Dramatic Footage Captures Airplane/SUV Collision

In a dramatic collision captured on video over the weekend, a Cessna 172 and an SUV crashed into one another at Northwest Regional Airport (52F) as the Skyhawk prepared to land at the private airfield in Roanoke, Texas.

As seen in the footage – captured by the Skyhawk pilot’s onlooking wife – the 172’s undercarriage sliced through the top of the Volvo SUV as it drove into the airplane while on a private road that runs perpendicular to Runway 17 – which lies just feet away.

The airplane lost a significant portion of its landing gear during the accident, but the pilot was able to walk away unharmed after making a successful emergency landing on the Skyhawk’s belly. Likewise, one of the two occupants in the SUV was taken to a local hospital after receiving minor injuries.

The accident has already stirred calls for additional safety measures at the Roanoke-based airport, as well as debate over who was at fault. Local news outlets report that Northwest Regional Airport has previously attempted to purchase the privately owned road – which contains stop signs on both sides of the runway – but has been turned down by the owner.

The man operating the Cessna 172 is a student pilot and was conducting a solo flight at the time of the accident.

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Submitted by rallyr on November 06, 2012.

It is difficult to tell from the angle of the video, but the Cessna seemed way too low for a displaced threshold. Of course, there was a stop sign which I believe gave the aircraft right of way. Basically, it was bad timing and fortunately everyone is alive to argue about it.

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Submitted by farrell01 on November 06, 2012.

I look this airport up. It has a 400' displaced threshold. The student pilot had no business being 5' above the ground just short of the runway. With a 3 degree approach he should have been approximately 60' above the SUV.

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Submitted by ChampPilot44 (not verified) on November 06, 2012.

I saw some additional footage of this from a local news source. Wow, the insurance lawyers are gonna have a field day with this one. You know, "sue everyone and see who pays up".
So many factors, it's hard to point a finger.

For sure, the airport needed to do more than spray paint "stop" on the pavement. A sign, maybe even a flashing red light and a sign warning of the active runway would be better.
The SUV clearly didn't stop but was it because he didn't see the stop or was he just disregarding it?

There is displaced thresh hold that has the start of the runway well clear of the street (look at it on satellite views). If he were right on target for the numbers, he might have missed the SUV by a nose hair and safely landed.
The pilot was low and may not have realized just how close he was cutting it and would have likely landed in the displaced area anyway. Could have added some power or a go around wouldn't have been bad either. He may not have seen the SUV at that attitude. Either way, I can cut the guy some slack because he was a solo student.

Will they go after his CFI or the school saying he didn't have adequate instruction in approaches, displaced thresh holds, etc? I hope not because we all make rookie errors and this would have been a minor one had that SUV not been in the way. How many students botch hitting the numbers and land in the displaced thresh hold at airports every day? I'll bet it happens all the time and normally with no more consequences than a chiding from their CFI if it's even witnessed.

I think the saddest part of this whole thing is that I hear the pilot has hung it up for good. While I can't fault a man for thinking of his family and the inherent risks of flight, this would have been a non-event had the SUV not been there right at that moment.

I truly hope he reconsiders and gets back in the cockpit. Even if he doesn't complete his private, which I hope he does, he needs to not let the fear consume him after an accident.

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Submitted by Pappa51 on November 06, 2012.

Seems to me that everyone involved is lucky. It's sad that accidents like this make pilots look bad. Private road or airport property; marked cross walk or Jay walker, crossing before you look can get you 6 feet of mowed grass. Always look before you cross, and land long if some one crosses your path.
Nuff said.
Cheers

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Submitted by Martin E Haisman on November 06, 2012.

The pilot can do whatever landing he wants to do, practice a performance landing, normal approach or it may be an emergency. The "SUV" driver was oblivious to their surroundings and careless in their consideration for an operational area. Without NTSB frame by frame and background analysis it seems the SUV was traveling fairly quickly if not faster then the approach speed of the 172?

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Submitted by FLYINGav8r on November 06, 2012.

OBTW, the displaced threshold on runway 17 is NOT 400' - the AFD is out of date. It's more like 50'.

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Submitted by RHalstead on November 07, 2012.

Anyone ever have your instructor insist on you landing as close to the usable end of the runway as possible? That means either a very steep, power on approach, or a very low angle to put it on the end which in this case is 50 feet from the end of the pavement.

An experienced pilot should be able to do either, but we should not and do not hold students to the same standards.

Note: The airplane appears "clean". IE 172's have large flaps. If the flaps are not extended it will glide a long way requiring a very shallow approach for a student. It will also be traveling faster than a typical full flap landing. Another point is this runway is only 40 feet wide. This creates a visual condition or mirage causing the VFR pilot to think he is much higher than he actually is. I'm not so sure about the reporter's description of private. It is open and attended year round but has a great many restrictions on traffic and aircraft. The FAA would not normally allow an airport to place these restrictions on type of aircraft so it is apparently truly privately owned with no FAA funding. BTW they also have a $100 landing fee.

Displaced thresholds on the current AOPA site shows 400' on 17 and 320' on 35. That is about the distance to the "touchdown zone" on most runways.

Although this is listed as VFR only there are 550 single engine and 62 multi engine aircraft listed as based there. It is one very busy airport with 110,000 local operations and 55,000 transient operations per year so it's not just 4 or 5 guys with a private airport and all locals should be well aware of it's presence and dangers of crossing the end of that runway.

I wouldn't put it past a driver to cross in front of a plane just to scare the pilot not realizing the pilot was an inexperienced student. Students and particularly low time students try to do everything the same each time. So this time tragedy was averted, but replaced with an expensive accident.

Apparently that was the first "fender bender" the person using the camera ever saw as there should have been no reason for the drastic camera movement.

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Submitted by Thomas Boyle on November 07, 2012.

RHalstead,

While the tendency of citizen videographers to drop the camera, instead of documenting the accident, is perhaps irritating and regrettable (from an investigative standpoint), in this case we might cut the videographer some slack - she is the pilot's wife, and must have thought she was watching her husband die.

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Submitted by N3922B on November 07, 2012.

Pause the video at the point just before impact. The pilot was too low to begin with and he elected to perform a no-flap landing. He was probably going to float that sucker 5' off the deck halfway down the runway and if lucky he might have drug it all the way to the numbers.
Sorry he hit an SUV, scared his himself and his poor wife half to death and now has some deductibles to pay - but it was clearly the student pilot's mistake.
Yeah I agree the SUV wasn't looking but that doesn't change the fact that the guy was just too low to pull off that landing in the 1st place.
I hope he meets with his CFI, has long discussion about this, then goes on to be a competent private pilot with one hell of a story to tell.

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Submitted by Gabriel on November 07, 2012.

Ok, we need a real, factual confirmation on the current status of the displaced threshold.

If it's some 400ft, then the airplane had no business being 5 ft high 400 ft short of the runway threshold. It's the pilot's fault (mitigated by his student status).

If it's some 50ft, then the airplane was more or less ok being there, still a bit too low for my taste but I wouldn't judge him. But either the street or the runway threshold (or both) had no business being there. A runway can't put an airplane on approach path in a collision course with obstacles. It's the airport manager's fault (or whoever is in charge of this matter). After all, the threshold could have been and once was 400ft displaced.

Blame is one of those things that you don't need to have any less because another one has more.
The car driver should have fully stopped at the stop sign and looked both sides before proceeding. Maybe he did (the stop sign is left of the visible video frame, so we don't know). But if he did, he failed at finding the conflict.

That said:
- The sign is of very poor quality. so the owner of the road has it's share of blame here too.
- Drivers must look for other cars, trains, pedestrians, bicycles... but the shouldn't be concerned for planes. When was the last time that you saw "the car must give right of way to an airplane" in a driving course, test or law? Beyond the driver's duty to stop and look on the stop sign, a driver can logically think that if he is in a car in a publicly accessible road, he is safe of airplanes crossing his path, at least when the airplane in a normal operation.
- Stop signs are not completely effective to prevent car crashes in small streets intersections. So why trust them to prevent a crash between a car and a plane? This could have been a Baron (tha approaches at some 90kts) against a 12 Y/O kid on a bike.

So, if the threshold is not displaced 400 ft as reported, the layout of the runway and road must be changed to prevent that an airplane taking off or landing and a land vehicle (or even a pedestrian) on the road cross their paths.

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Submitted by aharrin1 on November 07, 2012.

Here at my home airport, cars use the taxiways and cross the runway in order to get to the other side of the airport. Oh, also, there is only one taxiway too. We have never had an accident involving a car and an airplane landing and everyone is expected to stop and look both ways before crossing the runway. That SUV clearly didn't stop and the student pilot, even low, could have possibly even seen the SUV and thought that it would stop. The poor student. Even if the plane was 1 ft off the ground, floating over the displaced threshold, as long as he lands at the beginning of usable runway, he is legal. Remember, in aviation, there is a very large difference between what is 'smart' and what is legal. I can do lots of things in an airplane that are very dangerous but still legal. I think the NTSB will probably not find fault anywhere, but will rather just document the incident and submit a recommendation to the airport to either put up a light/sign on the road and/or increase displaced threshold. A good example near me is Martin State airport (KMTN) when landing on runway 33, you cross over a river where there are lots of sailboats crossing. They spent quite a few years modifying the instrument approach on that end of the runway and eventually had to make it an LDA w/glideslope approach instead of an ILS to make the approach angle greater in case of sailboats crossing. It even says on the approach plate "Sailboats transitioning Frog Mortar Creek between the FAF and the landing runway"

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Submitted by Henry@PanatechC... on November 07, 2012.

It is very disturbing the lengths that some posts herein are going to, to exonerate a pilot who almost killed someone by his own inadequate behavior.

* The video shows impact on the SUV well below the roof line, about 5' high.
* A bicyclist or even a pedestrian just standing there would have been struck (and killed).
* Google maps and the AF/D clearly show a 400' displaced threshold, which the plane was clearly not on target for.
* There is no reason - save emergency - that any of us should ever, ever, ever be 5' AGL before we even cross the airport property line.

It is very, very repugnant to me as a pilot (Sundowner/Piper kinda stuff) to hear other pilots state or imply that someone on a road outside of the airport (at 5' high - maybe a kid on daddy's shoulder looking at all the planes on the field) is in anyway responsible for their injuries.

Such a position is tantamount to "Even if you are outside the airport, it's your fault if an airplane swoops out of the sky and hits you". I've certainly made my share of bad landings, but I take full responsibility for any damages that would cause - I don't blame the fence or bicyclist for being outside the airport, and 5' high.

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Submitted by Gabriel on November 07, 2012.

aharrin1: "Even if the plane was 1 ft off the ground, floating over the displaced threshold, as long as he lands at the beginning of usable runway, he is legal. Remember, in aviation, there is a very large difference between what is 'smart' and what is legal"

Intentionally overflying a publicly accessible road 400 ft short of the threshold at an altitude of 5 ft is reckless and careless, hence illegal. There are altitudes minimums you must comply with except as needed for take-off and landing, and I very much doubt that being 5 ft high 400 ft short of the threshold is needed for landing.

That, IF the threshold was displaced 400 ft, that now is in doubt.

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Submitted by Stackfamus on November 07, 2012.

The threshold was moved. I can't post a picture here but a picture of the runway taken from my plan is at the following. If you are going for the numbers, you will be about 4-5 ft over the road at a 3-4 degree glideslope.

http://i1310.photobucket.com/albums/s653/Stackfamus/DSCN2076.jpg

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Submitted by Gabriel on November 07, 2012.

Thanks for the photo.

Having the threshold so close to a publicly accessible road that doesn't belong to the airport is almost criminal.

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Submitted by ChampPilot44 (not verified) on November 08, 2012.

Someone familiar with the airport designed some really neat freeware scenery for 52F usable in MS Flight Sim X. Apparently there are well known wind patterns to the locals flying into both 17 and 35 and this scenery includes those weather phenomenon.
http://www.flightsim.com/vbfs/fslib.php?searchid=2301813

I'm sure this is one more link in the accident chain...

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Submitted by dannybpm on November 08, 2012.

I fly at that airport all the time. The A/FD is incorrect. It is not 400 feet. It is more like 20 feet. The displaced threshold was moved back a while ago. From what it looks like the pilot was on track to land just beyond the numbers. I heard on a separate news cast that the displaced threshold was move back when a break-away fence was installed. That leaves cars in danger of being hit if a pilot aims for the spot just after the threshold.

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Submitted by Henry@PanatechC... on November 09, 2012.

If the current threshold is in fact 20' (and the AF/D and Google maps are out of date), then you have an airport that is basically telling pilots to fly 5' over public roadways, and a pilot who arguably foolishly obeyed.

A kid just standing there looking at the airport would have been hit under those circumstances, too.

Unfair as it may seem to hold the pilot responsible for following the directions he is given (to land where the runway markings say he should), my flight instructor impressed upon me FAR 91 "The pilot in command of an aircraft is directly responsible for, and is the final authority as to, the operation of that aircraft"

Yes, I have had to disobey ATC when they told me to do something wrong - they have confused me with another aircraft, told me to land on a runway that had crossing traffic, etc.

That is a really tough lesson for a new pilot (or anyone - to disobey 'authority') to deal with.

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Submitted by MASSEYPILOT on November 12, 2012.

Pure 'Pilot,' and more than likely, 'Instructor' Error! If this 'Student Pilot' had been adhering to the Displaced Threshold, the Accident would never have happened! The 'Driver' of the Vehicle could have been driving a Tractor-Trailer and the Cessna would not have been anywhere near it! This Runway '17,' 3500 x 40 ft., at Northwest Regional Airport (52F), has a 400 Ft. Displaced threshold due to Obstructions: 10 ft. hill, 200 ft. from runway, and the 'Road' being 30 Feet from the End of the Runway! This ole Boy seemed to be trying to 'Stick' it right on the 'End' of that Runway! The FAA is going to have a 'Sit Down' with Him, along with His 'Flight Instructor,' no doubt in My mind about it! 'Yes,' the Vehicle should have 'Stopped & Looked,' but this accident was caused by the Pilot, no way was He 'Displacing' His 'Threshold' any 400 Feet!

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Submitted by MASSEYPILOT on November 12, 2012.

Now I'm hearing that the '400 Foot Displaced Threshold' had been moved back practically to the end of the Runway, and if it has, then the 'Airport' is the Problem, also! It would have been Ignorant to have 'Removed' this particular 'Displaced' Threshold, not to mention, Idiotic for the Pilot to have been a 'Low' as He was here, causing this accident! There was 3500 feet of runway out in front of that airplane! Student Pilot and Flight Instructor 'Error' completely!

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Submitted by donallen on November 14, 2012.

Simple risk-benefit analysis goes like this for the SUV driver:

Plan A: Don't stop, which gets you there, if you make it, a few seconds sooner, and depend on the pilot of an approaching airplane being skilled enough not to be too low, or

Plan B: Do what it says and STOP (as well as LOOK and LISTEN). You get there a few seconds later, but you get there.

I disagree strongly with the people commenting here who are focusing on flying skills, blaming the pilot, blaming the instructor. This guy was a STUDENT, not Capt. Sullenberger!

The SUV driver made a careless, stupid decision that utterly flunks any sensible risk-benefit test and nearly got both of them killed.

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Submitted by Bravo3 on November 18, 2012.

These days being stuck-on-stupid makes you a "victim". Mr. And Mrs. Hungry Hippo in the SUV couldn't have been thinking about much other than stuffing their pie holes with a couple of double bacon cheddar burgers. Why didn't airport management make this crossing idiot-proof? Well, at least idiot-resistant.

I don't see anything wrong with what the pilot did at all. It shouldn't be his responsibility to look out for ground pounders while on short final. It looks like he was dragging it in to come down on or near the numbers. So what?

And how the heck is a pilot on very short final expected to see a vehicle streaking from right to left (below his cowling)? He was probably looking further down the runway for his flare anyway.

What part of FAILURE. TO. YIELD. are the pilot-blamers not grasping?

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Dramatic Footage Captures Airplane/SUV Collision

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