C177 down Whidbey Island (W10)

RyanShort1 said:
BRS doesn't save everybody. The BRS dragged a Pipistrel through fences in high winds and killed one of the pilots after being on the ground... lot's wrong on this flight, but it CAN put you in a tough spot.

https://generalaviationnews.com/2015/06/15/wrong-poh-fuel-exhaustion-bring-down-pipistrel/
Click to expand...

Please read your source before you spread misinformation: "The pilots attempted to deploy the ballistic parachute just before the forced landing, however, due to the low altitude, it did not fully deploy."
 
MountainDude said:
Please read your source before you spread misinformation: "The pilots attempted to deploy the ballistic parachute just before the forced landing, however, due to the low altitude, it did not fully deploy."
Click to expand...
Did you read the commercial pilot's statement included in the NTSB report referenced by Ryan? Here's an excerpt: "...When the plane came to a halt, I made my move to get out. I told him to get out with me as I unbuckled my seatbelt and opened my door. As I began to throw my body out the side, the plane jerked back and whipped me out. The plane rolled over my body and lifted enough to avoid crushing my head. I again passed out. When I came back, I could still hear the crashing of the plane and could see the parachute. I found my way to my feet and I followed the noise and trail of debris. The plane traveled 1. 7 miles when it got stuck on a barbwired fence, with Don still in it." The parachute did drag the plane and ended up in a barbed wire fence. The terrain wasn't too bad and they both might have survived a forced landing if they hadn't pulled the chute or they both might have survived if they had pulled the chute earlier. I'm not a soothsayer but I agree with Ryan on this one--BRS can be a lifesaver but it isn't a substitute for good ADM.
 
MountainDude said:
Please read your source before you spread misinformation: "The pilots attempted to deploy the ballistic parachute just before the forced landing, however, due to the low altitude, it did not fully deploy."
Click to expand...
I know somebody who was particularly knowledgeable with what happened NTSB report or not. I was also flying a Pipistrel with that individual, and was additionally flying another BRS equipped aircraft (An Apollo Fox) down at 5C1 and we had several discussions about our particular BRS deployment perimeters as a result of that accident. If it's high surface winds and I still have control of an SLSA, I would probably take my chances with a landing into the wind... you still need good judgement.
 
Of course you need good judgment, and of course a BRS is not a substitute for ADM.
However, these two pilots would very likely be alive today if their plane had BRS.
 
MountainDude said:
Of course you need good judgment, and of course a BRS is not a substitute for ADM.
However, these two pilots would very likely be alive today if their plane had BRS.
Click to expand...
I'm generally a fan. When I had access to the light sport plane equipped with BRS, I found myself taking students on night flights in that aircraft even if we had access to a 172, because I felt it gave us more options in the Texas Hill Country. I'm no BRS hater, trust me.
 
Dan Thomas said:
We can install any number of "lifesaving" devices, all at great expense and loss of useful load. Or we can beef up the training to where it should be, and eliminate about 90% of the accident factors altogether. If (IF) this was a carb ice event, it's an example of poor training or absorbtion of the material. Carb ice has been examined at great length and found to be the most common cause of engine failure, by a wide margin. Engines very seldom catastrophically crater.
Click to expand...

Was flying under the hood over Wyoming once and experienced a drop of rpm and obvious engine roughness. Gave the controls over to my safety pilot and we worked the problem. Carb heat was the first thought and action, including experimenting with some altitude deviations and other in-cockpit checks. In retrospect we felt we did experience carb ice. Definitely a learning experience.
 
RyanShort1 said:
I'm generally a fan. When I had access to the light sport plane equipped with BRS, I found myself taking students on night flights in that aircraft even if we had access to a 172, because I felt it gave us more options in the Texas Hill Country. I'm no BRS hater, trust me.
Click to expand...
Just curious. Do the BRS installed in aircraft have a way of disconnecting the parachute harness from the cockpit once on the ground to prevent getting dragged? In the F-111 we had a number of handles that needed to be pulled once on the ground and one of them blew the bolts connecting the harness.
 
Witmo said:
Just curious. Do the BRS installed in aircraft have a way of disconnecting the parachute harness from the cockpit once on the ground to prevent getting dragged?
Click to expand...

No.
 
Witmo said:
Just curious. Do the BRS installed in aircraft have a way of disconnecting the parachute harness from the cockpit once on the ground to prevent getting dragged? In the F-111 we had a number of handles that needed to be pulled once on the ground and one of them blew the bolts connecting the harness.
Click to expand...
No. A recent Cirrus pull has brought this up: some sort of cord-cutter to prevent dragging could be useful if it can be 100% failsafe locked out.
 
A bit more on this crash, from Frederick Lundahl at Cardinal Flyers Organization Community (members only):

"My flying student was just putting away our a/c and witnessed the accident happen 100 yds from where he was standing. We had been with this aircraft in Bellingham 30-40 minutes earlier. We flew VFR direct back to W-10 our home base while Josh and Carl filed IFR back to Boeing Field in their club Cardinal. We learned later that they reported engine trouble and declared an emergency. A witness on the ground further north heard loud backfiring and saw the a/c descending. W-10 is hard to find at the best of times and they approached the north-south runway from the west where the airfield is invisible until you are over it. By the time my student saw the aircraft pass over at low level, the prop was unfeathered and stopped. Seeing the airstrip perhaps for the first time, they made one 180 degree turn to come back over the field and then attempted one last 90 degree turn to line up with the runway. It was this last steep turn at very low level that caused the fatal stall. Sadly they passed over plenty of possible emergency landing sites along the way. We suspect they may have hit “nearest” on their GPS which would give them a track to the middle of W-10 and which, with everything else happening, focused them on seeking out a difficult to find airport they were unfamiliar with, rather than choosing an off airport option."

and

"Was Good VFR below the overcast layer except for that pesky mist developing right over our hard-to-spot airport. Sad they passed up so many off airport emergency landing sites in their determination to reach W-10. Maybe they were victims of their navigator’s “nearest” button.
Pretty clear that the engine problem was not icing but maybe internal bearing or crankshaft failure. The prop was totally stopped and didn’t even move with the impact. Pulled out of the ground by NTSB, the blade that didn’t break off at impact was completely undamaged. And there was no visible damage to the cylinders or rocker arm covers. The wreckage is now down in Auburn for the investigation."
 
Hello all, sorry to revive this thread, but I only recently found out about this accident. I briefly knew one of the pilots involved (the younger CFI) and was very surprised to hear about what happened. Given the relatively small scale of the accident I unsurprisingly found little meaningful information beyond radar tracks and what info was contained in the initial NTSB report. I did, however, manage to get hold of most of the ATC audio. I've transcribed it below:

Accuracy is to the best of my ability
Bold/underlined numbers are zulu time
Tildes represent garbled, unintelligible or cut-off audio
ATC communications regular text
Aircraft communications right-aligned and underlined.
Parentheses represent words uncertain if correct

1937.20

[Aircraft audio not recorded at this point]

~~~ is that correct?

There is an airport at your eleven o'clock, eleven to ten o'clock and five miles, it's Langley airport. It's about twenty-five hundred feet by twenty-five and it's asphalt at eleven o'clock and five miles.

~~~ Whiskey Ten airport

Six-three-three how about a heading of one-zero-zero if you're able, heading one-zero-zero. And are you currently VMC as well?

Six-three-three copy that, I caught some of that but I do understand that you are trying to hold your altitude and Eastbound. Eastbound about one o'clock and about five miles.

Six-three-three, you think you can make it to Payne airport? One o'clock and about twelve miles.

November six-three-three, do you have your carb heat on?

Six-three-three, roger. Do you want to try for Payne, or do you want to circle around and keep Langley in sight? It's about eleven-thirty or so and four miles.

Six-three-three, how about Langley? It's 1130 and four miles, Payne is exactly about twelve miles-12 o'clock and ten miles.

Six-three-three, approach.

Cardinal Six-three-three, approach.

Cardinal ~~~

1941.31

Seattle Approach, Cardinal three-four-six-three-three, we were on another frequency, we're a little low to pick them up, we are declaring an emergency. I don't know if we'll be making Payne with no engine at two-thousand-seven-hundred so I am going to try for Whidbey, err-Whiskey Ten.​

I hear you loud and clear how do you hear me?


Loud and clear on this frequency, six-three-three.​

-o'clock and two miles, there's an airplane in between you and Langley. It's about one mile, one-thousand-four-hundred, do you have that airport (sic) in sight?

I have the airport, err, I have the plane that looks like is lined up for Langley, so I'm going to try and make it that direction.​

​

~~is, Payne, six-three-three?​

November six-three-three, directly off your left, Langley airport off your left, one mile.

November six-three-three, approach.

Approach, I'm diverting, we're gonna go off airport.​

​

Negative, contact. I got Langley in sight, we're going for the airport.​

November six-three-three, approach.

Six-three-three, Langley is in sight, approach, six-three-three has Langley in sight.​

Six-three-three, thank you. Roger, there's no other traffic observed and you can change your (mic?), frequency change approved.

1944.11: [brief transmitted sound (metallic?)]

November six-three-three.
Click to expand...

There is one other thing I would also bring to this discussion. As I understand it the CFI was trained through ATP. To the best of my knowledge, during ATP training students are restricted to a minimum runway length of 4,000 feet for insurance purposes. Every airport I've seen with 4,000 feet of runway is at least 100 feet wide, sometimes double that. W10 is 25 feet wide and surrounded on all sides by 100+ foot trees.

During one discussion I had with the CFI in Spring 2020 (prior to him completing that portion of his training), I mentioned that me and my girlfriend enjoyed flying into W10. I cannot remember his exact reaction, he seemed quite intimidated by the prospect himself. While I have no detailed knowledge of his activities between then and the accident date, and while at the time of the accident he had many more hours than I have now, I personally doubt that he had much prior experience flying into W10. It is not an easy airport to find even when you know where it is, and under an emergency situation with no engine placing yourself in a favorable landing position would be extremely difficult.
 
Last edited:
@NoshurViverse Firstly, thanks for digging up and transcribing the recordings. It is a real pity that he did not continue to land off airport. My understanding is that there were quite a few decent fields to land in along his course of flight.

Early in my training I read Rick Durden's article "Judgement and Survival 501" with its section on Precautionary Landings and the story he tells there. I imagine ATP likely does not do much with precautionary landings. Some training in a glider definitely makes you less afraid of landing either without power or off the airport.
 
From the FlightAware playback, it appears they were about the same distance from Port Townsend (0S9) when their altitude and ground speed started dropping, and it looks like that one would have been easier to get into.
 
Palmpilot said:
From the FlightAware playback, it appears they were about the same distance from Port Townsend (0S9) when their altitude and ground speed started dropping, and it looks like that one would have been easier to get into.
Click to expand...
Not familiar with the particulars, but Whitbey Island is, well, an island. From the Flightaware track, it looks like they were following the west coast of Whitbey. They'd have had to cross a strip of Puget Sound to get to Port Townsend. Myself, I'd minimize flying over water with a dicky engine, even if it is just "a few miles."

Ron Wanttaja
 
wanttaja said:
Not familiar with the particulars, but Whitbey Island is, well, an island. From the Flightaware track, it looks like they were following the west coast of Whitbey. They'd have had to cross a strip of Puget Sound to get to Port Townsend. Myself, I'd minimize flying over water with a dicky engine, even if it is just "a few miles."

Ron Wanttaja
Click to expand...
Whidbey.

I'm not saying it would have been an easy decision.

They were at about 6700 MSL when they started losing airspeed, and only about three nm from the west shore of Admiralty Inlet. They were about eight nm from each airport, but 0S9 would have had the runway lined up with their direct course to it, and a much larger area cleared of trees than I remember at W10. They would probably have needed to make the turn as soon as the airspeed started dropping though, because by the time they altered course, 0S9 was already 50% farther than W10. They also would have needed to know the obstacle and weather environments around both airports, and the winds aloft. Not much time to gather information and make a difficult choice.

I haven't seen any mention of whether they had a GPS on board. An immediate list of nearest airports could have revealed their options more quickly than talking to ATC.
 
Palmpilot said:
Whidbey.

I'm not saying it would have been an easy decision.
They were at about 6700 MSL when they started losing airspeed, and only about three nm from the west shore of Admiralty Inlet. They were about eight nm from each airport, but 0S9 would have had the runway lined up with their direct course to it, and a much larger area cleared of trees than I remember at W10. They would probably have needed to make the turn as soon as the airspeed started dropping though, because by the time they altered course, 0S9 as already 50% farther than W10. They also would have needed to know the obstacle and weather environments around both airports, and the winds aloft. Not much time to gather information and make a difficult choice.
I haven't seen any mention of whether they had a GPS on board. An immediate list of nearest airports could have revealed their options more quickly than talking to ATC.
Click to expand...

Another note of psychology:

If you're out of Boeing Field, your mental picture is running north and south in your flight planning, rather than east-west. Like Ron said, Puget Sound is not an option. We lost a C170 coming down from Alaska in it this year too. I agree with the lack of sight picture as they came upon the field and the low level maneuvering to save the plane and line up. They had a better chance without the last turn - to simply put it into the tree tops. No altitude, no speed and steep bank vs. going into the trees. But who are we to say what the final few seconds of thinking are. You don't have a pause and think it over switch. The brain gets fixed on a certain option and you are locked into a follow it through mode. I think you could probably even have a better chance going into the rocky shoreline of the sound or lining up 10 feet off shore. The insurance company owns the plane at this point anyway.
 
Waaay back in the day when I was learning to fly, I was taking instruction (7EC Champ) in an area where carb icing was common. On one of my early dual flights, my instructor had me take us up above a solid overcast for some air work. After completing the air work, I reduced power (once again forgetting the carb heat), and we descended below the overcast for some touch and goes. As we leveled off below the clouds, I pushed the throttle up, but the engine didn't respond as expected, and, not knowing what to do, I looked back at my instructor who pointedly and loudly suggested: "Carb heat". Of course the melting ice made the engine sound and act like it had swallowed a valve, and my first reaction was to remove the carb heat; however my instructor was expecting that and firmly said: "Leave it!" ... which I meekly did. The engine soon consumed all of the water from the melted ice and resumed its smooth running, but I was still in a sweat from thinking that the engine had eaten itself and we were doomed to an off-field landing. Needless to say, the lesson penetrated my hard head, and I never neglected the carb heat again. That's the problem: If you apply carb heat after ice begins to form, it seems like you've done something to destroy your trusty engine, and it can take quite a bit of discipline to keep the heat on until the engine clears.

Anyway, that's my rather dim recollection of events from "long ago and far away".

Cheers,
Grog
 
Capngrog said:
Waaay back in the day when I was learning to fly, I was taking instruction (7EC Champ) in an area where carb icing was common. On one of my early dual flights, my instructor had me take us up above a solid overcast for some air work. After completing the air work, I reduced power (once again forgetting the carb heat), and we descended below the overcast for some touch and goes. As we leveled off below the clouds, I pushed the throttle up, but the engine didn't respond as expected, and, not knowing what to do, I looked back at my instructor who pointedly and loudly suggested: "Carb heat". Of course the melting ice made the engine sound and act like it had swallowed a valve, and my first reaction was to remove the carb heat; however my instructor was expecting that and firmly said: "Leave it!" ... which I meekly did. The engine soon consumed all of the water from the melted ice and resumed its smooth running, but I was still in a sweat from thinking that the engine had eaten itself and we were doomed to an off-field landing.
Click to expand...
If you had been a little longer without the carb heat, you likely would have had a forced landing. The carb heat comes off the exhaust system, and that system gets cold quickly when carb ice shuts off the airflow though the carb and the engine stops firing. Exhaust component in an airplane are made of really thin stuff to save weight. They don't store heat well at all.
 
Dan Thomas said:
If you had been a little longer without the carb heat, you likely would have had a forced landing. The carb heat comes off the exhaust system, and that system gets cold quickly when carb ice shuts off the airflow though the carb and the engine stops firing. Exhaust component in an airplane are made of really thin stuff to save weight. They don't store heat well at all.
Click to expand...
Most airplanes with bad carb icing make a point in the POH to list an RPM below which carb heat is “strongly” recommended every time you reduce power. It becomes habit to always pull the knob and leave it on below 2100 (C150).
 
Matthew Rogers said:
Most airplanes with bad carb icing make a point in the POH to list an RPM below which carb heat is “strongly” recommended every time you reduce power. It becomes habit to always pull the knob and leave it on below 2100 (C150).
Click to expand...
Yup. The small Continentals are bad for carb ice. The Lycomings, such as the one in the 177, aren't as bad but Cessna still recommends carb heat on reduced power. I've had ice in cruise in a 172, on a nice day. Piper had Lycomings in their Cherokees but they didn't have the same carb heat recommendation; something about the installation seemed to lower the icing risk. We had a Citabria 7GCBC, 150-hp Lyc, and it would ice up in a heartbeat. It was as bad as a Continental.
Carb ice is a problem because it's not well-understood by many pilots, and they didn't get it because their instructors often didn't understand it. And for training, it's nearly impossible to simulate it or to get it to happen when you want it to.

Car manufacturers dealt with it in various ways. For about 30 years before fuel injection took over, they had a thermostatic valve in the air cleaner that modulated a vacuum-driven valve that let warmed air from around the exhaust manifold into the air cleaner, keeping the air at a steady 70°F or so. The carb was also mounted on the intake manifold, which had either contact with the exhaust manifold, or had exhaust channels through it to warm it. But such measures cost power by reducing the air density and therefore oxygen. Can't have that in an airplane.
 
Funny you should mention Carb Ice and cars... If I can remember from 1990... I was going on the freeway one day north of Seattle and I had a Honda Civic lose power and start to stumble. I pulled off to a library parking lot and waited for a while and it ran fine. Carb ice was the probable cause, I found a little hose to the air cleaner from the exhaust manifold was off the inlet. Apparently they had hot air being fed into the air cleaner a lot to solve the issue and the weather was just right for that.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top