Wednesday, August 26, 2015

Planes Colliding End Up Badly.........

Image result for pictures of small planes colliding crashesA phrase you must have heard a thousand times: “there is nothing new under the sun” applies to bad landings and resultant sequelae. In the latest FAA accident happenings 5 out of 5 accidents involve landings and the day before 7 out of 17. Typical errors such as: hard landing, busted left main wheel, struck prop etc. As I have dealt with these before, I don’t want to belabor it now. But If I had to use one word to help pilots reduce these errors, it would be PRACTICE. Practice makes perfect, is a phrase commonly thrown about. It would be great if   one’s practice always made a positive change in piloting technique. No guarantee, but go out and try, so you have a better chance to beat the odds.

Changing gears, we have recently had an awful (avoidable?) mid-air accident involving an F-16 fighter jet and a Cessna 150. The pilot and his passenger, his father, died in the crash. The military pilot was able to safely eject. The F-16 was IFR, the C-150 VFR. The F-16 pilot was in radio contact with the radar controller, the C-150 was not.  The controller advised the jet pilot that he had traffic ahead, and if not in sight turn left 180 degrees.  The jet pilot replied by asking “confirm 2 miles?”.  The controller replied “..if traffic not insight turn left heading 180 immediately”. Over the next 18 seconds the track of the F-16 began turning southerly. Ouch! If you ever have an “immediately” order, you must do exactly that. Lean on those controls, nice steep bank up to 60 degrees if needed. That is not a casual order. The result here was a mid-air with two innocents buying the farm.

Another landing accident, albeit somewhat unusual, involved a Socata TBM700  landing in Wisconsin. Apparently the plane was on short final and decided for an unknown reason, to initiate a go-around. Now the TBM700 is a turboprop with an engine that can deliver a lot of torque to the prop rapidly. If flown slowly as on short final, the throttle must not be shoved full open too rapidly as the large amount of torque delivered to the prop, can overwhelm things. This apparently happened here with tragic results. The plane supposedly went into a steep left turn, stalling and crashed into the ground. According to Socata, there have been 36 crashes between 1990 and 2010. This included 6 crashes where pilots applied power while landing with resultant stalls and crashes. Power must be applied “steadily and slowly to full climb power”, as related by a Socata instructor.

So that’s it for now. Enjoy the coming cooler weather, and watch that power application.