Piper Malibu down north of Atlanta

CJones

CJones

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News is reporting a Piper Malibu is down north of Lake Lanier north of Atlanta. One fatality.

Are all of the ATL guys accounted for tonight?
 
Wx has sucked all day. Departed Morristown, NJ for PDK. What's the range of a Malibu?

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk 4
 
I'm here. I know the plane was based at PDK, but I don't know who owns it.

My prayers to the family.
 
From flight aware, this looks like it is most likely it:

http://flightaware.com/live/flight/N87NF

Departed Morristown.

End of the flight track shows a right turn to the NW which he flew for about 5nm. If it was some sort of emergency, not sure why he wouldn't go for GVL, which was only 8 or so miles from the point of the turn. From the speed graph, it looks like there was a continual decrease in speed during his descent. Maybe he was picking up ice?

Looks like the plane belonged to a Dr. John Culberston Jr, a plastic surgeon at Emory.

This one hits close to home...personally, I went to Emory and fly out of PDK.

RIP...very sad.
 
Crappy wx all day, especially up here in the mountains. We cancelled our training earlier.
 
Many of the owners go right up to FL 270. I haven't seen this Malibu since it was in conversion back in 1998. He is the same owner that originally had it converted too.
 
Heard it on the radio this morning driving into work. Yesterday sure was scuzzy and nasty. Bad time to have a problem. The report also mentioned a larger debris field and looked like one wing or both were separated from the fuselage. Very sad. :(

dwalt said:
From flight aware, this looks like it is most likely it:

http://flightaware.com/live/flight/N87NF

Departed Morristown.

End of the flight track shows a right turn to the NW which he flew for about 5nm. If it was some sort of emergency, not sure why he wouldn't go for GVL, which was only 8 or so miles from the point of the turn. From the speed graph, it looks like there was a continual decrease in speed during his descent. Maybe he was picking up ice?
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GVL would've been the closest ILS available. A left turn instead of right would've hopefully set him up for the ILS 5.
 
Sad. :(

Will be interesting to hear the cause.
 
I was on frequency at the time and heard the whole thing and it sounded like a classic case of spatial disorientation.
 
AvProFlt said:
I was on frequency at the time and heard the whole thing and it sounded like a classic case of spatial disorientation.
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What makes you say that? I know a lot of people who have experienced spatial D, but it wasn't really apparent over the radio.
 
kmead said:
Many of the owners go right up to FL 270. I haven't seen this Malibu since it was in conversion back in 1998. He is the same owner that originally had it converted too.
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They regularly operate above a POH limitation?
 
What whould the cabin altitude be at FL 260?? I know the Conquest is over 10K feet at FL250.

kmead said:
Many of the owners go right up to FL 270. I haven't seen this Malibu since it was in conversion back in 1998. He is the same owner that originally had it converted too.
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N747JB said:
What whould the cabin altitude be at FL 260?? I know the Conquest is over 10K feet at FL250.
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I thought the Malibu had something like a 6 PSI cabin, which is a very nice feature.
 
I'm a little confused here. This is a turboprop version correct? Also is it the same N87NF that had a crash in 2000? He was cruising at FL270 at the time of engine problems.
 
James_Dean said:
5.5 I believe
Click to expand...

I could certainly be wrong, I'm no Malibu expert.

The turboprops I flew were 5.4, so it is still a pretty strong number for a piston. I like high cabin pressures.
 
Velocity173 said:
I'm a little confused here. This is a turboprop version correct? Also is it the same N87NF that had a crash in 2000? He was cruising at FL270 at the time of engine problems.
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Me too then. I thought it was the straight Malibu. If it is the Meridian than max altitude is 30k. Still a 5.5psi cabin dif. Sorry for any confusion if I was wrong.

Eggman
 
That TBM crash a couple of years ago was TEB to PDK, just crashed on the opposite end.

Kinda eerie.
 
N87NF was enroute to PDK in 2000 when it crashed in Arkansas.
 
rpadula said:
Heard it on the radio this morning driving into work. Yesterday sure was scuzzy and nasty. Bad time to have a problem. The report also mentioned a larger debris field and looked like one wing or both were separated from the fuselage. Very sad. :(



GVL would've been the closest ILS available. A left turn instead of right would've hopefully set him up for the ILS 5.
Click to expand...

Although not currently NOTAMed as such it is OTS. I tried to fly it on Saturday for practice.
 
Ted DuPuis said:
That TBM crash a couple of years ago was TEB to PDK, just crashed on the opposite end.

Kinda eerie.
Click to expand...

That was a sad deal...the pilot told ATC the ice wouldn't be a problem, he said something like "We'll go right through it".

Airliners in the vicinity were reporting significant accumulations. I saw the radar track afterwards, he was climbing at max rate but only 105 kts. They made it to 16,500 before it quit flying.
 
Just had the story on Atlanta news tonight. Same aircraft and same pilot from the 2000 crash that was inbound to PDK as well...RIP.
 
I believe the Jetprop is approved door FL270 it leaves you very close to the 10k cabin. With reduced inflow bleed air into the cabin it's very easy to drop max dif. and increase cabin altitude without a lot of cabin leakage. There is also a cabin altitude warning annunciator.

5.5 is the max cabin dif. on the PA46.
 
3393RP said:
That was a sad deal...the pilot told ATC the ice wouldn't be a problem, he said something like "We'll go right through it".

Airliners in the vicinity were reporting significant accumulations. I saw the radar track afterwards, he was climbing at max rate but only 105 kts. They made it to 16,500 before it quit flying.
Click to expand...

Yeah, and when you look at the icing PIREPs for that day, it should have been very clear that you didn't want to fly there. Much better to fly south at 12k and eat the extra fuel, then climb high around DCish when the PIREPs went away.

Like with any airplane, the issue is the pilot.
 
Sunday night I quit on the return trip from HPN, at Youngstown OH. Tooo much ice, too much headwind up high, tired pilot. FIKI ship.

Paid Winner Aviation, the $170 callout fee and went to bed.

Priceless.
 
bbchien said:
Sunday night I quit on the return trip from HPN, at Youngstown OH. Tooo much ice, too much headwind up high, tired pilot. FIKI ship.

Paid Winner Aviation, the $170 callout fee and went to bed.

Priceless.
Click to expand...

Good move.
 
bbchien said:
Sunday night I quit on the return trip from HPN, at Youngstown OH. Tooo much ice, too much headwind up high, tired pilot. FIKI ship.

Paid Winner Aviation, the $170 callout fee and went to bed.

Priceless.
Click to expand...
That's the way it's done. Nice.
 
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