1. General

1.1 Braking and deceleration systems

An aircraft has several means of slowing down: wheel brakes, parachutes, airbrakes and spoilers, reverses, or pitch reversal.

• Wheel brakes

  As with land vehicles, they are responsible for the main degradation of kinetic energy, the other means being retarders, which will be mentioned here for information purposes.

  Wheel brakes are the subject of this article.

• Parachutes

  On landing, the pilot releases a parachute located in a container at the rear of the aircraft. As the holding force is proportional to the square of the airspeed, the parachute may break if extended at...