The simulated engine failure on the checkride and the field you picked from three thousand feet that you cannot actually reach

The simulated engine failure is one of the most commonly failed maneuvers on the private pilot practical test — not because students don’t expect it, but because they abandon their training the moment the throttle goes to idle. The key to passing is a disciplined sequence: pitch for best glide immediately, pick a reachable field with a clear approach path, and fly a normal traffic pattern without power. Every examiner wants to see the same thing — a pilot who stays calm, follows a systematic plan, and flies the airplane all the way down.

What Should You Do First When the Engine Quits?

Pitch for best glide speed. Not scan for a field. Not start turning. Pitch and trim.

Most students get this wrong immediately. They hear the engine go quiet and their eyes drop to the ground. While they’re scanning for somewhere to land, the airspeed is doing whatever it wants — usually bleeding off because the nose is still pitched for cruise, or building because the nose has dropped and they’re trading precious altitude for speed they don’t need.

In a Cessna 172, best glide is approximately 68 knots. In a Piper Cherokee 180, it’s around 76 knots. You need this number memorized. Not from a chart. Not from a kneeboard. The examiner will notice if you have to look it up.

Pitch for best glide. Trim for it. Stabilize the airplane. This takes about five seconds, and those five seconds buy you the most valuable resource in an engine failure: time.

How Far Can You Actually Glide?

The airplane does not fall out of the sky when the engine quits. A Cessna 172 at best glide covers roughly a mile and a half for every thousand feet of altitude. From 3,000 feet AGL, that gives you approximately four and a half miles of reach in any direction — a circle nine miles across.

You have options. You just have to be calm enough to use them.

How Do You Pick the Right Field?

Once you’re trimmed and stable, it’s time to choose a landing site. This is where mistake number two happens — students pick terrible fields.

Parking lots next to shopping malls. Fields on the far side of a ridge. Beautiful green rectangles that turn out to be ponds. The examiner won’t take you to the ground, but they can tell from your heading, altitude management, and approach path whether you’d actually make your field.

Use this checklist:

• Length: At least 1,000 feet, more is better
• Surface: Flat, firm, and clear of obstructions — a freshly harvested farm field is ideal
• Slope: Land uphill if possible; flat works fine
• Wind: Land into the wind — recall your last ATIS, watch cloud movement, look for chimney smoke
• Approach obstacles: Check what’s between you and your touchdown point — a line of 80-foot trees on the approach end means you’re landing in those trees, not the field behind them

Why Should You Talk Through the Emergency Out Loud?

The Airman Certification Standards require you to establish best glide, identify a suitable landing area, and plan a wind-corrected approach. But what the standards don’t spell out — and every examiner will tell you — is that they want to see a plan, verbalized.

Say it out loud: “Best glide, sixty-eight knots, trimmed. Wind is from the southwest. I’m picking that field at my ten o’clock, about two miles out, looks like a hay field, no obstructions on approach. I’ll set up a left pattern to land to the southwest.”

Verbalizing does two things. The examiner knows you’re not frozen. And talking forces your brain to organize, breaking the adrenaline loop and turning chaos into a sequence.

How Do You Fly the Approach Without Power?

This is mistake number three, and it’s a big one. Students either set up too far away and come up short, or too close and end up high with no way to descend.

An engine-out approach is just a traffic pattern without power. Fly to a position where you can set up a downwind leg at roughly 1,000 feet above the field, abeam your intended touchdown point. Turn base. Turn final. The geometry is the same as every pattern you’ve flown.

The critical difference: you cannot add power if you get it wrong. Manage altitude with distance from the field and flaps.

The rule that will save you: when in doubt, stay high.

• If you’re high, you have options — slip, add flaps, widen the pattern, S-turn on final
• If you’re low, you’re out of options — pulling back doesn’t extend the glide, it just slows you toward a stall

Set up close to the field. Keep the base leg tight. You can always dump altitude on final. You cannot get it back.

The Distance Trap: Why Closer Fields Are Better

Consider this scenario: You’re at 3,500 feet MSL, and you spot a perfect field three miles north. At best glide, you lose roughly 700 feet per mile — that’s 2,100 feet just getting there. The field sits at 800 feet elevation, so you only have 2,700 feet AGL to work with. After the glide, you arrive with 600 feet — barely enough for a pattern. One miscalculation on the turn to base and you’re in the trees.

The better play: Pick a field one to two miles away. Arrive with more altitude. Fly a proper pattern. Have a margin.

This also highlights a critical point: altitude above the ground is not the same as altitude on the altimeter. Your altimeter reads MSL. You need to know the terrain elevation in your practice area. At 3,000 feet indicated over 1,000-foot terrain, you only have 2,000 feet to work with.

What Checklist Should You Run After Picking Your Field?

The examiner wants to see you attempt a restart before securing the airplane:

1. Fuel selector — switch to fullest tank or BOTH
2. Mixture — full rich
3. Carburetor heat — on
4. Magnetos — check both, try each individually
5. Primer — in and locked

If the engine doesn’t restart, secure the airplane:

1. Mixture — idle cutoff
2. Fuel selector — off
3. Magnetos — off
4. Master switch — off (after you’re done with radios and flaps)

On the radio: squawk 7700 and, if time permits, broadcast on 121.5: “Mayday, mayday, mayday” with your callsign, situation, location, and souls on board.

Don’t Forget the Passenger Brief

A subtle mistake that costs points: forgetting the passenger. Tell them to tighten their seatbelt and shoulder harness, unlatch the door before touchdown so it doesn’t jam on impact, and identify the nearest exit. This takes five seconds and demonstrates you’re thinking beyond just flying the airplane.

What About Inconvenient Locations?

The examiner may not pull your power over an ideal practice area. You might be over a town, a lake, or terrain where the best field is behind you. Don’t be afraid to turn. A 180 or 270 is fine — just keep bank angles at 30 degrees or less. Steep turns bleed altitude fast, and altitude is the one thing you cannot waste.

How to Practice Before the Checkride

The students who ace this maneuver make field selection a habit on every flight. Look down right now — what field would you pick? Could you make it? Where’s the wind? How high are you above the ground?

Before your checkride, ask your instructor to pull the power in varied situations:

• Straight and level at 3,000 feet
• During a climb
• In a turn
• At 1,500 feet AGL returning from the practice area

Each situation changes your options and forces adaptation. That adaptability separates a pilot who passes from one who freezes.

Airspeed Discipline Is Non-Negotiable

The ACS allows no more than 10 knots deviation from best glide during the maneuver. Chasing a field with the nose low at 80 or 90 knots wastes altitude and will bust you. Pulling the nose up to stretch the glide while the airspeed drops to 55 knots flirts with a stall. Trim for best glide and leave it there. Let the airplane do the work.

You Don’t Need the Perfect Field

On the checkride, the examiner will call for a go-around between 500 and 200 feet AGL. They’re evaluating your process, decision-making, airspeed control, and whether your approach would have resulted in a survivable landing. Not beautiful. Not on centerline. Survivable.

In a real engine failure, the pilot who walks away is the one who flew the airplane all the way to the ground, maintained control, picked the best available option, and didn’t turn a bad situation into a worse one by forcing an impossible approach.

Key Takeaways

• Pitch for best glide immediately — before you look for a field, stabilize the airplane and trim
• Pick a close field over a perfect field — arriving with altitude margin matters more than ideal surface conditions
• Fly a normal pattern without power — the geometry is identical to what you practice every flight
• Stay high and talk out loud — you can always lose altitude, but you can never get it back; verbalizing keeps your brain organized
• The standard is survivable, not perfect — demonstrate a calm, systematic process and maintain airspeed within 10 knots of best glide