Crazy Plane Crash Video from Inside Cockpit

I'll cut and paste my response from the BAC forum where I first saw this video posted.....

Holy Crap!

At what point did he figure on aborting the take off since it ran into the next county! Uh.....that would be he never gave it a second thought. He's lucky the passengers didn't kick his butt after pulling him out.

I guess I should add that the others didn't look to bad, maybe they did beat the pilots a$$ for almost getting them killed.
 
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Two Words: Density Altitude. No performance, no climb and long a$$ take off roll. Guy should be fired.
 
I recall nearly aborting my takeoff from Oshkosh, and I was doing far better than him. Had a positive rate of climb. Wasn't a very good positive rate, but a positive rate. Only time I fly that close to trees is on landing. I don't' even like to get that close on takeoff.
 
Wow, There were like minutes of warning as to their inability to fly and tons of perfectly good landing places he could have put it down. Instead he continued to try and fly an airplane that didn't want to until he was out of nice terrain.
 
Wow, that's all :(
That was a hell of a long takeoff roll.
They are so fortunate that there were not more seriously injured, or worse.
 
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"Air pocket"... right. :rolleyes2:
Maybe a little sink as they approached the lee side of the rising terrain and the cooler air over the trees, but they crashed because the airplane simply would not climb, and he was trying to force it to do so, with less and less clearance available as they went forward.

Damn, the PIC got hurt pretty bad! I feel for him, but... that's what you get sometimes when you lie to yourself and the airplane. He's lucky it did not go worse for him or his pax. Amazing how well that airplane protected them.

I can see why he didn't abort over the runway; looked sort of do-able still. But right after that, when it touched down again in the meadow beyond the runway, it was definitely time to chop it and try to get stopped in one piece. Or at least try to turn around (gently) after it became airborne again.
A lot of wishful thinking there... I hope he keeps flying, as long as he remembers this lesson.
 
The first clue should have been that he was unable to get airborne in about a mile of runway.
 
Sac Arrow said:
The first clue should have been that he was unable to get airborne in about a mile of runway.
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the second clue was after it did get airborne despite his efforts to make it fly it didn't want to, and set back down. should have chopped the throttle then.
could he have been overloaded? his pax were hiking. 4 people with hiking gear.
 
Sorry but that pilot is a complete idiot and was lucky nobody was killed. Alllllll the time in the world to discover things didn't look right and abort.
 
Inverted said:
It looked longer than a mile. I was shocked how long the takeoff roll was.
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Yeah, I kept wondering if he was flying in ground effect or something... but the shaking on the soft field gave it away. That little bounce when the wheels touched ground again... I could not believe he turned into the trees as low as he was. I had a density altitude issue one time, on a hot day in the mountains where it was 12K or so, and even the 182 had trouble with it. It did take off but I spent about 20 minutes circling around slowly gaining altitude right over where the airport was until I leveled off, circled again, and felt comfortable enough to push ahead, about 1000ft over the mountain peaks. Of course, as fuel burned off the plane also got lighter and easier to fly. I wasn't fully aware of AoA in theory at that time, but I sure "got it" in practice on that day!

If he didn't want to abort (I get it), then he could have just done the same over the flat ground until gaining enough altitude to venture out over the trees. Was the plane over-gross? I would guess it was, but still flyable... just needed extra care.
 
wsuffa said:
Video unavailable.
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Just worked here...

I'm getting to the point where I'm no longer shocked by stupid decisions regarding Density Altitude. We just see it too often up here. In fact, more and more it just makes me angry at the so-called "pilot". (Yeah, that angry. They're not a pilot if they're this dumb. They're just a takeoff-passenger hoping the airplane won't crash.)

There should have been a calculated go/stop point during that takeoff roll, and the aircraft should have never left the ground. Abort and live to fly another day.

As others have mentioned, if you're STILL stupid enough to force it to fly, put it down on the next open patch of ground. Don't go wandering out UPHILL over TREES.

(Beat head here...)
 
All I can say is WOW... Looks like the only one that was hurt is the pilot... Im not that experience but I knew that the take off roll was WAYYYYY TO. DANG LONGGGGG..... DA WILL GET U every time.....
 
Anybody recognize what airfield they might have been flying out of?
 
rottydaddy said:
"Air pocket"... right. :rolleyes2:
Maybe a little sink as they approached the lee side of the rising terrain and the cooler air over the trees, but they crashed because the airplane simply would not climb, and he was trying to force it to do so, with less and less clearance available as they went forward.
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Probably the only reason he was able to fly over the meadow at all was be the rising air heated by the open ground in the sun. The air over a forest will be cooler and sink. When I towed gliders on hot, marginal DA days I had to be careful with my flight path and avoid the bush, picking out open areas in the sun.

Dan
 
That, and the fact he was in ground effect for about half of the video....
 
He was doing really well up until that last tree jumped up in front of him.

Rotten luck with those air pockets.
 
Well at least he didn't spin it in. It almost looks like what saved them was he took a tree on both sides of the fuselage going in absorbing a lot of the impact. They were damn lucky!
 
Good old Stinson Roll cage protected them.

For those of you who have never flown in the high country on hot days, 100' per minute climbs are pretty normal.

but in this case the terrane was climbing faster than he was.
 
I'm a student, and I would of aborted way before he got airborne the first time. Have to wonder if he was within weight. Maybe within weight for when that motor was brand spanking new!
 
Swampfox201 said:
Well at least he didn't spin it in. It almost looks like what saved them was he took a tree on both sides of the fuselage going in absorbing a lot of the impact. They were damn lucky!
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Yeah, at first I thought for sure the clip would end with a stall and partial spin. As the view ahead gets more ominous, you see him tentatively pulling back, over and over (you can really see the pitch changes in the "camera 2" view at the end of the video). I was saying aloud "don't do that... don't... it won't work..." It would swoop a little, but without real lift being generated by the wings, you have to pay that back right away. It's just like thinking "stick lift" will get you somewhere in a glider. But he stopped doing it before the impact... good for him.
I think going into the trees upright and more or less in control really helped them (that, and not hitting a tree head-on, LOL).
He gets some credit for not completely succumbing to fantasy-pulling back enough to unload the wing as so many others have done in the same situation. I was very surprised- and relieved- to see him bite the bullet and just try to "keep flying into the crash".

But it never had to happen... sigh. :nonod:
 
Tom-D said:
Good old Stinson Roll cage protected them.
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Oh, since you mentioned Stinson, that reminds me about Franklin engines and some questions I have. I'll start a new thread in Hangar Talk.
 
Tom-D said:
Good old Stinson Roll cage protected them.

For those of you who have never flown in the high country on hot days, 100' per minute climbs are pretty normal.

but in this case the terrain was climbing faster than he was.
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I posted on another forum - the only reason he was "climbing" was that the ground effect was rising with the terrain. He tried to yank it into a climb a couple of times; all it did is make the airplane shudder. He had no reserve performance to turn, but plenty of places to set down until he got to the trees.

It looks like he (finally) tried to ease it around to the left - that's when he starts to sink. The wings came level just before impact.

He's gotten away with this before, I'll bet. Maybe the additional weight of the two cameras ...

+1 on the roll cage. :)
 
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4,700 ft airstrip, at 6,300 feet. Used a good 4k to get off the ground. Flying into rising terrain offset any gain in altitude he was able to muster. Betting Over-Gross... with DA problems.
 
The takeoff roll took 40 seconds to cover 5000 feet. 2PM, SW bound. 6000 MSL, hot summer day, into higher terrain with at most a 165 hp engine and 4 up.

He apparently did this once before. Revocation or one year suspension would be appropriate, but I'll bet he continues to fly despite that.
 
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I wonder how the accident pilot feels about the money he saved by not buying shoulder harnesses for his airplane?
 
If he only would have filed a flight plan.......;)

Typical mountain flying crash. Out flying the altitude performance of the airplane as the terrain rises.

Glad they survived. :D
 
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bbchien said:
The takeoff roll took 40 seconds to cover 5000 feet.
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Wow, I don't think it even took that long for Howard Hughes to get the H-4 off the water, did it?
 
I've had a couple experiences with high DA, and it's entirely unforgiving. It can come up at some surprising points too - last week I was departing from KSJT runway 3 in a 172 loaded to within 50 pounds of MTOW, at about 103F in the shade and calm wind. I burned every bit of 3000' of runway if not 3500', and another 500 in ground effect with high alpha before climbing out. I wouldn't have expected this poor performance at an airport at 1900 ASL, but the air temp above the runway was probably around 125 or 130 and that will kill you (literally in some cases). Just past the departure end less than a minute later, over the lake, I was maintaining 500 per minute.

Worst I've had was a 4000' takeoff roll (on a 9000' runway) coming out of Durango CO southbound into dropping terrain in a max-loaded rental 172 on a warm day. 150 per minute was all it wanted. You gotta fly by the numbers, wishful thinking has no place in the cockpit.
 
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JimNtexas said:
I wonder how the accident pilot feels about the money he saved by not buying shoulder harnesses for his airplane?
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No kidding.....the FIRST thing I did when I bought my '48 170 was install shoulder harnesses for the front seats.
 
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