In commercial aviation, landings are designed to be gentle, with the idea that travelers will avoid planes with rough landings—but military aircraft place far less emphasis on comfort.

Many people have flown in a commercial aircraft. Most, one assumes, have landed safely. The experience is familiar: a smooth descent, a long flare, and hopefully, a gentle touchdown.

Although fighter jets land on the same concrete, their pilots have a vastly different landing experience, shaped through differences in physics and procedures and risk profiles. The contrast reveals differences in aerodynamic priorities, safety assumptions, and mission requirements—which naturally contrast with transporting civilians from place to place. 

Why Fighter Jets Have to Make Faster Landings than Civilian Planes

Commercial airliners are designed for efficiency and stability. They have long wings with pronounced dihedral angles, generating high lift at low speeds. Fighters, on the other hand, are designed for speed, maneuverability, and combat. They have smaller wings, which typically extend straight from the fuselage, and allow for higher wing loading. The result is that airliners fly slowly and stably on approach, while fighters, who have traded low-speed grace for high-speed performance, must land much faster.

Typical airliners land at speeds in the range of 150 to 170 miles per hour. Fighters, on the other hand, land at higher speeds—typically in the range of 170 to 210 miles per hour, or even higher.   The higher speeds are necessary thanks to high wing loading and thin, swept wings that are optimized for supersonic flight. Fighters just can’t fly as slowly and as safely as airliners; slower approach speeds would risk the plane stalling. So counterintuitively, speed squats to safety for fighters on final approach. 

Airliners also rely on large flaps, slats, and high-lift devices, while fighters use more limited flaps and operate within the confines of fly-by-wire control laws. Lastly, fighters often land at a high angle of attack, with the nose pitched up significantly—an attitude that would alarm a commuter sitting in the back row. In a fighter, control is computer-assisted and actively stabilized, whereas airliners are passively stable and generally very forgiving near the ground. Fighters are only stable because software makes them so; they are designed to be aerodynamically unstable, because it lends to greater maneuverability.

Civilian and Military Planes Use Different Landing Techniques

With respect to two techniques, the airliner employs a long flare, with a smooth touchdown; passenger comfort is the goal. But fighters without paying customers employ minimal flare, opting for a firm, positive touchdown to ensure wheel contact and enable immediate braking. (Of course, carrier operations are a different animal entirely—in which the aircraft doesn’t flare at all, but is flown straight into the deck where the tail hook snags on the arrestor cable.)

Commercial pilots and fighter pilots fly with different safety philosophies. Airliner safety is about redundancy, automation, and very conservative margins. Fighter safety comes down to pilot skill and advanced training and performance margins. Fighter pilots accept higher risk and narrower envelopes, because combat aircraft aren’t built for comfort or luxury, but for mission success; comfort is an afterthought. 

Ultimately, the vast majority of commercial and fighter aircraft land safely. But they do so in different ways, for different reasons: the commercial airliner exists to transport and protect passengers, whereas the combat aircraft exists to survive combat. These are different machines with different core purposes, and those differences announce themselves in the final moments before touchdown. 

About the Author: Harrison Kass

Harrison Kass is a senior defense and national security writer at The National Interest. Kass is an attorney and former political candidate who joined the US Air Force as a pilot trainee before being medically discharged. He focuses on military strategy, aerospace, and global security affairs. He holds a JD from the University of Oregon and a master’s in Global Journalism and International Relations from NYU.

Image: Wikimedia Commons.

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