0 time passenger lands plane (Cessna Caravan)

No one is saying it isn't a great thing that the passenger landed the plane. No one is saying it isn’t a great thing that the pilot survived the ordeal. And the majority of us knows that flying isn’t anything special that the average person can’t do.

What some of us are saying is, there’s a good chance the media is misrepresenting this guy because everyone likes stories that are too good to be true. It’s like when they say a pilot avoids a populated area in a crash to save lives on the ground. We’d all like to believe that but in most cases, the aircraft decides where it’s going to end up.

If there are those that believe this guy had never touched the controls of the Caravan before and God truly did guide his actions that day, great that’s what you believe. I’m not going to criticize your opinion. Usually though there are more logical explanations for events like this.
 
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I don’t care how good this zero-hero is to land a Caravan. He *NEVER* could have pulled this same scenario off in a 150. ;)
 
Whitney said:
Why would it matter if the guy had flown something before, or not? Mentioned that he had a flooring store, or not?
That doesn't take away at all from the great job he did landing the plane.
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Yes he did. What I’m going to say next is based on that he was not just any ol’ passenger that did this remarkable thing. I am convinced that he had a whole lot more experience in the cockpit of a plane including maybe some time at the controls, than just any ol’ passenger. But not once in that interview did he say anything about that. Like he didn’t want to take an edge off of the fame he was enjoying. I just don’t like people like that. I may be wrong. Yeah, I’ve come to a conclusion without proof. I can’t ‘prove’ the sun is going to come up to tomorrow. But it is. And this wasn’t this guys first rodeo in a cockpit.

EDIT: More I think about this, it was a talk show interview. And ewspaper articles. Maybe he told the reporters/interviewers and they didn't like it because it didn't make for the story line they wanted so it got edited out. I dunno
 
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Albany Tom said:
The news never gets things 100% right. Mostly, they don't even get things even close. And I'm not speaking from a conservative/liberal perspective, I'm just talking about basic simple facts. The times when I've been involved in local stories that went national, where I was involved with the people doing whatever work was newsworthy, the news people mostly got it wrong. It's just what they do. Hell, in emergency response, the first responders usually get the initial facts wrong. The difference is, police and fire know this, and they'll send corrected reports along as the facts develop. So who cares about what the reports are vs the time spent flying.

What I'm pretty sure of - pilot didn't stage having his aorta separate, or whatever happens in that situation. Betting he'd have liked to avoid that. Also pretty sure that the controller/CFI that talked him down did a great job. The only video I've watched on any of this was Juan's interview of the controller, and that was pretty cool.

I think the news people built up the guy who landed the plane as a hero. That's not such a bad thing, who cares. Having a little bit of flight experience and landing a caravan is an achievement. Not stalling it on those turns isn't bad, either. All turned out great. As to knowing about stalls, all you have to do is watch a bunch of aviation videos, or talk about flight risk with a pilot to know about that.

News people are just entertainers. They entertain. Like musicians, except without skills, purpose, or character. Don't let them wind you up.
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if liar, liar pants on fire was true - watching the news would be more entertaining
 
Who has more credibility: Darren Harrison or Dan Gryder?
 
I recall Darren saying something to the effect that he had to be careful pulling out of the dive in order to avoid stalling or overstressing the wings. That didn't sound to me like he was pretending to know less than he did.
 
Palmpilot said:
I recall Darren saying something to the effect that he had to be careful pulling out of the dive in order to avoid stalling or overstressing the wings. That didn't sound to me like he was pretending to know less than he did.
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Lemme know if you hear him correcting someone when they make the "no flight experience" statement.
 
Palmpilot said:
I recall Darren saying something to the effect that he had to be careful pulling out of the dive in order to avoid stalling or overstressing the wings. That didn't sound to me like he was pretending to know less than he did.
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Salty said:
Lemme know if you hear him correcting someone when they make the "no flight experience" statement.
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If I might suggest a look from another angle… I knew things like that a very, very long time before I ever took a flight lesson or touched the controls of a full sized airplane. Dad and I flew RC airplanes, mostly of his own design, the whole time I was in junior high and high school. We have flight simulators that anyone can play with, and there’s this wonderful thing called the Internet where you can learn all sorts of wonderful things without ever leaving a trail of “evidence” like diplomas or pilot certificates.

Would you fault the guy for claiming no flight experience, or not disputing those who said he had none, if he’d just studied enough basic aeronautics to understand things like not shedding the wings as you pull out of a dive? I wouldn’t.
 
DaleB said:
If I might suggest a look from another angle… I knew things like that a very, very long time before I ever took a flight lesson or touched the controls of a full sized airplane. Dad and I flew RC airplanes, mostly of his own design, the whole time I was in junior high and high school. We have flight simulators that anyone can play with, and there’s this wonderful thing called the Internet where you can learn all sorts of wonderful things without ever leaving a trail of “evidence” like diplomas or pilot certificates.

Would you fault the guy for claiming no flight experience, or not disputing those who said he had none, if he’d just studied enough basic aeronautics to understand things like not shedding the wings as you pull out of a dive? I wouldn’t.
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He was friends with the aircraft owner and flew with him many times over many years....
 
Maybe someone told him when they let him fly that he couldn't tell anyone because he doesn't have a student certificate, the pilot is not a CFI or something along those lines. So he's just trying to protect his friends.
 
donjohnston said:
Maybe someone told him when they let him fly that he couldn't tell anyone because he doesn't have a student certificate, the pilot is not a CFI or something along those lines. So he's just trying to protect his friends.
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I think that’s a stretch, but I’m willing to give him that one. Nice job.
 
This guy should fry.

He wasn’t even qualified to act as PIC, yet exercised PIC authority. He obviously manipulated the controls of aircraft he was not qualified to operate, and in promoting his business in the interviews he is obviously receiving compensation from this act of aerial malfeasance while transporting paying passengers without a valid certificate to do so. And we haven’t even begun to look at all the possible shades of a 134.5 operation here.

I’m not quite sure I want to even delve into whether or not the Air traffic controller was qualified to provide instruction in the aircraft in particular, endorsed his student’s logbook appropriately, or violated some type of union or government work rule while he was moonlighting as an instructor in a complex turbine aircraft.

I want some butts and I want them now.
 
donjohnston said:
Maybe someone told him when they let him fly that he couldn't tell anyone because he doesn't have a student certificate, the pilot is not a CFI or something along those lines. So he's just trying to protect his friends.
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Maybe. Or that insurance would void the coverage if he were allowed to fly.
 
TCABM said:
This guy should fry.

He wasn’t even qualified to act as PIC, yet exercised PIC authority. He obviously manipulated the controls of aircraft he was not qualified to operate, and in promoting his business in the interviews he is obviously receiving compensation from this act of aerial malfeasance while transporting paying passengers without a valid certificate to do so. And we haven’t even begun to look at all the possible shades of a 134.5 operation here.

I’m not quite sure I want to even delve into whether or not the Air traffic controller was qualified to provide instruction in the aircraft in particular, endorsed his student’s logbook appropriately, or violated some type of union or government work rule while he was moonlighting as an instructor in a complex turbine aircraft.

I want some butts and I want them now.
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Good points. Sure hope the guy filed a NASA report.
 
TCABM said:
This guy should fry.

He wasn’t even qualified to act as PIC, yet exercised PIC authority. He obviously manipulated the controls of aircraft he was not qualified to operate, and in promoting his business in the interviews he is obviously receiving compensation from this act of aerial malfeasance while transporting paying passengers without a valid certificate to do so. And we haven’t even begun to look at all the possible shades of a 134.5 operation here.

I’m not quite sure I want to even delve into whether or not the Air traffic controller was qualified to provide instruction in the aircraft in particular, endorsed his student’s logbook appropriately, or violated some type of union or government work rule while he was moonlighting as an instructor in a complex turbine aircraft.

I want some butts and I want them now.
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I think we might be looking at 134.5 duty day limits exceeded as well.
 
donjohnston said:
Maybe someone told him when they let him fly that he couldn't tell anyone because he doesn't have a student certificate, the pilot is not a CFI or something along those lines. So he's just trying to protect his friends.
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You and Half Fast (insuror caution) beat me to it by an hour on a couple points, and congratulations for cracking the case. What I will add is the man's obvious discomfort with being interviewed in general. Plus a disinterest in flying lessons he stated with emphasis. Finally, if you listen to the complete voice tapes of his initial encounter with tower, it's obvious he has no formal training. That was no contrived scenario YouTube style. The pilot suffered a nearly life ending medical event. No rehearsal, no nothing.

What you hear on those ATC tapes is real-time truth coming out. https://www.liveatc.net/recordings.php (sorry, I'll have to look up date/time again). Controller tells him to set transponder to 7700 and ident. Passenger says 'iwhat?' About 4 minutes in he says 'got the coast in my headlights.' Said a couple minutes later, 'I don't know how to do anything.' That's the only exaggeration.
 
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Piperonca said:
You and Half Fast (insuror caution) beat me to it by an hour on a couple points, and congratulations for cracking the case. What I will add is the man's obvious discomfort with being interviewed in general. Plus a disinterest in flying lessons he stated with emphasis. Finally, if you listen to the complete voice tapes of his initial encounter with tower, it's obvious he has no formal training. That was no contrived scenario YouTube style. The pilot suffered a nearly life ending medical event. No rehearsal, no nothing.

What you hear on those ATC tapes is real-time truth coming out. https://www.liveatc.net/recordings.php (sorry, I'll have to look up date/time again). Controller tells him to set transponder to 7700 and ident. Passenger says 'iwhat?' About 4 minutes in he says 'got the coast in my headlights.' Said a couple minutes later, 'I don't know how to do anything.' That's the only exaggeration.
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From what I heard he probably didn’t know how to navigate to the best place in the emergency. I think that’s a fair exaggeration considering the circumstances.
I think he knew how to make the plane do stuff, but he didn’t necessarily know what he should be making it do.
 
Salty said:
Lemme know if you hear him correcting someone when they make the "no flight experience" statement.
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If I were in his shoes, and if someone said that during an interview, I doubt that I would consider it important enough to nit-pick them on it.
 
I think Darren needs to heed the advice in that song about Lawyers, Guns and Money. Change my mind.
 
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Salty said:
From what I heard he probably didn’t know how to navigate to the best place in the emergency. I think that’s a fair exaggeration considering the circumstances.
I think he knew how to make the plane do stuff, but he didn’t necessarily know what he should be making it do.
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"I don't know how to do anything" was clearly an expression of fear and frustration. My comment on exaggeration was a play on words that seems to have missed the mark.
 
Salty said:
Lemme know if you hear him correcting someone when they make the "no flight experience" statement.
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Yeah. But if the Media wants to play the sensational hero passenger saves the day angle, we probably won’t hear it from them. Who knows, maybe he did and the editors and producers said cut that piece out. Maybe.
 
Salty said:
I think that’s a stretch, but I’m willing to give him that one. Nice job.
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What do you think is a stretch?

That someone would tell the non-pilot not tell that they flew a plane when they weren't supposed to? Or that they actually did as requested?
 
donjohnston said:
What do you think is a stretch?

That someone would tell the non-pilot not tell that they flew a plane when they weren't supposed to? Or that they actually did as requested?
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Doesn't matter. I like that you came up with a way I can look at it positively and I'm accepting it. I'm a skeptic by nature, but I like thinking the best of people whenever I can.
 
Even after TCABM’s brilliant post laying out the transgressions in detail and recommended corrective action, I still feel like there’s at least another layer to this onion.
 
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Eq9r-gYW8AAjIsL


“Suddenly, amidst all the confusion, Fifi seized the controls and saved the day.”

If Fifi can do it, then Darren should have been able to do it...
 
donjohnston said:
Maybe someone told him when they let him fly that he couldn't tell anyone because he doesn't have a student certificate, the pilot is not a CFI or something along those lines. So he's just trying to protect his friends.
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I'm not clear that any regs would be violated in that scenario.
 
Lindberg said:
It seems like some of y'all are really worried that people will come away with the impression that what we do is easy, anyone can do it, and we're not amazing sky gods.
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Umm, we're not?
 
Palmpilot said:
I'm not clear that any regs would be violated in that scenario.
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It wasn’t a 135 flight so there wouldn’t be any. But, due to someone else’s ignorance, they might have told Darren that’s it’s not allowed. A stretch but possible.
 
If the plane had crashed, it would be a 1 page thread, and some saying RIP.
Because the guy did amazing and saved it, we have 5 pages of some people saying 'well he probably touched the controls of a plane before'.
Who cares, he saved the plane, and 3 lives.
He did great, as did the controller, and both are heroes IMHO.
 
Whitney said:
If the plane had crashed, it would be a 1 page thread, and some saying RIP.
Because the guy did amazing and saved it, we have 5 pages of some people saying 'well he probably touched the controls of a plane before'.
Who cares, he saved the plane, and 3 lives.
He did great, as did the controller, and both are heroes IMHO.
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Those same critics are the ones that get bent out of shape when a blade of grass in their front yard is at 89° rather than 90°. It’s humorous really
 
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