Aircraft Flight Test Engineer Training Intern

Now assume you are an Aircraft Flight Test Engineer at an aircraft manufacturer that makes
Transport Category airplanes in the United States. This manufacturer has offered you the task to
mentor an intern, participating in a cooperative arrangement with a local university, on important
features of a flight envelope diagram (also known as a V-n or V-g diagram) and why these
diagrams are vital for flight test pilots and future pilots for this new aircraft. You realize, because
of the intern’s lack of experience, the first hurdle to overcome is to brief them on the significance
of such a diagram and the warning of ‘danger areas’ provided in it. There are areas of the
diagram that indicate regions of stalls and accelerated stalls and regions where possible
structural damage may occur. You need to discuss aspects of these operational limitations and
potential implications if the aircraft exceeds any of these flight parameters.
You have been tasked to brief this new intern on the operational flight limitations contained within
the flight envelope diagram, so you start with a simple, generic V-n (V-g) diagram regulatory to
introduce the topic to the intern. Choose your method of communicating this information; it
should be a short essay. It may prove valuable to include a sample diagram with arrows or
callouts to label the axes, regions, etc. Feel free to include your drawing/diagram as an attached
photo or scanned image.