Cessna 172 fatal plane crash in SE Michigan

4 adults in a 172? Wow. Definitely should of done a w&b. we can be our own worst enemies. 10 minutes of work and he would still be alive.
 
It happens every year, every summer. Over and over and over.
 
it would be interesting to see what the weight of the 4 people on board was. I certainly am aware that a 172 can fly in some situations if you take off above gross weight. I wonder if in the rush to get back to the airport that the oft talked about stall from overbanking came into play.
 
tangopapa said:
http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/small-plane-crash-kills-se-michigan-airport-19459211#.UcVXCeuE7n4

Sad to say, a simple weight and balance would have likely saved their lives.
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I know many pilots who insist it's safe to launch when "a little" over the limit. If that was the culture at KPTK, the pilot may well have performed a weight and balance calculation, but decided to take off despite the excess weight because he wanted to include his whole family in the flight. That would explain his immediate assuredness, expressed in his radio transmission, that the plane's difficulty was due to being overweight.
 
With today's heavier passengers I don't know why they even have 4 seats in a 172. :dunno:
 
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When my wife and I were dating I was about 160 pounds and she was about 125 pounds. In those days 4 in a 172 wasn't such a challenging thing to do. Both my wife and I have gotten bigger!
 
Warrior said:
it would be interesting to see what the weight of the 4 people on board was. I certainly am aware that a 172 can fly in some situations if you take off above gross weight. I wonder if in the rush to get back to the airport that the oft talked about stall from overbanking came into play.
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If the initial report is true that they only got 100' AGL is true, I'd say they were very overweight.

Reminds me of a thread here not too long ago that had some pretty cavalier attitudes about flying over gross.

Very sad. I heard on another forum that the pilot (19) was supposed to start at USNA in the fall.
 
One important consideration is that when a plane is over its weight limit, its stall speed is higher than what the POH and the airspeed indicator specify. The pilot may have failed to take that factor into account.
 
Fearless Tower said:
If the initial report is true that they only got 100' AGL is true, I'd say they were very overweight.

Reminds me of a thread here not too long ago that had some pretty cavalier attitudes about flying over gross.

Very sad. I heard on another forum that the pilot (19) was supposed to start at USNA in the fall.
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Good point about the cavalier attitude about being overgross. My dad, who was a Pan Am pilot, thought it was ok for me to take off 100 pounds overweight in the Cessna 172. In my old age many years distant from that opinion I am careful about the weight. I was flying in the spring in Florida and the Bahamas, flying out of long runways, and was careful to account for that higher stall speed and had no problems.

My dad was a very careful pilot, managed to fly 35 years for the airline without making headlines. But that cavalier attitude about the gross weight in the 172 was present.
 
Weight alone isn't a big deal. CG is the killer.

acrophile said:
One important consideration is that when a plane is over its weight limit, its stall speed is higher than what the POH and the airspeed indicator specify. The pilot may have failed to take that factor into account.
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wabower said:
Weight alone isn't a big deal. CG is the killer.
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It's also dependent upon the plane. Some planes (like some 182s) don't even notice it when they are a hundred or two pounds overweight. Others are far more sensitive.

Not that I'd advocate flying over...
 
Of course there's some safety margin built into a plane's gross-weight limit. But it's a bad idea to discard a (required) safety margin. There are many factors that could already be cutting into the margin:

  • Passengers' weight may not be recently measured and accurately, honestly reported. Among four people, that could add up to a 20-40 lb. discrepancy.
  • Passengers may not be including the weight of their clothes and possessions--another 10-20 lbs.
  • The FBO may keep 10-20 lbs. of stuff in the baggage compartment (spare oil, tow bar, stepladder, cover, etc.).
  • The plane and its engine probably aren't new. Sub-optimal performance can decrease the plane's capacity below the nominal maximum gross weight.
 
acrophile said:
Of course there's some safety margin built into a plane's gross-weight limit. But it's a bad idea to discard a (required) safety margin. There are many factors that could already be cutting into the margin:

  • Passengers' weight may not be recently measured and accurately, honestly reported. Among four people, that could add up to a 20-40 lb. discrepancy.
  • Passengers may not be including the weight of their clothes and possessions--another 10-20 lbs.
  • The FBO may keep 10-20 lbs. of stuff in the baggage compartment (spare oil, tow bar, stepladder, cover, etc.).
  • The plane and its engine probably aren't new. Sub-optimal performance can decrease the plane's capacity below the nominal maximum gross weight.
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Couldn't CG be screwed up just because the passenger's seat assignments change, especially when you're close to maximum gtw? Senseless loss of life.
 
It will be interesting to see what the actual combined weight was of all the victims .... The airport must be around 300msl or so and with 5600 feet of runway any decent pilot should have been able to milk it into the air and return safely.....:(

Edit.......... Possible engine problem adds a fatal ending...
 
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Lets not forget that our aircraft get fat too. Over the years aircraft get heavier with discarded wires, a little left over oil or grease. It may only be 20# or so but it all counts. I have heard many including myself state "I don't want my aircraft weighed because I know I will loose useful load when I do". The fact is that we probably already have, we just don't want it written on paper.

Sad ending to a promising life, and the lives of his loved ones.
 
Information I have from witnesses.

Inexperienced, newly minted pilot.
Four on board; full fuel.
Density altitude a bit over 2500. Field elevation 980.
Possible engine problem sound as related by an experienced IA.
Attempted U-turn at low altitude.
Plane stalled ?? feet AGL and pancaked in.
Fire did not start till after the crash.
 
100 feet agl
turn back to the airport
three adult men, one adult woman, C-172
1:40 pm (warmest time of day)
 
I had 4 people in my 172 on several occasions and was never "above the limit" some of the Air Plains conversions have a 1,000+ pound useful load. Lets not rush to judgement so quick.
 
DavidWhite said:
I had 4 people in my 172 on several occasions and was never "above the limit" some of the Air Plains conversions have a 1,000+ pound useful load. Lets not rush to judgement so quick.
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The conclusion that the plane was overweight isn't based solely on having four adults in a 172. It's also what the pilot himself attributed the plane's difficulty to, in his final radio transmission. Hence the speculation that he'd done the calculation and knew he was taking off while over the limit.
 
acrophile said:
The conclusion that the plane was overweight isn't based solely on having four adults in a 172. It's also what the pilot himself attributed the plane's difficulty to, in his final radio transmission. Hence the speculation that he'd done the calculation and knew he was taking off while over the limit.
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Or perhaps in his greenness had never flown the plane at gross and THOUGHT he was over weight. 172 doesn't fly the same at gross.
 
Just a quick word on gross weight, for your consideration

GW is a complicated thing, dealing with structure and performacne in various configurations. An over simplicated example is that a 180hp engine doesn't up the gross on a 172, but restricting the flap travel to 30 degrees in addition to the extra ponies can.

Or on some models of 182 the take off weight can be upped 150lbs with a paper only STC.

Now that said unless the natives are coining to kill you the published limitations are in full force and must be followed.
 
DavidWhite said:
Or perhaps in his greenness had never flown the plane at gross and THOUGHT he was over weight. 172 doesn't fly the same at gross.
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But it doesn't normally fail to climb above 100' AGL at gross weight.

If his W&B calculation had shown allowable gross weight, it seems unlikely he'd have matter-of-factly stated over the radio that the plane's problem was due to being overweight. Not impossible, but unlikely.
 
acrophile said:
One important consideration is that when a plane is over its weight limit, its stall speed is higher than what the POH and the airspeed indicator specify. The pilot may have failed to take that factor into account.
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Late to this thread, but a friend out of that field spoke with me yesterday and said that the plane was more than a 'little' overgross and it was at least in the mid to upper 80's at the time of the flight. This is not to cast anything negative on the pilot or his family. Most of the time we 'underestimate' the load we carry in our aircraft without a true W/B calculation.

RIP and I agree with the comments so far. We can and have to do better than this in the GA world.

Totally avoidable, totally. Sad.
 
According to the tower recording, the pilot acknowledged nearby traffic about 1:30 after being cleared for takeoff, and then reported the need to turn back at about 2:00. He'd have been 1 or 2 nm away from the runway at that point, and appears to have successfully executed the U-turn before stalling on short final.
 
acrophile said:
But it doesn't normally fail to climb above 100' AGL at gross weight.

If his W&B calculation had shown allowable gross weight, it seems unlikely he'd have matter-of-factly stated over the radio that the plane's problem was due to being overweight. Not impossible, but unlikely.
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If he was overweight enough to not get above 100' I don't think he would have ever gotten out of ground effect.
 
One day I rented a PA-28-161, my friend came, he brought two other guys, both of them were around 250 pounds each. I decided to put low fuel on both tanks because I knew we were out of balance. We ran out of fuel 30 minutes later...thanks God I was flying at 6,500 ft., so had time to re-start the engine with the fuel from the left tank.
:mad2:
 
DavidWhite said:
If he was overweight enough to not get above 100' I don't think he would have ever gotten out of ground effect.
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Why? The plane could have been right at the edge of its density ceiling. Alternatively, he might have been sacrificing airspeed for altitude as he climbed out of ground effect, forcing him to level off or descend before he got very far off the ground.
 
acrophile said:
Why? The plane could have been right at the edge of its density ceiling. Alternatively, he might have been sacrificing airspeed for altitude as he climbed out of ground effect, forcing him to level off or descend before he got very far off the ground.
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Growing up in Texas, I learned fast the airplane climbs better when you're not over the really hot asphalt anymore.
 
DavidWhite said:
Growing up in Texas, I learned fast the airplane climbs better when you're not over the really hot asphalt anymore.
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True. But if he had to bleed airspeed in order to climb out of ground effect over the runway, couldn't he still have gotten stuck even when climb performance increased after he cleared the runway?
 
At 60 hrs(2008), I flew my family(225/135/90/50 Lbs) in a 160 hp and a 180 hp 172. We were close to gross weight with full fuel and no baggage and within CG range. There was no full gross flights ever mentioned during flight training(my mistake too). I study a lot and am very safe and knew what to expect...light controls, longer ground roll, slower climb, higher stall speed and the need for a sterile cockpit. We did not have any problems, but as my kids grew we built the RV-10. Still at gross and within CG on a trip, but 260 hp and a CS prop makes a world of difference. He may have watched a 182 load up with four adults and figured he could too. If rented, did nobody see this gentlemen and his three passengers walking out to the plane. RIP.
 
acrophile said:
Why? The plane could have been right at the edge of its density ceiling. Alternatively, he might have been sacrificing airspeed for altitude as he climbed out of ground effect, forcing him to level off or descend before he got very far off the ground.
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If we were talking Leadville, I'd buy that. Michigan with a sub-3000ft DA, not a chance.
 
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