Cirrus SR22 Airplane crash

That's terrible. Looks like maybe he was crushed? Is there a cage structure around Cirrus SR-2x? I think Mooneys are the only one I've heard of.
 
Sad to hear. If I remember right winds around here were 10 gusting 20 out of the West.
 
Cirrus' do have an integrated roll cage like structure that is essentially reinforced composite so not welded tubular steel like you would have in a race car. It's supposed to add quite a bit of strength but obviously nothing is infallible.
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A tricycle gear airplane flipping on its top ? How does that even happen ? In a tailwheel aircraft I could understand it but in a tricycle gear plane you almost got to really want that.
 
Skid said:
Sad to hear. If I remember right winds around here were 10 gusting 20 out of the West.
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No way light to moderate winds like that should of flipped a Cirrus on it's back, even if it was direct.
 
Looks like it might have been fully inverted before impact as opposed to a rollover near or at touchdown?

The only time I can recall something similar was a plane on final that had the flap mechanism fail on one side and it retracted. Too low to recover it.
 
Did the Cirrus crash in Meriden CT recently end up inverted?


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This is second hand hearsay but I heard that eyewitness account suggests loss of control in failed go around. Basically got inverted airborne (snap roll, lack of right rudder on full power?)

Seems improbable that it would have flipped on rollout badly enough to cause that much damage.
 
Checkout_my_Six said:
or a crash cage....:eek:
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Every airplane has their safety pluses and minuses, but one of the things a Mooney is known for is the cage - which has remained intact through some nasty crashes.

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ya but.....no chute.
gsengle said:
Every airplane has their safety pluses and minuses, but one of the things a Mooney is known for is the cage - which has remained intact through some nasty crashes.

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And they still walked away...


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If low and slow and the pilot tried to go-around, the sudden application of full power can cause a Cirrus to rapidly roll over to the left.
 
citizen5000 said:
Which model does this?
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All of them, if insufficient right rudder applied. Obviously more of a factor in the SR22's with more than 100 extra hp.

"Smoking holes" to the left of the runway are depressingly common in Cirrus botched go-arounds. Someone on the COPA site referred to it as "exit stage left".

Very similar to this, from Stick and Rudder:

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Sudden left yaw/roll is often instinctively countered with right aileron and back pressure - which can be the last mistake a pilot ever makes.
 
And EVERY pilot should know this.


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gsengle said:
And EVERY pilot should know this.
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I think nearly every pilot "knows" this.

The problem is outlined in this, which I posted to COPA on the same topic:

No question about training, but I think this misses a key to these recurring problems - reflexes.

In all our driving, if the car suddenly swerves left, we jerk the wheel to the right.

In 99.9% of our flying, uncommanded left roll is countered primarily with right aileron. And if the nose goes down, back pressure brings it back up.

So, when a sudden, unexpected left roll is encountered, it's not surprising the first reflexive instinct is to pull it back up with right aileron. And if the roll goes far enough that the nose is falling, back stick is reflexive as well. And I daresay most instructors have watched students lean away from an uncommanded turn, again, a vestigial reflex. And instructors who have themselves survived student's errant reflexes must necessarily have ingrained proper reflexes pretty deeply. But even they are not completely immune.

Its not enough to know what to do, a pilot has to over time learn and internalize new reflexes. That takes a LOT of repetition, and even then the new learned reflex will atrophy if not reinforced periodically.
 
I hope so. But we just lost someone close to home at MMK under basically the same circumstances...


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Art VanDelay said:
A tricycle gear airplane flipping on its top ? How does that even happen ? In a tailwheel aircraft I could understand it but in a tricycle gear plane you almost got to really want that.
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This past Friday and Saturday, the winds were pretty bad. I'm sure it had something to do with the accident. I wanted to fly over the weekend Saturday and Sunday but I couldn't. Sunday was much better in the morning.
 
We flew the Maule down to Cedar Key Sunday about noon. It was windy but not too bad. There were several planes there of different types. It was blowing pretty good by late afternoon departure but smoothed out above 3000. Tony's was good as ever!

Sad to here of the Cirrus pilot's demise. I know several people who fly them,,,

FloridaPilot said:
I was going to Cedar Key this weekend but I thought better of it.
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Art VanDelay said:
A tricycle gear airplane flipping on its top ? How does that even happen ? In a tailwheel aircraft I could understand it but in a tricycle gear plane you almost got to really want that.
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Trikes somersault as easily as taildraggers, and sometimes easier. That nosewheel, if it encounters something like a soft surface, will dig in and as the airplane's weight surges forward, it digs in even harder, like a pole-vaulter's pole, and over it goes. The taildragger's mains are almost under the CG instead of well forward of it, and the vaulting effect is minimal. The mains tend to roll over soft ground without digging in so aggressively. A more solid obstruction like a hardened snowbank will, of course, flip it, but it'll flip a trike too.
 
Dan Thomas said:
Trikes somersault as easily as taildraggers, and sometimes easier. That nosewheel, if it encounters something like a soft surface, will dig in and as the airplane's weight surges forward, it digs in even harder, like a pole-vaulter's pole, and over it goes. The taildragger's mains are almost under the CG instead of well forward of it, and the vaulting effect is minimal. The mains tend to roll over soft ground without digging in so aggressively. A more solid obstruction like a hardened snowbank will, of course, flip it, but it'll flip a trike too.
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Oh, thank you for that Dan as you can well tell I'm very inexperienced and glad for you help in this difficult topic.

I have only been an active CFI since 1990 teaching both conventional gear and tricycle gear aircraft. There is no F -ING WAY a tricycle gear airplane tips over as easy as a tail wheel - ok let's just establish that. Your pole vaulter analogy holds no water with what my own eyes have seen.
 
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Dan Thomas said:
Trikes somersault as easily as taildraggers, and sometimes easier. That nosewheel, if it encounters something like a soft surface, will dig in and as the airplane's weight surges forward, it digs in even harder, like a pole-vaulter's pole, and over it goes. The taildragger's mains are almost under the CG instead of well forward of it, and the vaulting effect is minimal. The mains tend to roll over soft ground without digging in so aggressively. A more solid obstruction like a hardened snowbank will, of course, flip it, but it'll flip a trike too.
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Almost all of the mass of a trike is behind the nose gear. I would think you'd need more than just an obstruction to get the whole plane to rotate over the nose before snapping the gear. But I'm not an engineer.
 
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