Hey Guys! I thought you would enjoy this picture. It’s not often you see a power plant from the air so close. Being vectored for final for an ILS approach, we got an awesome, close up view of the power plant. I actually got vectors through the steam once and I have to say it got really turbulent! I knew it would be rough, but I didn’t realize it would be as rough as it was.
Yes, I was on an IFR flight plan so I didn’t have to worry about staying VFR. If you are ever talking to approach and they happen to give you a heading to fly that will take you into steam or clouds, tell them you need to deviate one way or the other to maintain VFR! Don’t just assume that it’s ok because they are telling you to fly a heading. It is still your responsibility to maintain VFR if you don’t have an instrument rating.
This one hits close to home. This happened just a few miles from my home airport. I had just landed before it happened and one of the other instructors where I teach actually heard some of the conversation. This is a video from AOPA’s site. It’s very sad. Please learn something from this. Listen carefully to all the bad decisions that were made and promise me you will never do the same! It didn’t have to happen and could have been prevented.
For you guys that are uncomfortable flying into control towered airport, here’s a video for you.
Hopefully you will feel a little more at ease after watching this when you realize that there really isn’t much to flying to a towered airport.
Now don’t laugh because it’s my first real attempt at making a video. I was really nervous making it and I felt really weird talking to myself but hopefully you’ll like it. There are controls in the lower right corner to raise the quality of the video and make it full screen if it’s too hard to see. Sorry if it’s too long, I will try to make them shorter!
Please leave a comment below and share this with your pilot friends if you like it. Thanks!
Here’s another post from someone who was still a student pilot when this happened. I don’t know how he kept calm enough to make it through this, but he did a great job! For the record, the Joe he references in his story is not me.
Article written by Dave Reinhart
Just before I took my PP flight check, the 150 I’d been flying was grounded for an overhaul. I told my instructor that I wanted to fly the one I’d be flying for the test before hand so I could get a feeling for it’s idiosyncrasies. His reaction was “Heck, they all fly the same”. Having flown at least five C-150s at that point, I politely disagreed with him and scheduled the airplane for a solo flight.
After arriving in the practice area, I did a power-off stall. I noticed the left wing dropped a bit, but nothing much. I then set up to do a power-on stall: slowed it down, pitched it up a bit, and poured on the coal. Nose up, starting to feel the buffet and then…
WHAM it broke, the left wing dropped and in a blink of an eye it had spun out and I was headed down.
It’s important to note that I had *never* spun an airplane. Not only that, I had never been in an airplane while it was spinning, ever. But there I was, looking at the desert floor below me getting closer by the moment and going around in circles.
To say I was petrified would be putting it mildly. I knew that if I didn’t do something quickly I was going to die. Say what you will about FLYING magazine, but that day it saved my life.
Before Dick Collins became the senior CFI at FLYING, the guy who wrote most about flight instruction was a fellow named Bob Blodget. I had just read an article by him about spin recovery and as I was watching the ground getting closer, his little checklist literally appeared before my eyes. While not in the exact PARE order taught these days, the way I remembered it was:
1. Relieve the back pressure. I suddenly realized that I was still holding the yoke up against my chest. I let go and the airplane instantly came out of the spin.
The wind noise started to build and I looked over at the ASI. It was already in the yellow arc and building fast. I started to pull back on the yoke, and as I did so I felt the airplane start to load up. I knew that if I kept pulling the wings would come off. I again released the back pressure, saying to myself “What am I forgetting?” when it came to me:
2. Reduce the power. Power! I was still at full throttle. I reached out and yanked the throttle so hard that I’m still amazed to this day that it didn’t come out of the panel. The airplane gave a sigh of relief, started slowing down, and I pitched up to level flight.
After getting it level, I flew around for 15-20 minutes just to get my composure back. After that I headed back to the airport and landed high, wide and awful but we were both back in one piece.
A friend of mine who worked at the FSS on the field lived on the airport. I went over to his place and begged a beer off him, being well below legal age at the time, I recounted my tale and he was properly concerned and sympathetic. When I next saw my CFI, I told him what had happened. His response? “Yeah, that plane does tend to drop a wing in a stall”. Nice to know that, Joe,
Here’s a situation that could have been much worse!
This is another story that I thought you guys would enjoy and hopefully learn from. It was submitted by someone who was making all his calls, and doing the right things, but it wasn’t good enough because the other person involved wasn’t doing the same. Keep your eyes open because you never know what may surprise you!
Article written by Rich Wegener
I was landing for a fuel stop at a uncontrolled airport, a long ways from my home base. The airport was in Northeastern NM, and was pretty deserted.
I had called “The 45”, Downwind, Base and then final.
As I was on short final, I heard a 182 call downwind for the same runway. As I landed and starting to brake, and was slowing down, almost ready to turn off the runway, but still on the center-line, I see the 182 not more than 20 feet above my windshield, and he touched down not more than 100 yards in front of me.
I was in my Cessna 170, so when he called “down-wind” he was already well into my “blind-side” I have no visibility up and aft. I heard the downwind call, but assumed he would, at the very least call base and final (he didn’t). As soon as he touched down, I said (sic)
“Cessna that just landed, do you know you landed right over the top of me???!!!”
(slight pause) “Where are you?”
“I’m about 100 yards behind you” at which point, I can see his wife and daughter (That’s how close he was) look out the back window at me. I was just slow enough at that point to turn off the runway.
“Oh, geez, I’m really sorry, I didn’t see you!”
I taxied to the fuel pump, and by the time I shut down, he and his family had secured his airplane and were on their way into the FBO. He came over to me, and took complete responsibility. It turned out that the guy was the owner of the FBO, and told me that “(he) always lands long, because the FBO was at the end of the (longish) runway.”
I did not think then, or now, that I needed to take it any further. He knew he screwed up, and we talked about flying the proper procedures. And I’m sure his wife let him have it also…. But…. the site of the oil-stained belly of that 182 not more than 20 ft above my windscreen will always be in my memory.
Easily the closest that I’ve ever come to being in a serious aviation accident. Oh, and one last thing… I did get a free top-off from him…
