What is crab?

Question

crab, crabbing - what's it mean?

Answer 1

Zach, my friend, you are going to be really confused some day when you actually get behind the controlls of an aircraft. Everybody playing with simulator toys, listen up. The more I see you folks mess with these things without learning such basic things such as "what the fvck is crab" the less likely I think you'll ever be pilots. Get some basic ground school for crying out loud people.

Answer 2

Crabbing means flying with a wind correction so that the nose of the airplane is not pointing in the direction you are going.  When you are flying to a set destination with an off-course wind component, so that you steer somewhat to one side of straight ahead, that is actually a crab, though it is usually not spoken of that way.

The term is usually used in connection with cross-wind landings.  The simplest way to approach a runway when the wind is from one side is to steer into the wind in a near-level attitude while descending on final approach.  That's called crabbing.

Then you transition to a forward slip just before touching down.  It's one of the reasons I tend to recommend that people who want to become pilots pack the flight simulator away in the closet and go get some time in real airplanes.

Playing with a simulator and thinking you know what it's like to fly an airplane is like talking about water skiing and thinking you can water ski.  You find out the difference on the round part of your butt.

Answer 3

I agree with John, Zach put the video game away and stick your nose in a book and you will find out the answers to the many questions you ask. If you are ever going to become a pilot you are going to have to start reading a book and take a ground school course. I know this isn't what you want to hear but you don't start out at the top flying a B-737 trying to learn how to fly on a computer game.

Answer 4

Crab/Crabbing - when you are approaching to land with a crosswind blowing across an airfield and are on the final approach, then you need to keep your nose pointing in the landing direction and towards the touch down point. If you come with wings level, then you will be blown off course. So, to counter the cross wind, you dip your wing in the direction of the wind to correct for the drift and use a touch of rudder to maintain your final approach. This wing down approach is known as the crab. Short of touch down, you level your wings and land normally.

Answer 5

The easy way to visualize crabbing is this.  

Think of a boat going across a river?  If there was a good current (Wind) the boat will point upstream as it goes across the river because the water (Air) is moving at it from the side and the boat wants to point in to the movement of the water.

Answer 6

Its a nasty bug girls get in their v****a's

Answer 7

Got caught crabbing lots of times myself. Sometimes my dory just gets ahead of me and my oar turns sideways in my hand and gets sucked under. Pretty serious sometimes if you are moving too fast and you don't catch it quickly. Been knocked on my butt more than once or twice.

Answer 8

crab:A cudgel made of the wood of the crab tree; a crabstick.

Answer 9

like aviophage said, its when a plane approaches with the nose offset to the runway to counter the wind, aka crosswind,  it much easier and safer than to keep correcting the heading every 10 seconds, the sideways flying is were the name is from

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crab_landin...

heres a good video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ljOxo0s33...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GHrLB_mli...

Answer 10

that you get a turkey neck on your string and throw in the ocean and catch yourself a crab

Answer 11

when the plane is flying sort of sideways...not straight forward

Answer 12

If yer crabbin', yer getting yer Yaw-yaws out.

Thank you, thank you, I'll be here all week.

Answer 13

Aviophage is completely correct. Your new new name sounds like a 3 year old trying to say lord of the rings...jk

John b is right simulator can be fun for a while but go get another Intro flight or a quick hop from one airport to a local one and roundtrip it....have fun... feel the the plane, and be in one , the best moment an aviator can experience.