Caravan Missing Near Nome

www.nomenugget.com

Plane missing between Unalakleet and Nome

UPDATE 8:40 p.m.: 15 searchers from the White mountain search and rescue crew are going to meet up with Nome SAR volunteers who are near mile 16/17 to make a base camp there. U.S. Coast Guard Public
www.nomenugget.com www.nomenugget.com
 
"Rescue crews searching for overdue Bering Air plane with 10 aboard"

The newscritters wanted so much for it to be Boeing...
 
The flight took off from runway 33 at UNK at 14:38 LT (23:38 UTC). It turned left and started tracking 287° over the water of Norton Sound toward OME. The aircraft climbed to a cruising altitude if about 7700 feet. The descent to OME was started at 15:11.
The last ADS-B datapoint captured by Flightradar24 was at 15:16:34 while the aircraft was descending through 5300 feet, at 38 nm from OME.
 
bonefishpete said:
The flight took off from runway 33 at UNK at 14:38 LT (23:38 UTC). It turned left and started tracking 287° over the water of Norton Sound toward OME. The aircraft climbed to a cruising altitude if about 7700 feet. The descent to OME was started at 15:11.
The last ADS-B datapoint captured by Flightradar24 was at 15:16:34 while the aircraft was descending through 5300 feet, at 38 nm from OME.
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Seems a bit early to start the descent, even for an unpressed aircraft.
 
One of my friends flew for Bering Air long time ago, when they had 206's.
 
The water is cold and very unforgiving anytime of the year. Most likely a recovery mission.

What was a single engine doing so far from gliding distance to shore.?
 
I’ve heard they had sleet and freezing rain in the area. Grim outlook but praying just the same.
 
Zeldman said:
The water is cold and very unforgiving anytime of the year. Most likely a recovery mission.

What was a single engine doing so far from gliding distance to shore.?
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In Florida they use a lot of part135 caravans to fly to the Bahamas. I believe they get FAA waiver to do so with routes of flights. Having rode on one multiple times and right behind the pilot it didn’t look like we could have made landfall engine out. Having said that I’d rather ride in a caravan any day than a clapped out C402 or Navajo.
 
Uh, doesn’t seem so!!! Arg…

7700 cruising altitude? Is that VFR northeast or southeast? That’s probably a clue…

A different flying world there.
 
bonefishpete said:
In Florida they use a lot of part135 caravans to fly to the Bahamas. I believe they get FAA waiver to do so with routes of flights. Having rode on one multiple times and right behind the pilot it didn’t look like we could have made landfall engine out. Having said that I’d rather ride in a caravan any day than a clapped out C402 or Navajo.
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Water temp is a whole lot different around the Bahamas, meaning survivable to be in for an extended time.

I believe the Caravan and the Pilatus are allowed to fly single engine IFR for paying passenger flights.

Stewartb said:
I’ve heard they had sleet and freezing rain in the area.
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This might have been the reason so far off shore, trying to fly around the weather.

Kenny Phillips said:
Because Alaska.
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Not sure I am understanding, can you expand on this.??
 
apparently Alaska flying can have some difference wrt what's allowed and what people routinely try to get away with because of bush flying...
 
Tools said:
Uh, doesn’t seem so!!! Arg…

7700 cruising altitude? Is that VFR northeast or southeast? That’s probably a clue…

A different flying world there.
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My understanding is that they were IFR.
 
Tools said:
Uh, doesn’t seem so!!! Arg…

7700 cruising altitude? Is that VFR northeast or southeast? That’s probably a clue…

A different flying world there.
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I think flying in Alaska you got everything tuned to 7700 and 121.50 yikes
 
Kenny Phillips said:
Seems a bit early to start the descent, even for an unpressed aircraft.
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Maybe, maybe not. I looked at the same airline on the same route for a few other legs, and this one didn't start down much earlier. The others were at 10 and 12,000 though. But it doesn't appear they ever turned for shore either.
Zeldman said:
I believe the Caravan and the Pilatus are allowed to fly single engine IFR for paying passenger flights.
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I don't think there's a limitation on SE IFR any more. We did it with TBMs as well.
Zeldman said:
This might have been the reason so far off shore, trying to fly around the weather.
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I'm wondering how they're not violating 135.183. It appears that they fly this route direct all the time.
Tools said:
7700 cruising altitude? Is that VFR northeast or southeast? That’s probably a clue…
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I don't know where that came from. Probably uncorrected PA. FlightAware shows them at 8,000.
 
www.adn.com

Coast Guard: No survivors in crash of Bering Air plane on ice near Nome

There were 10 people on the flight from Unalaska when the Cessna Caravan went down Thursday afternoon.
www.adn.com www.adn.com

Confirmed no survivors at this point. I’ve seen the pictures and it does not appear to be a stall/spin, at least not to me. The pictures are eerily reminiscent of the DLG PenAir accident, which was also a Caravan.
 
DavidWhite said:
www.adn.com

Coast Guard: No survivors in crash of Bering Air plane on ice near Nome

There were 10 people on the flight from Unalaska when the Cessna Caravan went down Thursday afternoon.
www.adn.com www.adn.com

Confirmed no survivors at this point. I’ve seen the pictures and it does not appear to be a stall/spin, at least not to me. The pictures are eerily reminiscent of the DLG PenAir accident, which was also a Caravan.
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Does look like a stall spin to me. Juan will better analyze it probably.
Pretty much everything right in one spot. Tail torn away.
 
bonefishpete said:
Does look like a stall spin to me. Juan will better analyze it probably.
Pretty much everything right in one spot. Tail torn away.
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Yeah I look forward to seeing what he thinks. Usually it seems like stall/spins are more vertical in their impact, the wing doesn’t really look as smashed up as I would expect in a stall/spin. To me it appears it hit nose down but not as nose down as you would expect. Tail stalls can happen in caravans super loaded up with ice, even though Cessna says they can’t.
 
Interestingly all of the accident companies Caravans are equipped with TKS and while I have never flown a TKS equipped Caravan I have heard they are substantially better in icing than the booted examples.
 
The spanwise accordion crushing of the inverted wings along with the fracture between the fuselage and empennage look like a high angle impact occurred consistent with a stall and spin.

RIP to those lost.
 
I remember the H3 being coated in ice when we got back to Sitka. Spooky
 
No idea what happened here, but icing hubris is a thing among a certain subset of the aviation community. I call it reverse Icarus. Still a corollary of FAFO, but we're splitting hairs at this point.
 
hindsight2020 said:
No idea what happened here, but icing hubris is a thing among a certain subset of the aviation community. I call it reverse Icarus. Still a corollary of FAFO, but we're splitting hairs at this point.
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Pilot medical incapacitated?
 
hindsight2020 said:
No idea what happened here, but icing hubris is a thing among a certain subset of the aviation community. I call it reverse Icarus. Still a corollary of FAFO, but we're splitting hairs at this point.
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Anyone flying a Caravan in Alaska has a very healthy respect for icing conditions. The problem is it can get so bad so fast that there really isn’t anything you can do about it except go down. I’m not sure how much ice it would take to overwhelm a TKS system but I’ve never heard of it happening. The important part being to turn on the TKS *before* you enter icing conditions.

I remember when I was flying caravans and had to do the icing course looking at the pictures that they used for “severe icing” and thinking “If that’s severe ice then I am in severe ice every day.”

Hard to explain to people who haven’t experienced it. I lost 40 knots in around a minute once, and was running 100% power on a 950hp motor going downhill at 300fpm and 115 knots with the yoke shaking in my hand due to the incipient tail stall. I had ice on the bottom of the wing all the way back to the flap tracks, and I can’t imagine the top was any different. The only thing forecast that day was light icing.

“There but for the grace of god go I.”
 
If I were to hazard a guess, I’d say that a caravan pilot in Alaska spends more time in icing conditions in one year than the vast majority of pilots do in an entire career. The problem with the caravan is you generally can’t get out of it, it’s unpressurized and can’t climb above it, and if it’s winter the freezing level is all the way to the ground so you don’t have anywhere to go.

“Just turn around” is all well and good, but if its IFR you may be talking a hundred miles between airports with suitable approaches and reporting weather in some cases, particularly in Southeast AK and up on the North Slope.

IIRC, there was an occluded front pretty much directly over Nome on the day of the accident, which means big time freezing rain and very bad ice.
 
DavidWhite said:
had to do the icing course looking at the pictures that they used for “severe icing” and thinking “If that’s severe ice then I am in severe ice every day.”
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I have iced up a 207 a few times where I could hold A/S or hold altitude, but not both at the same time.

One time in a Navajo doing the ILS into Kotz and picked up approximately 8 inches of ice on the nose cone. When it came off it could have been used for a punch bowl. Plus waves of ice running half way down the sides of the plane 2 to 4 inches thick. Definitely used up my bag of luck that day, and filled up my bag of stupid. Lesson learned, when a DC6 reports severe icing on final....BELIEVE IT.!!

One time one of the other pilots knocked the ice off his plane, put it in a glass then added rum and coke and called it a day.
 
I'm a Florida boy and I thought Icing was something that went on a cake.

But we did fly the Bonanza to Anchorage a few years ago and I think as we were approaching Slave Lake in the clouds, (IFR) we noticed Ice building up on the leading edges and then the windshield started icing. It happened pretty fast. We told ATC that we needed to descend but they said no. Something about a restricted area. We pleaded our case but they were firm and suggested we climb. Fortunately the cloud level was not too thick and when we topped the clouds into the sunshine, the ice went away almost as fast as it appeared.

I'm sure that people that live North of us, like perhaps in Georgia, would laugh at us, but it shook us up.
 
JOhnH said:
I'm a Florida boy and I thought Icing was something that went on a cake.

But we did fly the Bonanza to Anchorage a few years ago and I think as we were approaching Slave Lake in the clouds, (IFR) we noticed Ice building up on the leading edges and then the windshield started icing. It happened pretty fast. We told ATC that we needed to descend but they said no. Something about a restricted area. We pleaded our case but they were firm and suggested we climb. Fortunately the cloud level was not too thick and when we topped the clouds into the sunshine, the ice went away almost as fast as it appeared.

I'm sure that people that live North of us, like perhaps in Georgia, would laugh at us, but it shook us up.
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I, for one, would never EVER laugh at anyone that had to deal with icing.
 
First fatal for the company since 1987. It would seem that considering the environment and the light aircraft used, that's a pretty good record.
 
I thought the thread said missing near Home. Sad to hear this, RIP.
 
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