First, in April 1996, I had spent an hour in recurrent training in my Skyhawk. We had done some air work, including steep turns and slow flight, as well as some partial panel flying. As we returned to the Purdue University Airport (KLAF), my instructor suggested a no-flap landing, something I had not practiced since primary training nearly 10 years previously. It went well, and I was reminded that no-flap landings are faster and with a more nose-high attitude.

Second, a few days later I went with my daughter’s preschool class to visit the KLAF tower. The day was solid IFR with little activity, so the tower controllers had to be creative to entertain 15 5-year-olds. They brought out the light guns and the kids were captivated. 

The main event occurred a few days later when my wife, daughter and I flew to Kalamazoo, Michigan (KAZO), on an early Saturday morning. We had made this trip many times, and it proved the utility of a small airplane. Instead of spending seven tedious hours on the highway to spend five hours with my wife’s family, we spent three pleasant hours in the air to spend nine hours with her family. The flight was easy, we had a relaxing day with my in-laws, and in late afternoon we returned to the airport for the flight home.

• READ MORE: Everyone Should Pay Close Attention in the Cockpit

The walkaround was normal, the tanks were full, and with a forecast for “severe clear,” we were set for a relaxing flight home. On the run-up pad with the engine to 1,700 rpm, the mags checked out, and the oil pressure and suction were in the green. The ammeter showed a discharge with the landing light turned on and returned to center with the light off—well, maybe not completely center but close enough. After all, many a CFI had complained that these gauges in Skyhawks were not precise. A small voice in the back of my head said, “Hmm, maybe I should investigate that,” but I ignored the voice and we departed. 

On our IFR flight plan, as I spoke with air traffic controllers, the radio seemed scratchier than usual, but this was probably just some random electrical glitch, right? No. Just as the sun was setting, we lost all electrical power—no radios, no transponder, no lights, and, of course, no flaps. 

This happened as we were about 25 minutes from KLAF, but we were directly over a small airport where I had frequently practiced touch-and-goes. I told my wife that we could land immediately—without flaps—but otherwise all would be straightforward, and we could call a friend to fetch us. Alternatively, we could continue homeward. I explained that although ATC had lost our data block when the transponder lost power, the primary return was still visible on radar, moving steadily to KLAF. Chicago Center would tell the KLAF tower that a NORDO was inbound. We would fly 1,000 feet above pattern altitude, looking for the steady green light that meant we were cleared to land.

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My wife said that we should go ahead to KLAF. I was grateful for the vote of confidence. I grabbed my flashlight so that I could see the instruments and on we went. And it worked out exactly as I had told her: We approached KLAF above pattern altitude, saw the steady green light, entered the pattern, and made an easy landing in the dark with no landing light and no flaps. (And it was really dark—when we left KLAF that morning, I was wearing my prescription sunglasses and had left my regular glasses in the car in the hangar). After we had put the plane in the hangar, I called the tower and thanked the folks for their help. They confirmed that Chicago Center had forewarned them of my arrival and that they had alerted everyone in the pattern to be especially vigilant.

On the drive home, I reflected on the evening’s events. On the one hand, I was pleased that I had handled the emergency calmly and by the book. And I was grateful that the event had occurred in familiar airspace with no additional challenges associated with bad weather. On the other hand, I was annoyed that I had misread the signs that led to the emergency. 

What did I learn from the episode? 

First, periodically expand my scan of the panel to include instruments, such as the ammeter, that are on the far side of the panel. Second, receive recurrent training regularly to get feedback from a CFI about skills that may have grown rusty and should be practiced. Third, use the ATC system. These folks provide great service that can simplify a pilot’s tasks and can be a tremendous asset in an emergency. Fourth, when there are signs that something might be wrong, don’t weave a story to explain and then dismiss those signs. Instead, when the little voice says, “all is not right here,” pause to evaluate what’s going on.

Finally, keep a spare pair of glasses in the flight bag! 

This column first appeared in the July/August Issue 949 of the FLYING print edition.

The post Listening to That Inner Pilot Voice appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

A) Back Course (BC)

Sometimes, a back course (BC) is present even when it is into the prevailing winds instead of having a full ILS aligned with those winds. It might be for obstacles or equipment-positioning reasons that a glideslope is not able to be established from a particular direction. The BC is “the other side” of an ILS approach and traditionally requires a pilot to “reverse sense” while flying the approach. This means that instead of flying toward the deflected side for course alignment, a pilot would fly away from the direction, or, as most of us remember, “fly the needle to the ball.” Many modern avionics packages have HSI equipment or are digitally able to “flip” the signal and make it so a pilot doesn’t need to fly using reverse sensing. Knowing how your system works is critical to making sure you are correcting in the proper direction when flying this approach.

• READ MORE: Chart Wise: Charlottesville RNAV (GPS)-Y Rwy 21

B) Disregard Glideslope

Note 4 on this approach, like on many back-course approaches, indicates that a pilot should “disregard glideslope indications.” Glideslopes are typically generated on the opposite end of a runway when there is a back course and would lead a pilot along an incorrect descent path. This is a nonprecision approach,and a pilot should establish an appropriate descent rate to arrive at the minimum descent altitude before reaching the missed approach point.

C)  Discrete VOR and LOC Frequencies

On this approach the inbound course is generated through using the localizer (I-ESC) on 109.3. The VOR is also on the airport (ESC on 113.55), so be sure you are using the correct navigation source when you are inbound. This becomes especially confusing if you were using the VOR to navigate to the area and then along the DME ARC. Be sure to be selected to the LOC frequency for the inbound course.

• READ MORE: Chart Wise: Ocean City (KOXB) LOC Rwy 32

D) DME ARC Alternative

If you are flying this approach and don’t want to do the DME ARC to establish onto the approach, you can also track outbound from the VOR on a 092-degree radial to the KULAH waypoint, where you will intercept the localizer and then conduct a procedure turn after you are out past the waypoint, which is either 6 DME from the ESC VOR or 5.7 from the I-ESC LOC.

E) VDP and Map Differences

A visual descent point (VDP) is noted with the dark “V” at 1.1 DME from I-ESC, the localizer-based DME. A missed approach point (MAP) is noted at 0.5 DME from I-ESC and is where a pilot would need to go missed if they did not see the runway environment. Be careful not to confuse these DME readings with ones from the ESC VOR a pilot may have previously used to navigate onto the approach or while conducting a DME ARC.

F) Missed Hold Entry Turns Nonprotected Side

When going missed on this approach, a pilot would execute a climb to 2,500 feet, turn right back to the ESC VOR, and then hold. The turn in this case is toward the nonprotected side of the hold for the entry, and once established you will continue right turns while in the hold at 2,500 msl.

• READ MORE: Chart Wise: Spirit of St. Louis ILS 26L

G) Magnetic Disturbance Note

A note on the chart indicates that “magnetic disturbances of as much as 14 degrees exist at ground level in Escanaba.” A pilot is going to want to take that into account when setting their directional gyro. You might be best served to set it based on runway alignment rather than using a comparison to your magnetic compass.

This column first appeared in the July/August Issue 949 of the FLYING print edition.

The post Escanaba (KESC) LOC BC Rwy 28 appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

Convective outflow boundaries emanating away from thunderstorms are generated as cold, dense air descends in downdrafts then moving outward away from the convection to produce a mesoscale cold front also known as a gust front. Some gust fronts can be completely harmless or may be a precursor for an encounter with severe turbulence and dangerous low-level convective wind shear. The direction of movement of the gust front isn’t always coincident with the general motion of the thunderstorms. If the gust front is moving in advance of the convection, it should be strictly avoided. The pilot’s best defense is to recognize and characterize the gust front using METARs, ground-based radar and visible satellite imagery.

According to research meteorologist and thunderstorm expert, Dr. Charles Doswell, “cold, stable air is the ‘exhaust’ of deep, moist convection descending in downdrafts and then spreading outward like pancake batter poured on a griddle.” As a pulse-type thunderstorm reaches a point where its updraft can no longer support the load of precipitation that has accumulated inside, the precipitation load collapses down through the original updraft area. Evaporation of some of the rain cools the downdraft, making it even more dense compared to the surrounding air. When the downdraft reaches the ground, it is deflected laterally and spreads out almost uniformly in all directions producing a gust front. 

• READ MORE: Keeping an Eye on the Storm

Gust fronts are normally seen moving away from weakening thunderstorm cores. Once a gust front forms and moves away from the convection the boundary may be detected on the NWS WSR-88D NEXRAD Doppler radar as a bow-shaped line of low reflectivity returns usually 20 dBZ or less. Outflow boundaries are low level events and do not necessarily produce precipitation. Instead, the radar is detecting the density discontinuity of the boundary itself along with any dust, insects and other debris that may be carried along with the strong winds within the outflow. The gust front in southwest Missouri shows up very well on the NWS radar image out of Springfield as shown below. 

 An important observation is to note the motion of the gust front relative to the motion of the convection. In this particular case, the boundary is steadily moving south while the thunderstorm cells that produced the gust front are moving to the east. This kind of outflow boundary is usually benign especially as it gains distance from the source convection. On the other hand, a gust front that is moving in the same general direction in advance of the convection is of the most concern. These gust fronts often contain severe or extreme turbulence, strong and gusty straight line winds and low-level convective wind shear. 

As mentioned previously, gust fronts are strictly low-level events. As such, even the lowest elevation angle of the radar may overshoot the boundary if it is not close to the radar site. Shown above at 22Z, the NWS WSR-88D NEXRAD Doppler radar out of Greenville-Spartanburg, South Carolina is the closest radar site and clearly “sees” the gust front (right image). However, the NEXRAD Doppler radar out of Columbia, South Carolina (left image), is further away and misses the gust front completely. As the gust front moves away from the radar site, it may appear to dissipate, when in fact, the lowest elevation beam of the radar is simply overshooting the boundary. 

As a result, it is important to examine the NEXRAD radar mosaic image before looking at the individual radar sites.

Not all gust fronts are easy to distinguish on visible satellite imagery; the gust front could be embedded in other dense clouds or a high cirrus deck may obscure it. It is also possible that the boundary may not have enough lift or moisture to produce clouds. In many cases, however, it will clearly stand out on the visible satellite image. When the gust front contains enough moisture, as it was in this situation, cumuliform clouds may form along the boundary and move outward. This is very common in the Southeast and coastal regions along the Gulf of Mexico given the higher moisture content.  

As this particular gust front passed through my neighborhood located south of Charlotte, North Carolina, strong, gusty northerly winds persisted for about 10 minutes. As is common, the main core of the precipitation didn’t start to fall for another 10 minutes. When a gust front such as this appears on satellite or radar, it is important to monitor the METARs and ASOS or AWOS closely for the occurrence of high winds. Several airports in the vicinity reported wind gusts peaking at 30 knots. The sky cover went from being just few to scattered clouds to a broken sky with these cumuliform clouds moving rapidly through the region.

• READ MORE: The Ins and Outs of Pilot Weather Reports

As mentioned earlier, a gust front moving away from thunderstorms is a low-level event that can contain very strong updrafts and downdrafts. The graph shown above is a time series, plotting the upward and downward motion or vertical velocity in a strong gust front as it moved over a particular point on the ground. The top half of the graph is upward motion and the bottom half is downward motion. 

Time increases from left to right. As the gust front approaches, the vertical velocity of the air upward increases quickly over a one or two minute period. While the maximum vertical velocities vary with height in the outflow, a common maximum number seen is 10 m/s at about 1.4 km or 4,500 feet agl (25 knots is roughly 12 m/s for reference). As the gust front moves through, the velocities abruptly switch from an upward to a downward motion creating strong wind gusts at the surface. Most outflow boundaries don’t extend above about 2 km or 6,500 feet agl. What is remarkable is that upward to downward motion changes in just about 30 seconds over the ground point where this was observed. But imagine flying an aircraft at 150 knots through this; the up and down exchange will happen in just a few seconds producing a jarring turbulence event.

Just in case you were wondering, gust fronts are conveniently filtered out by your datalink weather broadcasts as shown above for XM-delivered satellite weather. This is because the broadcast only provides returns from actual areas of precipitation. Often outflow boundaries or gust fronts produce low reflectivity returns that fall below the threshold used to filter out other clutter not associated with actual areas of precipitation. When in flight, pay particular attention to surface observations looking for strong, gusty winds before attempting a landing at an airport when storms are approaching. 

This feature first appeared in the July/August Issue 949 of the FLYING print edition.

The post Know Your Convective Outflow Boundaries appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

After starting up, calming my nerves, keying the mic, and receiving my taxi clearance, I joined the slow parade of aircraft taxiing up to the departure point of Runway 27. This looked startlingly familiar to the long lines of aircraft I’ve seen for years on the taxiways at KOSH during the real AirVenture.

Fond memories returned to me of short breaks taken beside the taxiway watching aircraft, a northerly breeze keeping the summer heat in check, puffy white cumulus clouds rolling softly over the field as innumerable one-of-a-kind, rare, and well-loved GA, warbirds, antique, and homebuilt aircraft slowly roll by on their way to go flying.

Although I’m in my home flight simulator, I am excited to be trying this bucket list flight simulator activity, knowing that landing at KOSH this afternoon will be a test of concentration and flying skill as I join my fellow sim pilots in attempting to traverse the famous Fisk arrival. 

Snapping out of this momentary reverie, I receive my clearance from the tower to line up and wait on Runway 27, and then: 

“November 3-8-3-Romeo-Sierra, cleared for takeoff, Runway 2-7.”

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Then, with as much calm in my voice as I can muster: “Roger, 383RS, cleared for take-off, runway 2-7.” 

Ahead of me, another Cessna 172 is on the upwind, a safe distance ahead. On either side I can see many more GA aircraft waiting their turn to launch, propellers all spinning in anticipation. We are 12 miles due south of KOSH, but my heart rate is up, left hand on the yoke, push the throttle forward, and the takeoff roll begins. A quick glance at the oil pressure, it is in the green, and my airspeed is alive: 30, 40, 50 knots, but no faster—something’s wrong. 

I can hear something is not right with the engine. But this is near impossible as I thought I had turned off major failure modes for the event. Another check of oil pressure—still green. A bit exasperated and running out of runway, I contemplate what it will feel like to botch this takeoff in front of 30 other sim pilots who are probably watching and listening on the radio.

If I don’t figure this out, I will need to abort the takeoff. I have only a few seconds to make the decision when I look across my sim cockpit and spot the culprit of the engine trouble. I leaned the mixture on the long taxi to the takeoff point, and it was still at roughly 50 percent. I jammed the mixture full forward, the engine responded, and the 172 returned to normal acceleration, up through 70 knots. I pulled back on the yoke and cleared the end of the runway to my upwind climb. Certainly an inauspicious start to the most exciting live flight sim event in which I have participated.

Having failed to double-check the mixture, I made a silent promise to myself—no more big mistakes. After all, this is the big live event of the summer for sim pilots. 

With my heart rate settling back to normal and Fond Du Lac fading into the distance behind me, it was time to get ahead and stay ahead of the aircraft. One of my goals for the flight was to hand fly it, which was made easier by the calm weather programmed into the flight simulator. 

I turned the heading bug on my Real Sim Gear G1000 PFD CDI and steered my 172 in a south-westerly direction over the small town of Waupun, Wisconsin. I set my altitude bug for 1,800 feet, per the arrival instructions, and trimmed to maintain the altitude.

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Just like in the real world, twins and faster aircraft could opt for the 2,300-foot altitude arrival, but I purposefully chose the slower single-engine piston Cessna 172 Skyhawk, knowing that it would still provide plenty of challenge. Once I reached Waupun, I would turn the aircraft in a north-westerly direction toward the Fisk arrival Transition starting point. This would be revealed as soon as I checked the ATIS, which functioned in this SimVenture event exactly as it does in real-world flying. 

There were a few important differences between the real-world EAA AirVenture Oshkosh arrival and the SimVenture version. To coordinate the same flight sim environment for all participants, pilots were asked to set their simulator weather to CAVU skies, calm winds, and standard pressure altitude of 29.92 on the barometer. This assured that all pilots were flying at the same altitude and that there were no major crosswinds, given the high density of live aircraft in the simulation.  

The most interesting and compelling similarity to the real-world AirVenture experience was the fact that real Oshkosh ATC were controlling all pilots participating in SimVenture. Some of the participating controllers were even using SimVenture to warm up for the real AirVenture environment just like some pilots use simulators to fly routes in advance.

Having some of the real-life KOSH air traffic controllers join the flight simulation community to provide the ultimate full-immersion experience made it a can’t-miss event. Working from their own homes, the controllers were provided with software and access so they could see the activity on their screens and control the sim participants effectively. As soon as I tuned into the ATIS to learn which Fisk arrival transition was in use, I recognized the familiar voice, having watched numerous real-world arrivals on YouTube as part of my preparation.

PilotEdge delivers the integration of the live ATC service with participating sim pilots connecting to the event through their software client. For SimVenture, PilotEdge designated one of the four runways at KOSH for each day, providing incentive for sim pilots to fly the Fisk arrival all four days of the event. For those pilots wishing to be surprised, the runway information can be picked up when listening to ATIS or from the announcements of the approach controllers. Trying to preserve that element of surprise and realism, I briefed all four runways as part of my prep work and felt reasonably prepared for each. 

I experienced some trepidation about how much of the critical scenery I would be able to see out my left window, even at 1,800 feet. Spotting the railroad tracks at Ripon, for example, and picking up Fisk Avenue over the town of Fisk were both critical details. So, a few days before SimVenture, I took a practice flight on my sim from Ripon to Fisk, trying the Fisk Avenue transition first, and then looping back to try the railroad track transition over the gravel pit second.

• READ MORE: Here Are 2 Quick VFR Flights to Try on Your Home Flight Simulator

My justification for this practice flight was simply that I would use my home simulator to do the same thing if I was flying the arrival in real life, so why not get a quick familiarization ahead of the big event? Also, I knew how task-saturated I would feel on the day of SimVenture, and I wanted to ease that a bit. 

I was 10 miles south of the start of the Fisk arrival now and dialed in the SimVenture ATIS, confirming that Puckaway Lake was the selected transition starting point and that Runway 27 was the active arrival runway for the day at KOSH. I then tuned to the Fisk Approach frequency and started to listen to the controller providing a series of directions to aircraft far ahead at the RIPON checkpoint. For now, I turned my attention to the aircraft forming up over the lake. Whatever aircraft I could form up with would become the loose formation that would make the run up the railroad tracks to the town of Fisk, and then on to landing at KOSH. 

When I arrived over Puckaway Lake, the informal formation of aircraft had the organizational qualities of what I remember my middle school dances looking like— a few parts of chaos and a lot of improvisational choreography as we danced with two left feet—trying to find an aircraft of similar size and speed to fly with. It was a group assembly en masse, like a murmuration of starlings but with much more function and a lot less beauty. 

Aircraft of all varieties were moving generally eastward but at a wide range of altitudes and speeds. I counted no fewer than 30 aircraft and did my best to join a small group near the southern edge of the lake. There was a concerted effort among us to order ourselves, with some jockeying for position. I slowed down to 82 knots momentarily to set myself in the back of the flying-V formation that was beginning to take shape. It wasn’t pretty, but we were Oshkosh-bound.  

The next transition point ahead of us was Green Lake. Per the notice, we had until the town of Ripon to form a single file line, and this had to be completed without talking to each other on the radio. All of us were doing our best to balance the many simultaneous tasks of navigating visually, watching out for nearby traffic, holding altitude and airspeed, and listening to the controllers. The leg from Green Lake to RIPON isn’t more than 10 miles, so there wasn’t much time to make it all work. It was odd to be so close to other aircraft but with no direct way to communicate with them. The flying-V shape was holding on the right side, but there was a bevy of aircraft that still needed to sort themselves into order off to my left. 

Farther ahead, the radio was alive with the Fisk Approach controller turning around a group of sim pilots that couldn’t get themselves into a single file. They were receiving the “turn back” instructions, which meant the whole group had to enter a left turn counterclockwise and fly over the northern shore of Green Lake, then fly nearly 20 miles back to the transition point on Puckaway Lake and try the entire process again. In my group, we had 6 miles to go until RIPON and we still had some work to do.  

I used the hat switch on my yoke to move the camera view to my left and right so that I could read our position and progress towards single-file-ness. Satisfied with my relative position to the other aircraft, I clicked the button to return my camera view to straight ahead out my windscreen, and without warning, another single-engine piston aircraft flew directly in front of me from the left, giving me cause to wonder if I would feel the prop wash in sim.

If it had been real life, it would have been a nerve-wracking close call, and I suspect that I could have seen the other pilot’s eye color. I immediately corrected more to the right and tried to slow down by a few knots, wanting to avoid the accordion effect of stacking up the sim pilots behind me. Not an ideal situation, but one I probably should have been expecting given all of the traffic. By now, the frequency was alive with activity from the Fisk Approach controllers, who were exercising equal parts patience and directness. 

Soon we were on the doorstep of the RIPON transition, and I began looking for the railroad tracks that would lead us to Fisk. I was confident that I could see the tracks from 1,800 feet, having run the practice flight a few days before. I was glad I had done so since Route 44 runs closely alongside and can be visually mistaken in the sim environment if glanced at casually.

Our informal gaggle of aircraft formed a decent single-file line of four, and we made it to RIPON without getting sent back to the end of the line. The others in our group had pressed ahead, probably at faster than 90 knots. No matter. I double-checked my altitude, airspeed, engine instruments, fuel remaining, and that I was still tracking correctly over the railroad just out of my left window.

This feature first appeared in the July/August Issue 949 of the FLYING print edition.

The post SimVenture Adventure Doesn’t Disappoint appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

Out of power, altitude and options, Captain Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger and copilot Jeffrey Skiles ditched the aircraft in the Hudson River near midtown Manhattan. There were 155 souls on board. There were injuries but no loss of life, and the term “Miracle on the Hudson” was coined since it was viewed as one of the most successful ditchings ever performed.

What Is Ditching?

According to the Aeronautical Information Manual (AIM), ditching is defined as “a controlled emergency landing of an aircraft on water.” If the aircraft isn’t equipped with floats, it’s usually a one-time-only event, and unlike power-off landings to full stop on a runway, it is not something you can practice. But you can prepare mentally by studying what to do in the unlikely event of a water landing.

Any time you fly over water, you should be thinking about it, especially when the aircraft is beyond gliding distance of the shoreline.

Always Consider It When Flying Over Water

“Do you know how to swim?”

A pilot of the J-3 Cub asked me this the first time I took off from Runway 17 at the Tacoma Narrows Airport (KTIW) in Washington. The airport sits on a peninsula that leads onto the Puget Sound. If you have seen the 1983 movie War Games, the scene with the ferryboat and the island was shot just south of KTIW.

The pilot asked the question after I wondered out loud where we’d land if we had an engine issue. I assured him I could swim as in my teens I trained to be a lifeguard and was thrown out of boats in the middle of a lake fully clothed, with no life vest to test my skills. Until that flight all my training had been over land.

Most of my information about ditching comes from interviewing colleagues who have done it.

• READ MORE: For Those Aviators Attracted to Water

In July 2022, John La Porta, a CFI in the Seattle area experienced an uncommanded loss of engine power while flying a Cessna 150 over the water west of Seattle. La Porta was alone in the aircraft at the time. According to La Porta, the aircraft was at less than 2,000 feet when he noticed a loss of oil pressure. He was attempting to reach King County International Airport-Boeing Field (KBFI), but when the engine lost power, he knew he wouldn’t make it. He didn’t want to take a chance on flying over the hilly terrain, homes, and streets, so he set up to put the aircraft in the water next to Alki Beach.

Things happened quickly, he recalled. He tightened the lap belt and cinched the shoulder harness as tightly as he could. He did not lower the flaps to 40 degrees per the ditching instructions in the POH, but that may have been a blessing as the flaps would have possibly blocked his egress from the aircraft, which flipped over. He was upside down but couldn’t tell in the submerged aircraft.

Although the shoulder harness probably saved his life since it kept him from slamming into the panel, it also pinned him inside the airplane.

“I could not get the belts to release until the airplane’s tail settled into the water. I had one hand on the window, and I was able to sort of stretch up and take a breath of air, and then I found the lap belt and was able to get it undone. I held on to the window as I released the shoulder harness, and then I swam out of the window,” La Porta told FLYING, adding that, if he had someone else in the airplane, he’s not sure if they both would have survived because of the seat belt jamming.

After that experience, La Porta became a big believer in carrying a seatbelt cutter on his person.

Training for the Worst

When it’s more than just you in the airplane, ditching reaches a whole new level, said Amy Laboda, an ATP/CFI and FLYING contributor.

On June 14, 2001, Laboda was in her Cessna 210 with her two daughters, ages 9 and 10, their 15-year-old babysitter, and an adult family friend heading for the Cayman Islands. Shortly after takeoff from Key West International Airport (KEYW) in Florida, as the aircraft passed through 1,500 feet, there was a loud bang and a loss of engine power.

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“It was the kind of sound that makes you push the nose over and start turning back,” said Laboda, adding that she drew upon her experience as a glider pilot to get the most distance out of the altitude available but quickly realized she wasn’t going to be able to make it back to land.

She declared an emergency and was cleared to any runway but had to respond, “Unable.”

“The last thing I heard from ATC was ‘services on the way,’” she said.

The aircraft came in like a bobsled, and the windscreen popped out. “It was like getting hit in the face with a fire hose,” said Laboda, noting they were lucky because the water was flat, warm, and smooth.

Laboda boasts years of experience teaching the ditching seminars for the FAA FAASTeam, and from an early age she taught her kids how to quickly put on the overwater safety gear.

“When they were little, we made a game of it,” she explained, adding that part of the preflight briefing is what to do if they had to put it down in the water.

Everyone did what they had been told to do and survived with just cuts and bruises. “There were several boats in the area, and we were in the water for less than 10 minutes,” she said.

Train to Ditch

If you have the opportunity to take a water survival course for aviators, do so. If not, chapter 6 of the AIM provides illustrations and textual descriptions of how to ditch an aircraft. There are a great many variables that result in a successful ditching.

The condition of the landing area is key. Is the aircraft coming down in rough seas or a calm lake? Does the pilot have the skill to come in at the slowest possible airspeed? Was there time to prepare?
The AIM advises stowing or jettisoning loose objects from the cockpit so they don’t become projectiles. Tighten seat belts and unlatch doors because if the aircraft frame is bent, they might jam. If you have time, jam a shoe in the door crack to prop it open.

The National Search and Rescue Manual along with the emergency section of most POHs advise pilots to attempt to bring the aircraft in at a slightly tail-low attitude—slower, the better.

Once the airplane comes to a complete stop, keep your seat belt on and reach for the door. When you have found the door and opened it, release the seat belt. It is important to stay belted until you have grasped the door handle because it helps with orientation. It’s dark underwater, and if the airplane is upside down, you won’t know it. Use the seat belt cutter if you have to—but still hang on to the door.

Once you are free of the belt, pull yourself clear of the aircraft and activate the life vest if you are wearing one. If you are underwater, blow one bubble and follow it to the surface.

Unlacing your shoes so you can kick them off easily is also a good idea because of all the articles of clothing you are likely wearing they are the heaviest and will drag you down.

This feature first appeared in the July/August Issue 949 of the FLYING print edition.

The post The One-Time Water Landing appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

The contest, which typically occurs on grass or dirt areas parallel to paved runways, was to take place alongside Runway 5-23. 

On Friday afternoon the wind picked up. It blew out of the northwest across the STOL Drag course. Qualifying heats were postponed until the next day. 

A number of the competitors then decided to conduct an impromptu “traditional STOL” event, omitting the drag racing component. They would use the grass Runway 31, which was conveniently aligned with the wind. The pilots, organizers, and FAA inspectors who were present held a safety briefing, and the participants were divided into four groups of five or six aircraft to prevent clogging the pattern. The objective of the contest was to see who could come to a full stop in the shortest distance after touching down beyond the target line.

Each group completed two circuits without incident. Two groups had completed a third circuit, and now the third group was landing. The third airplane in that group was a modified Rans S-7, the fourth a Zenith STOL 701—unusual among the participants in having tricycle gear—and the last a Cessna 140. The S-7 landed, came to a stop in less than 100 feet, and taxied away. The 701 was still a fair distance out, and the 140 seemingly rather close behind it and low. 

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A STOL Drag representative who was coordinating the pattern operations radioed the 140 pilot: “Lower your nose. You look slow.” The 140 pilot did not acknowledge. Half a minute later, the coordinator again advised the pilot to lower his nose. 

A few seconds later, the 140 yawed to the right, its right wing dropped, and with the awful inevitability of an avalanche or a falling tree, it rolled over into a vertical dive and struck the ground an instant later. A groan went up from the small crowd of onlookers. “Oh, my God, what happened!” one voice exclaimed. What had happened was all too clear—a low-altitude stall-spin that resulted in the pilot’s death.

The 140 pilot, 45, had an estimated 470 hours total time, more than 300 of which were in the 140. He had already qualified for STOL Drag competitions at a previous event.

The wind at the time of the accident was 15 knots gusting to 21. (As with all aviation wind reports, the 15 is the sustained wind and the 21 the maximum observed; no information is provided about lulls or wind speed variations below the sustained value.) The pilot of the 701 said that he had been maintaining about 50 mph (44 knots), as he had on several previous approaches, and that the wind on this approach felt no different than on the others. 

The 701 is equipped with full-span leading-edge slats, which make it practically incapable of unexpectedly stalling. Operating at a likely wing loading of less than 7 pounds per square foot, it could probably fly at around 35 mph. For the 701, an approach speed of 50 mph was conservative. The 140’s wing loading was only slightly higher, but its wing was not optimized for extremely slow flight. The 140’s POH stalling speed at gross weight was highly dependent on power setting, ranging from 45 mph power off to 37 mph, flaps down, with full power.

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An FAA inspector who witnessed the accident reported his observations to a National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) investigator. He noted that the 140 generally took longer to get airborne than other airplanes in its group, in part because the pilot, after first lifting the tail, rotated prematurely, so that the tailwheel struck the ground and the airplane continued rolling for some distance before finally becoming airborne. The pilot, he said, would climb steeply at first, but then have to lower the nose to gain speed. He appeared low and close behind the 701 on the last approach.

Earlier videos also showed that, on landing, the 140 rolled farther than other contestants, despite braking to the point of almost nosing over.

On previous circuits the pilot had used flaps, but on his last approach he failed to put the flaps down. The omission could account for the coordinator’s observation that the nose seemed high. Full flaps would have resulted in a more nose-low attitude.

The NTSB blamed the accident on the pilot’s obvious “exceedance of the airplane’s critical angle of attack.” It went on to cite as a contributing factor the “competitive environment, which likely influenced the pilot’s approach speed.” Since there were many knowledgeable observers of both the accident and of several previous takeoffs and landings by the 140, and everything was recorded on video from several angles, the NTSB’s diagnosis could probably have been even more specific and mentioned the failure to use flaps and the premature downwind-to-base turn.

If, by a chance misjudgment, the 140 pilot found himself too close behind the 701, he still had options other than slowing to the lowest possible speed. Since there was no one behind him, he could have gone around or made a 360 on final. The aircraft waiting to take off would have had to stand by a little longer, but only a fool would grumble because another pilot was being wisely cautious.

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Instead, the 140 pilot chose to maintain his spacing by flying as slow as he could.

The decisive factor in the accident was most probably the failure to use flaps. It was almost certainly inadvertent. He probably forgot to put the flaps down, then believed they were down—because he had them down on the previous circuits—and chose his speeds accordingly. Adding flaps would have brought the stalling speed down 3-4 mph and also obliged him to use a little more power. Actually, it would have been quite a bit more because he was low, and the added power would have given him still more cushion.

The 140 was a goose among swans in this flock of dedicated STOL airplanes that possessed a near-magical ability to take off and land in practically no distance at all. Still, it was OK to be an outlier. The point of the contest was to have fun. You didn’t need to go home with a trophy—not that there even was one for this impromptu event.

But integrating an airplane with somewhat limited capabilities among more capable ones required special attention to speed and spacing. It would be easy to make a mistake. Once the mistake was made, and compounded by the failure to use flaps, all the pilot had left to lean on was luck—or willingness to recognize an error and go around while there was still airspeed and altitude to recover.

Note: This article is based on the National Transportation Safety Board’s report of the accident and is intended to bring the issues raised to our readers’ attention. It is not intended to judge or reach any definitive conclusions about the ability or capacity of any person, living or dead, or any aircraft or accessory.

This column first appeared in the July/August Issue 949 of the FLYING print edition.

The post Nothing Short of a Fatal Mismatch appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

He complained there was something wrong with the airplane. The engine wasn’t producing enough power. He had attempted two takeoffs and wisely chose to abort, as it did not lift off when he expected.

“It pretty much ate up the whole runway!” he said. 

When asked if he had done the performance calculations, specifically accounting for density altitude, he acted like a deer in the headlights. He had not performed the computations because he didn’t think the conditions warranted. The field elevation was approximately 492 feet—certainly not what you would consider high elevation, and the temperature was in the mid-80s Fahrenheit. He was from Arizona, where the temperature routinely topped 100 in the summer, so this was not hot, and it didn’t feel humid out there, at least not by Midwest or Gulf state standards—also places he had been.

“Don’t you need all three to create density altitude?” he asked.

No. No, you don’t.

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He was surprised to learn that a single one of those factors can reduce aircraft performance, which is why those numbers need to be crunched and double-checked before every flight. And I mean every flight.

Of all the skills that go by the wayside after the check ride, determining aircraft performance is right up there next to “obtaining a weather briefing” and “weight and balance.” If you don’t make it a habit to use these skills, they fade—and quickly. I will never forget the private pilot who had her certificate for all of four months yet couldn’t remember how to access a weather report or read a takeoff performance chart and therefore had no idea how long the takeoff roll would be.

Consider what is off the end of the runway as well. If the performance chart says you need 1,120 feet to clear that 50-foot obstacle at the end of the runway, and the runway measures 1,900 feet, ask yourself where could you go if something went wrong? Is there a golf course? An industrial park? A lake? Don’t forget to review the short-field takeoff checklist and review the fine print, especially with regard to leaning the mixture for best power.

Watch the Weight

We can’t control the weather, but we can manage the weight of the aircraft. On warmer days, it is not uncommon to limit the fuel load of an aircraft to adjust for its reduced performance.

Most flight schools that use scheduling software have a place to put notes in the rental reservation where you can leave a remark such as special refueling instructions, such as do not refuel after flight. To be safe you might want to add a Post-it note in the dispatch binder or on it, or a note on a whiteboard in the CFI cubicles can work. This is a belt-and-suspenders and a staple-gun approach, but if your flight school doesn’t have the ability to expediently and safely offload fuel, it can save a flight. 

Don’t forget to note the time to climb in your calculations. It is a bit chilling to have planned for a climb rate of 500 feet per minute to clear a ridgeline but then notice the aircraft is struggling to achieve 300 feet per minute. This is one of those times you will want to fly  a shuttle climb, going back and forth in a confined space.

Protect Pilot Performance

High altitude, heat, and humidity also degrade the performance of a pilot. Most aircraft in the training fleet don’t have the same caliber of environmental controls as modern cars, so pilots, especially flight instructors, have to be creative. (You know it is a hot day at the airport when the CFIs keep the door of the aircraft open during taxi and don’t close it until just before takeoff.)

You can try to work around it by scheduling flights early in the morning or late in the evening but if that is not an option you have to adapt.

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In the Seattle area, anything over 90 degrees is unusual, and our homes, airplanes, and bodies aren’t used to it. There was one summer where it really got us. I still had to fly, so I scheduled as many of my learners as I could in the cooler part of the day—two before noon and one for when the day began to cool. I had learned that even if I used those products advertised to control sweat and stink and wore a cotton T-shirt under my flight school uniform (a black polo made from a material that nature never knew existed), by midday my shirt was sweat soaked and I felt as though I needed a bath in tomato juice.

I started changing my T-shirt at least twice a day, and when the temperatures reached the 100s, drew upon primacy, drawing upon my days as a teenage girl at slumber parties: I froze my own T-shirt. It’s not quite what we did back in those days, but the principle was sound, and I highly recommend it. Put a clean, dry T-shirt in the freezer overnight. Wear it the next day during the flight. You will be surprised how comfortable it is and how long it stays cool. 

On those hot days, I learned to carry frozen bottles of water in the airplane. Put the bottle in a clean tube sock to absorb the condensation. Sip from the bottle in between maneuvers, and in particular before landing, as dehydration can manifest as fatigue and slow down your reaction time. Also, you can be dehydrated without being thirsty. You may find it useful to take a few sips off water bottles as part of your before-landing checklist, as it increases alertness.

The Difficult Conversation

Using deodorant and daily bathing is not a universal thing. This was explained to me by a colleague who had some bad experiences with learners from other cultures, to the point her flight school added a page on hygiene information to its welcome-to-our-school packets. The CFIs told stories of using air fresheners in the cockpits and classrooms and using lemon-scented polish on the aircraft windows to try to mask the odor.

It is particularly awkward when it is a co-worker who needs the talk. I was forced to do a Redbird training session with a CFI who was a heavy smoker, and frankly smelled like a cross between an ashtray, a latrine, and a skunk. I’d been warned, but that did not do the situation justice. My eyes were watering, and I cut the lesson short—then promptly went to the gym around the corner, showered, and changed my uniform.

I had two more learners that day, and I wanted the focus to be on flying—not fragrance.

This column first appeared in the July/August Issue 949 of the FLYING print edition.

The post How to Beat the Summer Heat When Flying appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

Those guys are gone now, but the T-hangars on the south line at Cincinnati’s Lunken Airport (KLUK) where they worked are still there, close to where that little Ercoupe that my sister Mary and I came to fly was roosting in the grass. N341 (we should have kept the number) had been generously loaned to us by a friend who hadn’t flown it in some time. It needed an annual inspection, which Carl Garlough and his two helpers did, as well as repairing a few things like a hole in the gas tank before we took to the skies. 

Carl was an amiable, sort of fatherly guy, probably trained in the military, who always had a pipe clamped between his teeth. And the man who took me aside and explained I might stop bragging about being a member of the “Mile High Club.” My dastardly instructor, Larry Whitesell, announced my prestigious status after we coaxed the little airplane (with a “sick 75”) above 5,000 feet. Naturally, I bragged about it but didn’t understand the reaction of the old guys around the airport who knew there was no way that could happen in an Ercoupe. 

Carl was a good mechanic but also kept Tom Noonan’s airplanes running, although “TV Tom” had less than a sterling reputation with customers, creditors, insurance companies, and the FAA. Working with him in his shop was a nice, competent mechanic named Henry, who I would learn was a periodic alcoholic—on his game for weeks at a time only to disappear. Henry always showed up days or weeks later with the shakes and often badly beaten up. But Carl, bless him, helped him along. Another young guy, whose name I can’t remember, was a newly certificated “A&E” (in those days). He was maybe a little sweet on Mary, but I reminded her the only aircraft mechanic school in the state of Ohio, in those days, was the Chillicothe Reformatory.

• READ MORE: Perusing Some Old Logbooks

Those guys kept the Ercoupe running while Mary and I got out private licenses. And Carl even used a bolt cutter on the chain my dad had wrapped around the prop of the Ercoupe sitting out in the grass. He was determined to keep me grounded while he and my mom were away for a few weeks because he thought I was cutting too many classes at college to go to the airport. Before my parents even knew I was taking lessons, I had forged his signature on the permission slip required in those days for students under 21 to solo. Anyway, somebody hooked the chain back up before they got back.

Oh, my, how things have changed. There are no “small airplane” shops on Lunken Airport these days—at least ones that last. I fly to a smaller airport nearby for maintenance and annuals. In an emergency, Mark Day from Blue Ash Aircraft Service at Lebanon will drive down to do the repair. Lots of guys use freelance A&Ps who arrive in pickup trucks and pull the annuals in their (or a friend’s) T-hangar. And lots do the annuals themselves, paying a friendly IA to sign off their work. Thank the Lord, I’m not mechanically inclined. An old boyfriend—a toolmaker with an IA—used to tell me, “Machinery doesn’t love you.”

Small shops are increasingly rare at large airports. It’s too expensive and new A&Ps can get better-paying, more secure jobs with the airlines or large corporate operators. A friend took his Cessna 182 to the shop at a large, local FBO that caters to bizjets. It charged him for 10 hours of work to change the oil.

But it certainly wasn’t always that way through the 1970s when Lunken had at least two large, full-service, FBOs that began in the ’30s. Cincinnati Aircraft, a Cessna dealer, occupied two of the three large brick hangars built in the ’20s for the Embry-Riddle Company. Queen City Flying Service, a Beech dealer in Hangar 3, was always a “posh” operation that catered to people with more money than we had. The offices were up a spiral staircase that led you into something right out of a ’30s or ’40s movie with art deco furniture and fixtures, private inner-sanctum offices, and a woman at the front desk. The parties and liaisons that went in Hangar 3 were legendary but, in fairness, the airplanes, pilots, instructors, and mechanics at both operations were top-notch. 

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Back in the day, I confess we’d send the Cub logbooks to an IA friend who signed them off for $100. Another guy worked for years as a pilot and mechanic with phony, forged certificates. 

But you have to watch out even for the good guys. Flying your airplane after an annual is kind of a risky process, so do a good preflight check and stay over at the field until you’re sure everything works as it should.

Barry Schiff tells me he flew a Tri-Pacer (I said, “Shame on you.”) in California after annual. There was no problem in flight because you hardly use the rudder pedals anyway. But turning into the FBO after landing, there were curious “crunching noises.” It seems somebody had allowed a metal E6B computer to migrate back in the tail.

A corporate pilot for a squeaky-clean, very large company told me a mechanic had left a wrench inside the engine of a G3 with devastating results. I think he was relegated to making soap. Another lost all power (IFR) when flying a Cessna 182 home. Two G-5s had been installed by a radio shop, but the crankcase breather port was blocked by a plastic cap with oil spewing out of the underside of the engine.

I found a large black Maglite jammed behind the rudder pedals and another very conscientious mechanic wouldn’t let me fly again until he drove to Cincinnati to retrieve a hand mirror from the tail section.

You’d be surprised at the number of things that are FAA- and manufacturer-approved temporary repairs—some involving “speed tape’” (if you can afford $700 a roll). It’s said that you could stick one end of the roll onto the hood of your car and pull it with the other end.

Look at the FAA publication Maintenance Aspects of Owning Your Own Airplane but, remember, you gotta know what you’re doing. 

This column first appeared in the July/August Issue 949 of the FLYING print edition.

The post An Ode to Aircraft Mechanics appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

At 15,000 feet I notice that the fuel pressure is fluctuating. I watch the gauge intently. The tempo of the engine is unsteady. The fluctuations become larger and longer. 

The fuel selector valve and feed lines are under a floorboard beneath Nancy’s feet. I nudge her legs aside and remove the floorboard. I can see the fuel in the plastic lines on its way to and from the engine. Normally the flow to the engine is invisible, while the vapor return is full of bubbles. Now both lines are full of bubbles. What is going to the engine is more like froth than fuel. I switch tanks, and a moment later the engine goes silent. Boost pump—it roars back, hunts for a moment, then settles back to an unsteady rumble. Nancy has lifted her hands to her face in an instinctive gesture of fright. The mountains are close below us.

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What’s wrong? Has a fuel line sprung a leak? But how can the lines from both tanks have gone leaky at once? Suddenly I recall being told that paper fuel filters could get clogged without appearing to be excessively dirty. They would gradually choke off the fuel supply, and the telltale sign would be a drop in fuel pressure. There are paper filters in the feed lines from both tanks. That must be it: Some impurity in the fuel has increased the resistance of the filters, and the engine-driven pump is pulling against the resistance, forming vapor.

Reluctantly, I turn back, call Lima Approach, and report an engine problem. It clears us direct, and we make the ILS approach. Below 10,000 feet the problem disappears, and I feel chagrin at having turned back.

On the ground, I check the fuel system. No leaks. I inspect the filter elements. They contain some lint and metal chips, mementos of the backyard construction of the wet wings, but  do not appear excessively dirty. I discard them anyway, leaving the filter shells empty. 

After two hours we’re back in the air. Now we’re both watching the fuel pressure. Above 10,000 feet it begins to fluctuate and gets steadily worse as we climb. There has been no improvement. But there is also nothing I can do that I have not already done. We level out at 19,000 feet.

In the hours we’ve wasted, clouds have built up over the mountains, but they are conveniently placed on either side of our route, as is often the case, because the clouds form first over the peaks while the routes follow the passes. We pass the beacons of Oyon—a small town nestled in a valley on our left—and Huanuco. The mountains fall away. Clouds are building on the eastern slope. We turn gradually toward the north over Tingo Maria and Tarapoto. Our last radio contact is with Tarapoto: shouting and static, thanks, goodbye.

• READ MORE: Looking at the Physics of STOL Drag

The mountains behind us, we descend to 12,000 feet. The fuel pressure is a little steadier here, but its misbehavior has left me with a lingering distrust. We are over the headwaters of the Amazon River. I take a heading from the chart, which is now a blank interrupted only by an occasional blue line of latitude. Half an hour later, a huge, sinuous serpent of a river comes into view. It is the Marañon, but I cannot tell where along it we are.

It will be hundreds of miles before we encounter another positive landmark. Ahead of us the sky is creamy and, close to the horizon, ominously dark. I feel the quiet, suspended unease that sometimes comes upon me over ocean or forest, or in darkness over mountains in this homemade single-engine plane.

There is nothing to do but hold heading and wait. Time creeps by. The fuel tanks switch automatically every few minutes. The trees, which I can discern only with difficulty through 3 kilometers of haze, look low and flat in their billions, a dense blue-green canopy under which brilliant parrots shriek; myopic anteaters nose among rotten logs in solitary shafts of sunlight; monkeys pick lice from one another; jaguars sleep; giant blue butterflies fan their wings slowly on dripping vines; and snakes doze draped over smooth limbs. 

Perhaps the drone of our engine momentarily diverts the attention of a naked bowman. I know it’s all there. I’ve seen it in the movies. The sun disappears behind an anvil head. Soon we plunge into a wall of clouds. Rain showers clatter against the windshield. We break out, glimpse an anonymous river—is it the Urituyaco, Copalyacu, Corrientes, Tigre, Curaray or Tiputini?—and then collide with a new mountain of clouds.

In principle, we are heading almost due north and crossing a degree of latitude every 23 minutes. Each 23 minutes, therefore, I mark an estimated point on the folded chart. I suspect we may have drifted into Ecuador, but from our position the difference between Peru, where we are authorized to be, and Ecuador, where we are not, seems insignificant. We cross a big river full of silty islands: It must be the Rio Napo. We should be picking up the beacon at Tiputini, but we are not. 

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A little later the ADF suddenly wakes up and points to Limoncocha in Ecuador. A moment later it finds Tarapoa, then Puerto Asis, and I am finally able to triangulate our position: on the equator, near 76 degrees west longitude. Then, on the right, an airstrip, settlement, river fork, island. Completely unsought and unexpected, the landmark offers itself with a helpful generosity that is as touching in inanimate objects as it is in strangers. It is Putumayo. We have entered Colombia.

The sun is setting as we cross the eastern cordillera. It briefly illuminates a sublime vista of cloud, cliff, valley, and river that deserves a double-page spread in a coffee-table book of Colombian landscape. We are making a good ground speed: 180 knots. Florencia passes beneath us, Neiva, and Girardot. Chocolate pours down from the mountains as we make the long straight-in approach to Bogotá.

A few days later, at the airport, I chat with a local pilot who is there, like me, to wrestle with the bureaucratic serpent of flight authorizations. I tell him about the fuel pressure problems I had on the way from Lima.

“Oh, yeah,” he says. “High vapor pressure. As soon as I get up into the mountains, I just turn on the boost pump and leave it on. The fuel here is crap.”

This column first appeared in the July/August Issue 949 of the FLYING print edition.

The post Peruvian Excursion Provides a Lesson in High Vapor Pressure appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

This question is being asked at flight schools across the country as the CFI world and the nonaviation media are sharing the story of 36-year-old Philip Everton McPherson II, from Haddon Township, New Jersey. McPherson faces one count of involuntary manslaughter for the crash of the Piper PA-28-140 on September 28, 2022, that killed student pilot Keith Kozel, 49.

A federal grand jury indicted McPherson on August 1. He was arrested at his home on August 5.

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McPherson’s commercial and CFI certificates were surrendered to the FAA more than a year before the accident because he had failed a 44709 ride (reexamination for airman privileges).

FLYING Magazine obtained a copy of the 11-page indictment that said McPherson “acted with gross negligence because he knew that he was not competent to safely fly an aircraft as the pilot in command.” According to the indictment, his commercial pilot and instructor certificates were surrendered to the FAA in October 2021 after he failed a reexamination ride.

McPherson was employed by ProFlite Aero Services in Easton, Pennsylvania. FLYING’s attempts to contact the flight school for comment were unsuccessful. The website for the business is no longer in operation.

According to the indictment, in 2021 the FAA received a hotline complaint about McPherson’s alleged poor airmanship that included going off the runway on two different occasions while flying with a student, resulting in substantial damage to the aircraft.

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The first off-runway event was on November 18, 2020, when during the second attempt to land a Cessna 172 in a gusting crosswind the aircraft went off the side of the runway and the nosewheel failed, and the aircraft flipped onto its back. The winds near the site were reported as 13 knots gusting to 25.

The second event was on March 6, 2021, but FLYING was unable to locate the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) accident report for it.

The indictment notes the FAA made several attempts to reach McPherson—first by letter then by telephone—as part of its investigation to set up a reexamination ride. When he finally did the reexamination flight with the agency, he botched a go-around and the FAA safety inspector had to take the controls to prevent a crash, per the indictment.

After surrendering his commercial and CFI tickets, McPherson was granted a temporary certificate that allowed him to fly by himself or with another instructor in order to gain the skills necessary to regain his certifications. The temporary certificate carries the warning: “Carrying of Passengers Prohibited.”

McPherson did not request another reexamination ride, nor did he ask for an extension of the temporary certificate, which expired on November 8, 2021. But he continued to serve as a flight instructor carrying passengers.The indictment includes two pages of the initials of students and dates of flights.

He faces an additional 40 counts of serving as an airman without a certificate as he continued to fly with passengers and as an instructor between October 12, 2021, and September 2022.

The Fatal Flight

According to the NTSB, the fatal flight took off at 1:40 ET. McPherson told the agency the purpose of the flight was to go to a towered airport nearby so Kozel, the student who had 51 hours, could practice towered-airport operations.

McPherson instructed Kozel to perform a soft field takeoff. The aircraft was sluggish during the takeoff roll and had trouble obtaining airspeed. Kozel flew the airplane in ground effect trying to build up airspeed, and at least once the aircraft settled back on to the runway.

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McPherson allowed the takeoff to continue, but when the aircraft had trouble climbing above 200 feet, he took the controls. He told NTSB investigators that the engine was not producing full power, and there were trees ahead of them and no open places to land.

The Piper struck the trees and became inverted, coming down hard and catching fire. McPherson told investigators that Kozel was unresponsive after the crash. McPherson claimed he was injured but was able to drag himself away from the burning airplane. He told investigators he saw people approaching him and begged them to get Kozel out of the wreckage, but the fire was consuming the aircraft.

A witness account of the accident differs. The witness said he pulled McPherson from the wreckage and then tried to rescue Kozel, but the flames drove him back.

It should be noted that the Piper Cherokee only has a door on the right side of the fuselage. The instructor traditionally sits on the right side of the aircraft.

The NTSB ruled the cause of the accident to be a “partial loss of engine power for undetermined reasons.” The investigation noted that the weather conditions at the time were conducive to the “development of serious icing at glide power and was between the range for icing at glide and cruise power and serious icing at cruise power.”

According to the investigative docket, at the time of the accident McPherson reported having 1,350 hours total time of which 700 was in Piper Cherokees, with his last flight review or equivalent happening in March 2021. He also reported having flown 40 hours in the previous 90 days.

McPherson was arrested at his home in Allentown, Pennsylvania, on August 5. He pled not guilty to all the charges and was released the same day after posting a $50,000 bond and surrendering his passport.

If convicted he could face a maximum possible sentence of 128 years in prison and a $10.25 million fine, and a $4,100 special assessment. He has been assigned a public defender. 

According to the Office of the Inspector General, the case is being prosecuted by assistant U.S. attorney Robert Schopf and special assistant U.S. attorney Marie Miller.

The post Illegal CFI Faces Charge of Involuntary Manslaughter appeared first on FLYING Magazine.