N. Las Vegas Mid-air

[luvflyin]

Could be buried in this thread, but are there published instrument final approach courses for the two runways?

No. It’s been brought up though about loading a Visual in an RNAV/GPS Nvivigator. And speculated that maybe it was but to the wrong runway. Kinda looks like a possibility. If so, that should become known in the final report. Maybe even the preliminary. Those have a lot more detail nowadays compared to a few years ago.

 

[Ed Haywood]

It’s been mentioned that she handled the radios in the Malibu while her husband was the pilot flying.

I think that is speculation. We know she was on the radio, but don't know who was actually on the controls or where they were seated.
If the pilot flying the aircraft was in the right seat, that might explain the error. I'm not familiar with this aircraft, but generally the left seat in a low wing aircraft would have better visibility to the left in a left turn. Depending on bank angle, the right seat pilot might not have been able to see the runway and relied on other landmark cues until he/she rolled out wings level on short final.

The more I look at the altitude on that track, the more it looks like a hotdog turn. I'm not opposed to those; in my Decathlon a tight power off 180 from high key is my standard approach at my home airfield. But I'm operating off a grass strip, not a busy class D with parallel ops. Something to be said for being predictable and boring. Leave the fighter pilot stuff to the fighter pilots and us fighter pilot wannabes.

 

[Flying Keys]

Oh no doubt. I just like the idea. For some reason I can more easily disambiguate 29, 30, 31 in my head than 30L, 30C, 30R. Like, the mental latency is less to separate those for me mentally -- Others may not be that way.

What do you do with the reciprocal ends? 13, 12, 11 left to right? Or do you go 11, 12, 13 left to right, which gives you 11/31, 12/30 (remains correct), and 13/29? Yikes.

 

[EdFred]

I don't disagree, we pilots sometimes screw up no matter the solution. But I just have a hard time seeing two aircraft on opposing bases to close in parallel runways, at the exact same time. I've been told to extend my downwind before due to traffic, or at least call traffic in sight before getting direction to turn final, etc. We don't know all the details yet, but it sounds like both aircraft were in opposing patterns to parallel runways, on different tower frequencies, and may not have even been advised the other existed.

But again, the controller did what the controller's playbook says to do. The Malibu pilot clearly lined up on the wrong runway. I'm not saying the controller was at fault, but maybe a tweak to the controller's playbook could help prevent another one of these types of accidents.

You need to fly Operation Good Cheer sometime. Parallel runways departing and arriving, and it gets busy, and fun.

 

[PaulS]

Most here is speculation on this accident. The lady in the aircraft is a pilot, it would seem a very experienced pilot with many ratings. But from another forum with people who knew the couple, she rarely flew the Malibu, and pretty much always handled the radios. The lady was in her late seventies and her husband was in his early eighties. Others have said they were very safety oriented and returning from some sort of type safety seminar/meetup on this flight. f

It looks to me like they were on an instrument plan, saw the field but were close in, high and fast. Probably given the visual, started descending, worried about shock cooling, so they kept some power in. I don't know how many times this has happened to me, cleared for the visual close in and high.

Apparently the approach end of this runway is 2 miles from a bravo, so maybe the pilot was concerned about busting the bravo hence the need to over fly the field rather than widen out onto a long right base to final.

It would be nice to hear the communications with ATC further out. Hopefully it will be in the final. Maybe Gryder will dig it up, lol.

 

[RudyP]

Most here is speculation on this accident. The lady in the aircraft is a pilot, it would seem a very experienced pilot with many ratings. But from another forum with people who knew the couple, she rarely flew the Malibu, and pretty much always handled the radios. The lady was in her late seventies and her husband was in his early eighties. Others have said they were very safety oriented and returning from some sort of type safety seminar/meetup on this flight. f

It looks to me like they were on an instrument plan, saw the field but were close in, high and fast. Probably given the visual, started descending, worried about shock cooling, so they kept some power in. I don't know how many times this has happened to me, cleared for the visual close in and high.

Apparently the approach end of this runway is 2 miles from a bravo, so maybe the pilot was concerned about busting the bravo hence the need to over fly the field rather than widen out onto a long right base to final.

It would be nice to hear the communications with ATC further out. Hopefully it will be in the final. Maybe Gryder will dig it up, lol.

Worried about shock cooling a turboprop?!?

 

[PaulS]

Worried about shock cooling a turboprop?!?

Duh oh, that's right, lol.

 

[wayneda40]

No. It’s been brought up though about loading a Visual in an RNAV/GPS Nvivigator. And speculated that maybe it was but to the wrong runway. Kinda looks like a possibility. If so, that should become known in the final report. Maybe even the preliminary. Those have a lot more detail nowadays compared to a few years ago.

With new navigators (e.g. GTN750) there are, as @luvflyin suggests, visual approaches to specific runways (e.g. 30L). However that's not the case with pre-2015 navigators (e.g. GNS530, early G1000) in which case many pilots suggest using OBS off the airport (in this case KVGT, OBS at 300). But with multiple runways at an airport, this just swings a magenta line on that course from the "center" of the airport. At KVGT that magenta line just by chance runs thru 30R...

 

[RussR]

I'm just trying to figure out why this guy, who was apparently based at this airport, would cross over midfield, at 140 knots and basically turn into a short approach 0.6 nm from the centerline of the runway he was going to land on. This is 100% on the pilot, but I'm curious as to whether he was just hot dogging, or he was trying to please/help out someone. He basically attempted a 0.6 nm diameter 270 degree turn to final starting at about 140 knots. With a standard rate turn you can expect your turn diameter to be about 1% of your ground speed, 1.4 nm in this case. So this guy must've been yanking and banking to get the turn this tight, turns out it wasn't tight enough. That would have been slightly disorienting and his view of the intended runway would have been obscured for much of the turn.

We, as a collective, really need to be better.

For reference, I looked up the turbine PA-46 SOPs as recommended by the MMOPA (type club for the PA-46). While speeds are not specifically called out until final, their procedure is that on base, when slowing through 130 kias, going to 20 degrees of flaps. This statement infers that they expect you will be above 130 kias on downwind. Now, of course a normal pattern is also assumed, not a continuous turn from crossing the airport around to final. But it's reasonable to assume that much of the Meridian/Jetprop training and common practice has you entering the pattern around 140 kias.

I don't know that the comparison to a standard-rate turn is valid - nobody does standard-rate turns in the pattern, your pattern would be huge. But I agree, to make this turn at this speed would require some pretty steep turning.

Also, the visibility in the PA-46 is not great. Those forward windows feel like looking out through a WWII "pillbox".

 

[TrueCourse]

I think that is speculation. We know she was on the radio, but don't know who was actually on the controls or where they were seated.

My reply to that post was more than just speculation based on her talking on the radio. Apparently someone asked her at the safety seminar if she flew the Malibu and she said “no, I just just worked the radios”. Could she have been joking? Sure. The coroner gave a report which included “[the husband] 82, of Las Vegas, and [the wife] 76, also from Las Vegas both died…according to the coroner. Goldberg was the pilot and Scanlon was a passenger aboard the Piper PA-46.” It was mentioned earlier or elsewhere that she had another airplane she flew. Is all of this 100% actual fact? I won’t bet on it at this point. Perhaps the post I was quoting was pure speculation.

 

[mondtster]

For reference, I looked up the turbine PA-46 SOPs as recommended by the MMOPA (type club for the PA-46). While speeds are not specifically called out until final, their procedure is that on base, when slowing through 130 kias, going to 20 degrees of flaps. This statement infers that they expect you will be above 130 kias on downwind. Now, of course a normal pattern is also assumed, not a continuous turn from crossing the airport around to final. But it's reasonable to assume that much of the Meridian/Jetprop training and common practice has you entering the pattern around 140 kias.

I don't know that the comparison to a standard-rate turn is valid - nobody does standard-rate turns in the pattern, your pattern would be huge. But I agree, to make this turn at this speed would require some pretty steep turning.

Also, the visibility in the PA-46 is not great. Those forward windows feel like looking out through a WWII "pillbox".

I agree, the speeds shown on the photo in the second post don’t really seem out of line to what I would likely fly at. And having been through initial and recurrent PA46 training with a few different providers, the procedure is generally the same. I’d have to look but I think the Legacy training manual might have a graphic of a traffic pattern in it with speeds/procedures.

It is Interesting how different people view visibility. I never have thought the PA46 was bad, although it certainly isn’t as open as other things I’ve flown.

 

[RussR]

It is Interesting how different people view visibility. I never have thought the PA46 was bad, although it certainly isn’t as open as other things I’ve flown.

Interesting, the lack of visibility was the first thing I thought the first time I got in one. And then about a month ago, I was training another pilot in one, and his first comment was about the visibility as well.

I'd guess the standard upgrade path that leads to a PA-46 is probably from Bonanzas or Cirruses, both of which have better visibility.

 

[luvflyin]

With new navigators (e.g. GTN750) there are, as @luvflyin suggests, visual approaches to specific runways (e.g. 30L). However that's not the case with pre-2015 navigators (e.g. GNS530, early G1000) in which case many pilots suggest using OBS off the airport (in this case KVGT, OBS at 300). But with multiple runways at an airport, this just swings a magenta line on that course from the "center" of the airport. At KVGT that magenta line just by chance runs thru 30R...
View attachment 108769

I don't think this had anything to do with what happened here. But while we're here, with the pre Visual Approach boxes there would have been a pretty easy way to throw up a straight line into 30L. OBS off of OXYAP on the Rwy 12R Approach. At your home port, SBA, you could do it with Rwy 25. Not that I think you'd ever have a reason to do it with that much precision, but you could use a Waypoint on one of the Rwy 7 Approaches, They're both straight in. Even then there may be some issues with the Runways headings that have decimal points. Try it sometime, see what you get.

 

[TrueCourse]

Although visual approaches in the Garmin is a great tool, not sure circling overhead in a tight turn to short final it’s very useful. Maybe one glance on the base to final, but that’s a stretch.

 

[wayneda40]

I don't think this had anything to do with what happened here. But while we're here, with the pre Visual Approach boxes there would have been a pretty easy way to throw up a straight line into 30L. OBS off of OXYAP on the Rwy 12R Approach. At your home port, SBA, you could do it with Rwy 25. Not that I think you'd ever have a reason to do it with that much precision, but you could use a Waypoint on one of the Rwy 7 Approaches, They're both straight in. Even then there may be some issues with the Runways headings that have decimal points. Try it sometime, see what you get.

Yes, I agree on both @luvflyin points... OBS probably didn't play a role in the KVGT incident... and OBS off an aligned final approach waypoint is a good idea.

The point I'd like to emphasize to all of us is: using OBS off an airport id (in this case KVGT) is in general a very BAD idea --and-- only works with any reliability at all on a one-runway airport.

 

[luvflyin]

Although visual approaches in the Garmin is a great tool, not sure circling overhead in a tight turn to short final it’s very useful. Maybe one glance on the base to final, but that’s a stretch.

Yeah. With what happened here it, wouldn’t be.

 

[luvflyin]

Yes, I agree on both @luvflyin points... OBS probably didn't play a role in the KVGT incident... and OBS off an aligned final approach waypoint is a good idea.

The point I'd like to emphasize to all of us is: using OBS off an airport id (in this case KVGT) is in general a very BAD idea --and-- only works with any reliability at all on a one-runway airport.

Using the airport ID, yeah, could be bad juju. Maybe you want to have some fun though. Get the lat/longs for all the Runways at SBA. Now create some User Waypoints for them and give them names.

 

[wayneda40]

Using the airport ID, yeah, could be bad juju. Maybe you want to have some fun though. Get the lat/longs for all the Runways at SBA. Now create some User Waypoints for them and give them names.

Yep, I basically do this IRL at most all airports (if I'm not shooting an instrument approach), however not in the "panel" (unless done in advance, adding user waypoints in the panel GPS is not at all quick or convenient). In ForeFlight I load the appropriate Traffic Pattern procedure and then visually hand fly the magenta line in ForeFlight... yes, with lots of looking outside and just occasionally glancing at my heads-up mounted iPad. . YMMV

 

[Palmpilot]

...Apparently the approach end of this runway is 2 miles from a bravo, so maybe the pilot was concerned about busting the bravo hence the need to over fly the field rather than widen out onto a long right base to final.....

Since they were assigned 30L, with another aircraft using 30R, making right traffic for 30L could have posed its own potential for conflict.

Using the scale on the graphic in Post #2, their curving left-downwind leg only reached about 0.6 mile from the extended centerline of 30L. Based on the Terminal Area Chart, they could have flown the downwind farther out from the field, which would have given them more time on base to identify the correct runway. A one-mile wide downwind would have been about where the T 357 airway is on the Terminal Area Chart:

https://skyvector.com/?ll=36.19819388302796,-115.21817703493356&chart=113&zoom=3

 

[Salty]

In my Lance, it's pretty normal to come into the pattern at 120, but if I do, I'm not going to cross midfield and circle to a landing. There's just not enough time to do everything that needs to be done in a safe manner. And that's a bit slower, and a lot less complicated than the mirage.

 

[PaulS]

In my Lance, it's pretty normal to come into the pattern at 120, but if I do, I'm not going to cross midfield and circle to a landing. There's just not enough time to do everything that needs to be done in a safe manner. And that's a bit slower, and a lot less complicated than the mirage.

Yeah, the Cirrus is 120 knots into the pattern, but slowed to 100 by abeam the numbers, then slowed to about 80 by short final. If there are other planes in the pattern I'll get to 100 before I enter. I also do a "Cirrus" pattern, probably about a mile from the runway, that just accommodates making the turns at those speeds with out having to exceed 30 degree banks.

This guy came into the pattern at 147, but actually got it slowed to under 90 by short final. I really think he screwed the pooch with the tight turn. He was a little more than a minute from crossing over the field to running into the Cessna. I imagine he was quite busy managing the plane, flaps, gear and what not jammed into that minute.

 

[FPK1]

Not much new here from AOPA but some good pilot reminders:

 

[Warmi]

i just don't really feel like there is much that can be done to prevent things like this. it sounds like two experienced pilots in the malibu lined up for the wrong runway at their home field? how can you really stop something like that?

a class d tower can't be expected to call the base for every person doing pattern work.

The usual - technology.
If a computer were to announce “landing at runway X “ it may have worked or may have not worked but it would probably end up alerting at least some people in some situations ….

 

[wayneda40]

The usual - technology.
If a computer were to announce “landing at runway X “ it may have worked or may have not worked but it would probably end up alerting at least some people in some situations ….

Agreed, as a supplement to eyeballs, tech could and should help. Pretty sure my little DA40/G1000 would have been screaming at me... and ForeFlight might have also caught the possible conflict.

 

[Salty]

Who says there wasn't some tech telling them they were lined up for 30R?

 

[GaryM]

Maybe a case where they heard 30 and their mind filled in the rest based on what they were expecting to hear?

Announcing a clearance like “cleared to land Left 30 L” might have helped, but it is nonstandard terminology, and wordier.

 

[Rockymountain]

Well I won't argue because you clearly know far more about the subject than I do. But, I was under the impression that the literal definition of class B/C/D airspace is "a controller dictates how I fly my plane." I have certainly had base turns called or downwind extended to deconflict traffic. I was always grateful for the assistance and happy to comply.

in a class D the controller has 2 primary roles. Keep planes from bumping into each other on the ground, and to sequence planes so that they don’t bump into each other on the ground. They do not separate planes in the air. They can be nice and point out traffic, but the planes are see and avoid. That is why you will hear them say things like traffic 2 o'clock suggest turning to heading XYZ. It is a suggestion. You don’t have to do it. Separation is your responsibility. Compare that to a class B where ATC does separate in the air. Traffic 2’oclock turn to heading XYZ. That is a command not a suggestion. Subtle, but useful to know.

 

[Warmi]

in a class D the controller has 2 primary roles. Keep planes from bumping into each other on the ground, and to sequence planes so that they don’t bump into each other on the ground. They do not separate planes in the air. They can be nice and point out traffic, but the planes are see and avoid. That is why you will hear them say things like traffic 2 o'clock suggest turning to heading XYZ. It is a suggestion. You don’t have to do it. Separation is your responsibility. Compare that to a class B where ATC does separate in the air. Traffic 2’oclock turn to heading XYZ. That is a command not a suggestion. Subtle, but useful to know.

So why do I need to talk to them to enter their airspace if all they are concerned about are ground ops ?

 

[Rockymountain]

I would think most do but if it’s busy then expect min spacing and really cool formation landings on parallel runways.

Just how it goes sometimes. What we are talking about is the kind of thing that still makes having two monkeys in the front so much safer than one monkey ops. Another layer of eyes to the quality control.

both people up front were multi, IFR rated pilots

 

[FancyG]

You'd also lose the situational awareness of other traffic without the voice comms.

I can listen to comms and fly, would find monitoring a constant text scroll and flying very difficult.

Did it take longer for you to type this post out or for me to read it?

I use CPDLC on a regular basis at work. It's great for what we use it for. Departure clearances, amended clearances, enroute altitude clearances, route amendments, frequency changes ... all that stuff is great.

For taxi, takeoff and landing instructions, I think that's too dynamic of an environment for text based clearances. It's much easier/quicker/safer for the local controller to press the transmit button on the mic and say "Airline 123, go around, aircraft on runway" than it is to see the problem, type out a text message, send it, have Delta read it, then react.

 

[FancyG]

What do you do with the reciprocal ends? 13, 12, 11 left to right? Or do you go 11, 12, 13 left to right, which gives you 11/31, 12/30 (remains correct), and 13/29? Yikes.

Inverse of the cheat for the 30 end. Or whatever the FAA determines to be least costly to implement.

The function is breaking confirmation bias for L/C/R.

 

[Palmpilot]

Yeah, the Cirrus is 120 knots into the pattern, but slowed to 100 by abeam the numbers, then slowed to about 80 by short final. If there are other planes in the pattern I'll get to 100 before I enter. I also do a "Cirrus" pattern, probably about a mile from the runway, that just accommodates making the turns at those speeds with out having to exceed 30 degree banks.

This guy came into the pattern at 147, but actually got it slowed to under 90 by short final. I really think he screwed the pooch with the tight turn. He was a little more than a minute from crossing over the field to running into the Cessna. I imagine he was quite busy managing the plane, flaps, gear and what not jammed into that minute.

Also, his left bank for the turn could have caused his wings to block his view of the track during the base-to-final turn.

 

[Tarheelpilot]

both people up front were multi, IFR rated pilots

They were really bad at the job. I wonder what type of training they had regarding crew operations. I bet it was just two pilots up front. One flying one talking. Not a crew. I’ve been in both situations and the former is worse than single pilot in my experience

 

[jpskies]

The FAA's reliance on voice-grade communication channels is dismaying in these days of high-speed data networking. We all carry around portable comm terminals with 4 UHF and microwave transceivers, and high-resolution graphics displays. Call them tablets, smartphones, whatever; they are ubiquitous, reliable, effective, and cheap.

Scenario: upon startup, have the app locate the nearest ATC facility, and select "W"; hit SEND. No need for 25 seconds of chatter: "Ground, this is Skyhawk 567 Mike Alpha at Area 5 with Quebec, West departure". Instead, in 50 milliseconds, the app sends airplane N number and GPS coordinates to the local controller, whose own app responds with taxi instructions, bitmap of the taxiway path, and overlays it with text of the ATIS. Pilot hits the ACK key, starts rolling. No talking, no "readback of all runway crossings", just progressive permissives issued to the pilot as he navigates to the runway for his West departure, and awaits the takeoff clearance message.

Analogously, pilots of arriving aircraft just hit the "L" key on the app, and get their unambiguous landing instructions displayed in milliseconds. Without chatter, channel saturation, or tragic misunderstandings.

Other pilots lost the situation awareness of what's going on by using this text model, which is a critical factor of flying and ground operations. Pilots listen on the conversation between ATC and other aircraft in order to prepare and anticipate the action coming next, sometimes even avoid danger. On the other hand, if all text communication are broadcast to your screen, PIC will be flooded by too much information and cause safety issue.

This is the magic of the human brain. Our brain can prioritize what we listening to ATC conversations. When we are busy, our brain will only process the sentences calling/belonging to us (by the N number keyword) and throw away all other sentences that are not calling us. However, when the brain becomes less busy, it will process the other sentences that do not belong to us (even from what we heard previously but not yet processed) related to ourselves to gain situational awareness.
This capability cannot be achieved when we read from the screen (we call it human-UI) because it is a much harder task. Our brain needs to track the position of what we read on the screen, and it's hard to ignore the sentences that do not belong to us. Therefore, reading from the sceen can overload our brain and cause our brain not able to prioritize other important tasks, such as operating the aircraft itself. Moreover, If there are too many sentences and scrolling out of screen before our brain can even process them, this could be even harder as we need to scroll back the screen and to re-identify the position our brain last processed. This could cause missing the ATC instructions to us, not even to the other situation awareness sentences that might be important as well.

 

[Velocity173]

So why do I need to talk to them to enter their airspace if all they are concerned about are ground ops ?

To give the controller sufficient time in order to provide airborne services (traffic calls, pattern sequence, clearance to land).

 

[readytocopy995]

So why do I need to talk to them to enter their airspace if all they are concerned about are ground ops ?

you don't HAVE to talk to them, just squawk 7600 and do whatever you want

 

[woodchucker]

No. Pilot in command failed to use the proper runway. Pilot. In. Command.

Right. But the PIC failed here, and the nearly identical near disaster in Colorado. Trying to protect pilots from pilots. So crying PIC is nice, but not effective. So the question for the community then is there a better way to manage parallel runway operations other than saying that the accident is on the PIC and then dropping the issue?

 

[Salty]

Right. But the PIC failed here, and the nearly identical near disaster in Colorado. Trying to protect pilots from pilots. So crying PIC is nice, but not effective. So the question for the community then is there a better way to manage parallel runway operations other than saying that the accident is on the PIC and then dropping the issue?

Maybe we should ban GA aircraft. Think of the children.
?

 

[Zeldman]

Maybe we should ban GA aircraft. Think of the children.
?

Or ban children.?

No, no, of course not, some folks actually like their kids...

 

[Pinecone]

No doubt the FAA is going to be named. Maybe some of the other Usual Suspects also. Deep Pocket gonna apply. It's going to be a guessing game on what they think a Jury may end up looking like. I'm just giving it 50/50 right now on Trial vs Settlement.

You can't just name the FAA. You cannot sue the US Gov unless they allow you to do so.