder correction for P-factor results in uncoordinated flight, and the classic stall/spin setup is a go-around or short-field takeoff at high pitch attitude, high power, and low airspeed (par. 109).

Same template, one shortcut (AFH 5-18):

1. Immediately reduce AOA — as much nose-down input as required to eliminate the stall warning.
2. Level the wings with ailerons, coordinate with rudder.
3. Smoothly advance power as needed — since the throttle is already at the climb setting, this step may simply mean confirming the proper power setting.
4. Return to the desired flightpath — straight and level, or the departure/climb attitude.

Then configure per the manufacturer and accelerate to VX or VY (AI.X.D.S9); return to the assigned altitude, heading, and airspeed (AI.X.D.S10). With sufficient airspeed and control effectiveness, return the throttle to the appropriate setting.

Because they push the nose to the power-off recovery attitude. With takeoff power already set, the airplane is producing thrust and propwash over the wing the whole time — the AOA needs to come down only far enough to eliminate the stall warning, not to a diving attitude.

The correction phrase: "Break the stall, don't dive." Then note the two related common errors in the debrief: excessive forward-elevator pressure during recovery resulting in low or negative G load, and excessive airspeed buildup during recovery (AFH 5-21).

The opposite error is worse — pulling back too soon, which produces a secondary stall (Task X.H).

A loss of RPM. AC 61-67C par. 103 notes that in fixed-pitch propeller airplanes, a loss of revolutions per minute may be evident when approaching a stall in power-on conditions.

Pair it with the other cues you can name out loud during the demonstration: mushy controls and reduced control effect, a reduction in the sound of airflow along the fuselage, buffeting or uncontrollable pitching just before the stall, and the warning device firing 4 to 8 knots prior to onset (AC 61-67C, par. 103).

They skidded it. A stall in a skidding turn results in a spin entry and rotation in the direction of rudder application, regardless of which wingtip is raised (AFH 5-22; AC 61-67C, par. 109). Too much right rudder at the stall means an incipient spin to the right.

Your action, in order:

1. Reduce AOA.
2. Neutralize the rudder.
3. Level the wings.

Do not chase the roll with aileron — that deepens the down-going wing's stall (AFH 5-15). If rotation has started, that is a spin entry and PARE applies (Task X.I).

Then debrief it as the whole point: "An airplane needs to be stalled and yawed to spin" (AFH 5-22). Maintaining directional control and not allowing the nose to yaw before recovery is initiated is the key to averting a spin (AFH 5-22).

The departure stall's real-world twin is a horn nobody was expecting: rotation and initial climb, a go-around, an obstacle-clearance climb, or a climbing turn out of the pattern. In practice the student is braced for it. In normal operations they are not.

What to teach:

• One response, no diagnosis. Reduce AOA until the warning stops, then wings level, then power — the same recovery, applied at the horn rather than at the break (AFH 5-16). Deciding why it went off comes after the wing is flying.
• In a climb, the horn usually means pitch, not power. At takeoff power and low airspeed the student's instinct is to add power they already have. Adding power reduces the altitude lost but does not eliminate a stall (AFH 5-16) — the nose has to come down.
• Respect it at any airspeed. Weight, aft CG, a gust, or bank can put the wing near critical AOA well above the book number — a stall is the result of excessive AOA, not insufficient airspeed (AC 61-67C, par. 100b).
• Never treat it as normal. A horn tolerated on climbout becomes a horn ignored on a go-around, and go-arounds are where these accidents cluster (AC 61-67C, par. 104b).

The habit to build: any stall warning in normal flight gets called out and answered, then debriefed on the ground.

• Altitude floor — complete no lower than 1,500 feet AGL single-engine, 3,000 feet AGL multiengine (AI.X.D.S2; AC 61-67C, par. 200).
• Yaw is the take-the-controls trigger. Not pitch attitude, not altitude loss. If the ball is out and the nose starts to swing at the stall, take it.
• Pitch attitude ceiling — for some airplanes the AFH allows reducing power to a setting that will prevent an excessively high pitch attitude rather than using maximum power (AFH 5-18). Know your airplane's number.
• Trim — leave it set for the entry speed, not trimmed nose-up into the climb, or you have built an elevator trim stall you did not brief.
• Never demonstrate or practice single-engine stalls in a multiengine airplane (AC 61-67C, par. 200).
• Turbulence and density altitude (AI.X.D.R6) — a gust can produce an abrupt AOA increase and stall the airplane above book speed (AC 61-67C, par. 100l).

Say the next action before you take it, and name the cue when it arrives:

1. "Clearing turns. Floor is [altitude]."
2. "Carb heat off, gear up — takeoff configuration. Slowing to lift-off speed."
3. "Lift-off speed. Full power, climb attitude. Right rudder."
4. "Now the mistake: I'm going to keep pulling as if I'm clearing an obstacle. Airspeed's dying — feel me adding more right rudder."
5. "Horn. Controls are soft. Watch how much rudder this takes."
6. "Buffet — nose is dropping and I can't hold it. Full stall."
7. "Recovering: nose down until the horn stops — only that far. Wings level. Ball centered. Power's already up. Climbing again."

Then the debrief question that does the teaching: "Where in a real flight does that attitude and that airspeed happen?"

Follow AC 61-67C par. 200b: at a safe altitude, have the student fly coordinated power-on stalls straight ahead and in turns, and emphasize how these stalls could occur during takeoff. Then have them fly it again and distract them just before the stall occurs, and explain the effect the distraction had on the stall or the recovery.

Reinforce with par. 200c, the engine-failure-in-a-climb demonstration:

1. Set up VY over a straight-line landmark.
2. Chop the power at a cardinal altitude.
3. Lower the nose to best glide.
4. Fly a 260° turn at best glide, followed by an 80° turn the other way to re-intercept the landmark.
5. Point out the altitude loss — the honest answer to "can I turn back?"

As CG moves aft, the elevator deflection needed to stall the airplane at a given load factor is reduced — a higher AOA is reached with less control force (AC 61-67C, par. 100h). Consequences you brief:

• Inadvertent stall entries become easier, because the airplane reaches critical AOA with a light pull.
• During recovery, the same light forces make it easier to generate higher load factors — a secondary stall or an overstress on the pull-out.
• With an extremely aft CG, very light back-elevator forces may lead to inadvertent stall entries, and if a spin is entered, the balance of forces may result in a flat spin. Recovery from a flat spin is often impossible (AC 61-67C, par. 100h).

Forward CG does the opposite: the stalling AOA is reached at a higher airspeed and requires more back-elevator force (AC 61-67C, par. 100h). This is why the instructor runs the weight and balance for a stall lesson, not just for the cross-country.

From the AFH's list (5-21), the ones that show up here:

• Inadvertent accelerated stall by pulling too fast on the entry — "smooth, steady back pressure; let it come to you."
• Failure to maintain proper coordination with the rudder throughout the stall and recovery — "more right foot."
• Failure to maintain a constant bank angle during turning stalls — "hold twenty; look at the horizon, not the nose."
• Recovering before reaching the critical AOA when a full stall was requested — "hold the attitude until it breaks."
• Not maintaining a nose-down input until the stall warning is eliminated — "keep it down until it's quiet."
• Inadvertent secondary stall during recovery — "fly it out; VY isn't going anywhere."
• Losing situational awareness and failing to return to the desired flightpath.

Correct with one short phrase in flight and the full explanation on the ground — the airplane is a poor classroom during a stall.