Aircraft having stowable ladder for cockpit access

An open cockpit aircraft in combination with a non-self-supporting ladder for access thereto and egress therefrom and comprising:

• a ladder removably joinable to the outside of an aircraft to provide personnel access and egress into and out of a cockpit thereof and having a longitudinal axis and a transverse direction perpendicular thereto:
• the aircraft having a fuselage, an anchor proximate thereto and an external strake;
• and
• the ladder comprising a plurality of hingedly connected rung plates, each rung plate having two opposed hinge edges with hinges disposed thereon and configured to fanfold the plurality of rung plates into a footprint, each rung plate having two opposed side edges connecting the two opposed hinges edges to define a respective footprint therebetween, and a hole therethrough for accepting a person's foot when climbing up or down the ladder, a second rung plate of the plurality of rung plates being hingedly joined to the first rung plate, the other rung plates successively depending from the second rung plate;
• and
• a respective rung plate having a standoff joined thereto and being disposed wholly within the footprint, whereby the ladder is removably suspendable from the cockpit with only a single, predetermined contact with a fuselage of the aircraft at the standoff.

An open cockpit aircraft in combination with a non-self-supporting ladder for access thereto and egress therefrom and comprising:

• the aircraft having a fuselage and an anchor proximate thereto;
• and
• at least two hingedly connected rung plates, each of the at least two rung plates having a hole therethrough, the hole having a bottom edge configured to allow a person's foot to temporarily rest thereupon;
• a standoff joined to a predetermined, generally planar rung plate by a standoff hinge, whereby the standoff can articulate from a standoff retracted position generally lying within the plane of the predetermined, generally planar rung plate to a standoff extended position for preventing the ladder from contacting a fuselage except at the standoff, whereby the rung plates can fold into a fanfold footprint when the standoff is in the retracted position;
• and
• at least two hingedly connected rung plates, each of the at least two rung plates having a hole therethrough for accepting a person's foot during climbing and having opposed inward and outward faces;
• a standoff joined to a predetermined, generally planar rung plate by a standoff hinge, whereby the standoff can articulate from a standoff retracted position generally lying within the plane of the predetermined, generally planar rung plate to a standoff extended position for preventing the ladder from contacting a fuselage except at the standoff, whereby the rung plates can fold into a fanfold footprint when the standoff is in the retracted position;
• a pair of mutually opposed struts lying within the plane of the predetermined, generally planar rung plate in a strut retracted position and extending outwardly towards the fuselage in a strut extended position, whereby the ladder is fanfoldable into a footprint no bigger than the footprint of the largest rung plate;
• and
• a means to suspend the rung plates from an anchor associated with an aircraft.