Narrative:

We experienced a possible hard landing on the runway. It was hard enough that it resulted in a bounce. While we were back in the air a gust of wind from the left rolled us to the right far enough to result in a wingtip strike. When the captain (pilot flying) realized the aircraft was rolling right he countered with increased left aileron which stopped the aircraft from rolling farther to the right. We didn't realize there had been a wingtip strike until I performed the post flight walk around and noticed the missing paint under the right wingtip. While being vectored around prior to the approach we were informed there was a new ATIS available. I listened to the ATIS and passed along the pertinent information to the captain; that the winds were 310 at 15g21 (as I recall) and a slightly changed altimeter. The ride down final was perhaps a little bumpy but was about what I would normally expect with a direct; gusty crosswind. There was a large crab angle and the wind readout on the FMS indicated wind from the northwest at 52 KTS. On short final I asked tower for a 'wind check' and was told surface winds were 310 or 320 at 20 KTS; no gust or windshear warnings were mentioned. We discussed the idea briefly that the wind readout may not be entirely correct for our situation as I didn't know where the anemometer was located. We also discussed that there could be a strong shear lower as the wind readout on the mfd was showing 52 KTS from the northwest; 32 KTS more than ATC was calling it. We were alert for indications of windshear through the warning system or airspeed indicator and the captain had briefed we would be going around at the first indication of any windshear; windshear alert or warning. After we landed there was a warning given to one of the next aircraft to arrive that there was a wind shear report of a loss of 15 KTS on short final. We were given no such report. Both of us have been with the company for many years with thousands of hours each in crjs; but prior to this year we have each only flown the 50 seat aircraft which has slightly different landing characteristics than the 70/90 seat variants. Both of us are relatively low time in the aircraft (70/90); the captain with around 100 hours and I with around 35 hours. Unfortunately I am not familiar enough with the landing characteristics of the aircraft in strong crosswinds to analyze the last 50 ft of this landing in regards to the rate at which power adjustments were made and the resulting sink rates that were achieved to say with certainty there was a shear caused loss in airspeed that caused a loss of lift resulting in a possible hard landing.obviously a go-around; commanded by either pilot; would have prevented this event. If the wind information we were given stated the location of the anemometer it would be more relevant than a general airport readout. Example: tower wind was 310 at 20 KTS; touchdown wind was 320 at 35g45 would tell us there were some pretty good shears in the area; especially at a large airport where a couple of miles separate one side of the airport from the other. If there were some way to prevent pairings of 'green on green' pilots that would probably help. The captain stated that had I been more experienced in this version of the aircraft (like the last first officer he flew with who had been in the aircraft for five years) he would have given me the landing. As it was it didn't make much sense to change 'flying pilot duties' from one low time pilot to another.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: The flight crew of a CRJ-900; with little combined experience in the larger model; suffered a hard landing and a wingtip groundstrike in gusty crosswinds. They cited lack of pertinent wind and wind shear information as a contributing factor.

Narrative: We experienced a possible hard landing on the runway. It was hard enough that it resulted in a bounce. While we were back in the air a gust of wind from the left rolled us to the right far enough to result in a wingtip strike. When the Captain (pilot flying) realized the aircraft was rolling right he countered with increased left aileron which stopped the aircraft from rolling farther to the right. We didn't realize there had been a wingtip strike until I performed the post flight walk around and noticed the missing paint under the right wingtip. While being vectored around prior to the approach we were informed there was a new ATIS available. I listened to the ATIS and passed along the pertinent information to the Captain; that the winds were 310 at 15G21 (As I recall) and a slightly changed altimeter. The ride down final was perhaps a little bumpy but was about what I would normally expect with a direct; gusty crosswind. There was a large crab angle and the wind readout on the FMS indicated wind from the northwest at 52 KTS. On short final I asked Tower for a 'wind check' and was told surface winds were 310 or 320 at 20 KTS; no gust or windshear warnings were mentioned. We discussed the idea briefly that the wind readout may not be entirely correct for our situation as I didn't know where the anemometer was located. We also discussed that there could be a strong shear lower as the wind readout on the MFD was showing 52 KTS from the northwest; 32 KTS more than ATC was calling it. We were alert for indications of windshear through the warning system or airspeed indicator and the Captain had briefed we would be going around at the first indication of any windshear; windshear alert or warning. After we landed there was a warning given to one of the next aircraft to arrive that there was a wind shear report of a loss of 15 KTS on short final. We were given no such report. Both of us have been with the company for many years with thousands of hours each in CRJs; but prior to this year we have each only flown the 50 seat aircraft which has slightly different landing characteristics than the 70/90 seat variants. Both of us are relatively low time in the aircraft (70/90); the Captain with around 100 hours and I with around 35 hours. Unfortunately I am not familiar enough with the landing characteristics of the aircraft in strong crosswinds to analyze the last 50 FT of this landing in regards to the rate at which power adjustments were made and the resulting sink rates that were achieved to say with certainty there was a shear caused loss in airspeed that caused a loss of lift resulting in a possible hard landing.Obviously a go-around; commanded by either pilot; would have prevented this event. If the wind information we were given stated the location of the anemometer it would be more relevant than a general airport readout. Example: Tower wind was 310 at 20 KTS; touchdown wind was 320 at 35G45 would tell us there were some pretty good shears in the area; especially at a large airport where a couple of miles separate one side of the airport from the other. If there were some way to prevent pairings of 'green on green' pilots that would probably help. The Captain stated that had I been more experienced in this version of the aircraft (like the last First Officer he flew with who had been in the aircraft for five years) he would have given me the landing. As it was it didn't make much sense to change 'Flying Pilot Duties' from one low time pilot to another.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site as of April 2012 and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.