Aviation Safety

The airplane was substantially damaged during impact with trees at 1555 Central time after a loss of engine power during final approach. The commercial pilot and private pilot aboard were killed. Visual conditions prevailed.

On the student pilots second touch-and-go landing, the airplane bounced and the right wing lifted quickly. After the student applied right aileron and left rudder, the airplane landed back onto the runway on the right main landing gear and nose wheel. The airplane then veered left, departing the runway. The nose wheel dug into the ground and the airplane nosed over.

At about 1421 Mountain time, the airplane collided with mountainous terrain and was destroyed. The private pilot was killed. Visual conditions prevailed. Initial radar data indicates the airplane was on a steady, level course at 8600 feet msl. The final radar return was in the immediate vicinity of where the airplane wreckage was located. The highest terrain elevation in the vicinity of the wreckage is 9705 feet msl. Weather observed in the area included few and scattered clouds between about 8000 and 9500 feet msl.

At 2202 Central time, the airplane collided with terrain following a loss of control while landing. The instrument-rated private pilot was fatally injured. The airplane was consumed by post-impact fire. An instrument flight plan was filed and visual meteorological conditions existed at the time of the accident.

The airplane was destroyed when it impacted terrain at approximately 2015 Central time. Visual conditions prevailed for the positioning flight. The commercial pilot was fatally injured. According to friends and family, the pilot had scheduled a night flight lesson with a student to start at 2100, at a different airport. The pilot contacted a family member around 2000 and stated he was preparing to depart for the lesson.

I have a 100-knot airplane. Oh, sure; the airspeed indicator usually reads much higher than that. But when it comes down to what really counts-rate of movement over the ground-my shiny, expensive, 160-knot airplane is frequently relegated to speeds closer to those of an 18-wheeler on the Interstate below me. The reason? Headwinds. Eastbound, westbound-any direction-its not a matter of whether Ill have a headwind, but how strong it will be. If I plan a trip for Tuesday, on Monday the chosen route will afford a nice little nudge. On Tuesday, the fickle fates will deal a howling 40 knots on the nose. After an unplanned fuel stop, Ill drag into my destination about two hours late, landing only after being forced to shoot an ILS to near-minimums and well after the FBO has closed. The only food available will be a warm Pepsi and a package of cheese crackers. On Wednesday, that same route will once again have a nice little tailwind. Such is my life. Of course, there are good, logical reasons for headwinds. Lets explore them.

Any instrument-rated pilot who “grew up” before the mid-1990s probably still shakes their head at the way GPS navigation has revolutionized the way we fly IFR. If, Rip van Winkle-like, that same pilot awoke today after a 20-year snooze, he or she would find many different responsibilities and procedures have resulted. The same is true for someone whos been flying IFR all along but is just now making the upgrade to an IFR-certified GPS. What different rules, techniques and pilot responsibilities do you need to know? How has the workload changed, and are those changes for the better? While no one, including me, would seriously advocate going back to the “old ways” of flying IFR, we also must acknowledge that with the additional capabilities and accuracies of GPS come new and different ways of getting from Point A to Point B, along with skills, techniques and responsibilities for which we might not be trained or prepared.

On a recent foggy morning in Hagerstown, Md., I sat waiting for the visibility to improve enough for me to depart on a Part 135 passenger flight. Every airport in the region was socked in with less than a quarter mile visibility, when a somewhat agitated passenger came up to me and asked what we were waiting for. I explained that the visibility had to improve before we would be legal to depart. In an incredibly ill-timed coincidence, we heard the sound of a single-engine piston departing from somewhere in the cloud outside the door, and my passenger snidely inquired why that plane could leave, but we couldnt. I felt like I had been asked to explain Bernoullis principle to a five-year-old. It was a deceptively complicated question, and one that should be of interest to pilots flying in their own aircraft under FAR Part 91.

Some of the more memorable flights Ive made over the years involve flying over or through mountainous terrain. The terrain itself, of course, is visually interesting, with vivid colors and shapes, contrasting with the overwhelming monotony other geographic areas may present. I will long remember a late afternoon, eastbound flight over New Mexico, with some of my favorite music blasting over the headphones as I watched the terrain underneath change to its nocturnal state. I was overflying the terrain, though: The airplane performed as it always does at 13,000 feet msl. The weather was utterly benign, yet Im glad I was cruising instead of taking off or landing. On another occasion, I found myself looking at decent weather but strong winds aloft for a flight over other portions of New Mexico, plus Arizona and Nevada. I scrubbed that flight due to the forecast winds at altitude, which were at or above the airplanes stall speed.

The short-field approach and landing is something we all learned as student pilots. Commercial students get to show some additional expertise. However, both the private and even commercial requirements are a bit relaxed and dont really prepare us for that maximum performance, white-knuckle experience of putting the airplane down on that postage stamp some joker sadistically calls a runway. When we say “short-field approach and landing,” were really talking about two entirely different situations with different techniques. Obstacles at the approach end of the runway determine how we will make the approach-whether we can “drag it in” a few feet off the ground, or if we have to make a steep descent to clear the FAAs standard-issue 50-foot tree right at the runway threshold.