Plane makes emergency landing on highway in Indy
- Thread starter mikea
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Bob Bement
Pattern Altitude
No big deal to land on the highway. It is a lot of times a better landing spot than a lot of airstrips use. I have used it once myself, in a pinch.
inav8r
Line Up and Wait
Pilot forced to ease down on I-70
Pilot forced to ease on down the road
After repairs, they blocked the highway and allowed the plane to take off! Cool pic in the article.
Pilot forced to ease on down the road
Indy Star said:
After repairs, they blocked the highway and allowed the plane to take off! Cool pic in the article.
inav8r
Line Up and Wait
Re: Pilot forced to ease down on I-70
It was a Lance. No where in the article did they refer to it as a "cessna"!
It was a Lance. No where in the article did they refer to it as a "cessna"!
inav8r
Line Up and Wait
Bah, I even searched!
Bob Bement
Pattern Altitude
I had a lance make an emergency landing at my home field a few years back. An oil plug came out right behind the prop. Oil all over the windshield. He got it down but I had to replace two runway lights afterwards. Bob
gprellwitz
Touchdown! Greaser!
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Grant Prellwitz
And he had to replace a pair of shorts!
K
KennyFlys
Guest
Re: Pilot forced to ease down on I-70
Not in this lifetime, I think!
Now, a Lear...
Lance gave up a Mooney for a Cessna?
Not in this lifetime, I think!
Now, a Lear...
sbonek
Pre-takeoff checklist
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Steve Bonek
this is really close to my house... I'm not sure what the Wx was like at the time, but I think he was kinda in No Man's land. He probably had no chance of making Mount Comfort, KMQJ, but might have had a shot at Pope Field in Greenfield, but I don't think it's used much and with snow on the ground, it would probably have been tough to spot... his best shot might have been the private grass strip, about a half mile from my house... but again, with snow on the ground and not being real familiar with the area, he probably made the best choice... other than the whole landing on an interstate... it's Indiana after all, landing in a field right near I-70 might have been smarter, but I wasn't in the cockpit, and everything turned ok...
I found this quote in the comments on the Indy Star website interesting... especially given the fact that this "Organization" is based in Harvard, MA.
"Just one more example of rich people with deathtrap airplanes risking all our lives for their enjoyment. What would have happened if this joker came down on a minivan? Where's the story on that? The day is coming when one of these is going to land on a fuel storage or a power substation and cause some real damage. In this day and age there is no need for rich daredevils putting OUR lives on the line so they can get out of lines at the airport! STOP THE NOISE! Join us at www.stopthenoise.org and let your congressmen and senators know that we are getting sick and tired and want this daily danger stopped!"
Obi Heed Kenobi
Touchdown! Greaser!
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iBo Deeh Ibonek
lmao
I wouldn't be. Rabies is a serious health concern.
Obi Heed Kenobi
Touchdown! Greaser!
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iBo Deeh Ibonek
In regard to that group - they've been around for a little while. A little too tongue-in-cheek on my part!
DISCLAIMER: Because I find such groups to be unreasonable, and because unreasonable groups are prone to do weird things, I in no way mean to state or imply that either the group mentioned, or any member thereof, has rabies.
B
bee_pilot
Guest
I am the pilot that landed the Lance (N2920Q) on I-70. I found this forum and decided to join. I know lots of people have a bunch of questions. I have tried to address them in this note:
I was established in cruise at 7000 ft when I felt slight engine roughness. I barely touched the mixture knob and everything just went quiet. From engine roughness to everything going quiet was about 3 seconds. I shoved the “balls to the walls” and nothing happened. Suddenly, I felt very calm. I did not feel any pressure while this was unfolding. I heard a voice in my head say "best glide speed" and I instinctively trimmed the plane, next I heard "select landing site" and I looked at the GPS as there was a thin cloud layer underneath and saw I-70 and thru a hole in the clouds I saw that east bound had almost half the traffic compared to the west bound. Then I informed the controller that I had an engine out emergency. Now that I think about it, I was supposed to Aviate-Navigate-Communicate and I did that. I had absolutely no other thoughts in my mind, almost like a blank slate. I don't ever remember having focused this hard to keep extrenous information out of my mind and focus on the present. When the controller asked if I wanted to go to an airport 6 miles away, I remembered one of the more experienced pilots tell me “Don’t give up the option in hand for a promise-sight unseen”. Plus, I was losing altitude and would have had to make a 180 degree turn that would have taken more precious altitude, and I remembered discussions during some safety seminars about the merits of highway landing. That made up my mind for me. The controller told me about a county road and I declined because county roads are not wide enough, have ice and snow and almost always have electric poles next to them. The fields did not look appealing because the snow cover made it impossible to determine the contours. By now I had lost almost 1000 feet.
At this stage, I pulled out the checklist and went over emergency re-start procedure. Nothing happened. I did the whole exercise again, nothing. After two tries, I knew I was committed to a landing. By now I was at 3000 feet and going thru a broken cloud layer. I was looking for high tension wires and traffic on I-70. I broke out of the cloud deck at about 2500 feet. I saw two semis, then a car and then there was a space and another car.
The next issue was when to lower the gear. If I did it too soon, I would have more drag, so I decided to do it at about 200 AGL, but then I had to somehow warn the motorists and I could do both if I was low enough for them to see me dropping the gear. I targeted the space between the two cars, kept my speed up as I lowered the gear – it took the longest time for the three greens to show up. Then I did a porpoise move to give the drivers the idea that the plane was in trouble. I remembered an FAA guy once tell us that we MUST open the door just before touchdown, because in case of hard impact, an 1/8th of an inch shrinkage along the door line will seal the door and won’t open. Since I had full tanks of gas which could cause a fire on impact, I had to open the door for quick exit and not pay any attention to the noise. By then I was about 50 AGL and I saw the concrete bridge in the distance and high tension wires beyond. I had to land, I sorely missed having a rear view mirror to see how far behind the rear car was. I pushed the yoke forward, to keep speed up, not stall and to stay far enough ahead of the rear car and did a small flare and landed. I parked the plane on the curb, got out and started directing I-70 traffic away from the plane until the Police showed up.
Upon exiting the plane I called my partner, who is a more experienced pilot, who asked a mechanic to come out from Mt Comfort. The mechanic was there in less than 30 minutes of landing. He checked P-Leads, Plug wires, fluid leaks and indications of ice. He found none. Before this check, we called the FAA to get permission to work on the plane, which the FAA granted. He then started the engine, found it running slightly lean, fixed that and did a full run-up and checked the mags etc. The engine was generating power. My partner had also reached there by then and we had a detailed discussion with the mechanic and then we discussed with the FAA, who gave us permission to take off. We requested first destination to be Mt Comfort and if it ran fine, we would request Eagle Creek taking a Northerly route to avoid population (outside Morris Reservoir) and came in on the Localizer for 21 at Eagle Creek. We requested the police to clear 2 miles of I-70 to allow us to put it back down if it did not give us enough power. They did that.
We took off, got in touch with Indy Approach Control, with me in the left seat and kept the gear down, climbed to 2500 ft and upon reaching Mt Comfort requested a looping route towards the north to use Loc 21 at Eagle Creek. We landed, refueled the plane and put it back in the hangar for the mechanic to work on......
I was established in cruise at 7000 ft when I felt slight engine roughness. I barely touched the mixture knob and everything just went quiet. From engine roughness to everything going quiet was about 3 seconds. I shoved the “balls to the walls” and nothing happened. Suddenly, I felt very calm. I did not feel any pressure while this was unfolding. I heard a voice in my head say "best glide speed" and I instinctively trimmed the plane, next I heard "select landing site" and I looked at the GPS as there was a thin cloud layer underneath and saw I-70 and thru a hole in the clouds I saw that east bound had almost half the traffic compared to the west bound. Then I informed the controller that I had an engine out emergency. Now that I think about it, I was supposed to Aviate-Navigate-Communicate and I did that. I had absolutely no other thoughts in my mind, almost like a blank slate. I don't ever remember having focused this hard to keep extrenous information out of my mind and focus on the present. When the controller asked if I wanted to go to an airport 6 miles away, I remembered one of the more experienced pilots tell me “Don’t give up the option in hand for a promise-sight unseen”. Plus, I was losing altitude and would have had to make a 180 degree turn that would have taken more precious altitude, and I remembered discussions during some safety seminars about the merits of highway landing. That made up my mind for me. The controller told me about a county road and I declined because county roads are not wide enough, have ice and snow and almost always have electric poles next to them. The fields did not look appealing because the snow cover made it impossible to determine the contours. By now I had lost almost 1000 feet.
At this stage, I pulled out the checklist and went over emergency re-start procedure. Nothing happened. I did the whole exercise again, nothing. After two tries, I knew I was committed to a landing. By now I was at 3000 feet and going thru a broken cloud layer. I was looking for high tension wires and traffic on I-70. I broke out of the cloud deck at about 2500 feet. I saw two semis, then a car and then there was a space and another car.
The next issue was when to lower the gear. If I did it too soon, I would have more drag, so I decided to do it at about 200 AGL, but then I had to somehow warn the motorists and I could do both if I was low enough for them to see me dropping the gear. I targeted the space between the two cars, kept my speed up as I lowered the gear – it took the longest time for the three greens to show up. Then I did a porpoise move to give the drivers the idea that the plane was in trouble. I remembered an FAA guy once tell us that we MUST open the door just before touchdown, because in case of hard impact, an 1/8th of an inch shrinkage along the door line will seal the door and won’t open. Since I had full tanks of gas which could cause a fire on impact, I had to open the door for quick exit and not pay any attention to the noise. By then I was about 50 AGL and I saw the concrete bridge in the distance and high tension wires beyond. I had to land, I sorely missed having a rear view mirror to see how far behind the rear car was. I pushed the yoke forward, to keep speed up, not stall and to stay far enough ahead of the rear car and did a small flare and landed. I parked the plane on the curb, got out and started directing I-70 traffic away from the plane until the Police showed up.
Upon exiting the plane I called my partner, who is a more experienced pilot, who asked a mechanic to come out from Mt Comfort. The mechanic was there in less than 30 minutes of landing. He checked P-Leads, Plug wires, fluid leaks and indications of ice. He found none. Before this check, we called the FAA to get permission to work on the plane, which the FAA granted. He then started the engine, found it running slightly lean, fixed that and did a full run-up and checked the mags etc. The engine was generating power. My partner had also reached there by then and we had a detailed discussion with the mechanic and then we discussed with the FAA, who gave us permission to take off. We requested first destination to be Mt Comfort and if it ran fine, we would request Eagle Creek taking a Northerly route to avoid population (outside Morris Reservoir) and came in on the Localizer for 21 at Eagle Creek. We requested the police to clear 2 miles of I-70 to allow us to put it back down if it did not give us enough power. They did that.
We took off, got in touch with Indy Approach Control, with me in the left seat and kept the gear down, climbed to 2500 ft and upon reaching Mt Comfort requested a looping route towards the north to use Loc 21 at Eagle Creek. We landed, refueled the plane and put it back in the hangar for the mechanic to work on......
bbchien
Touchdown! Greaser!
Ice. It's gotta be ice somewhere. Surface at 2200Z was 1C. Sigh.
Hey if you are the pilot of bird, you did fine I hope he finds something, though- water in the strainers, anything.
Hey if you are the pilot of bird, you did fine
I hope he finds something, though- water in the strainers, anything.
kevin47881
Final Approach
Thanks for clarifying some of the not yet understood elements.
More importantly, glad you're o.k and welcome to the board!
More importantly, glad you're o.k and welcome to the board!
Last edited:
Great story, bee!
You might want to send that wirte up to AOPA for a Never Again, although I can't see anything you did wrong.
I say ice, too. When I had my first carb ice encounter it wasn't how I thought it be.
You might want to send that wirte up to AOPA for a Never Again, although I can't see anything you did wrong.
I say ice, too. When I had my first carb ice encounter it wasn't how I thought it be.
jshawley
Pre-takeoff checklist
Hey, Bee Pilot--
Bravo Zulu on how you handled the emergency! And good write-up, both here and in the local paper's online replies. Of course, we all know you're one of those rich kids with one of those dangerous going-to-fall-out-of-the-sky toys!
Bravo Zulu on how you handled the emergency! And good write-up, both here and in the local paper's online replies. Of course, we all know you're one of those rich kids with one of those dangerous going-to-fall-out-of-the-sky toys!
bbchien
Touchdown! Greaser!
Mike I could be wrong, but 2920Q is a '77 32R-300, IIRC it's an injected Lycoming 540. Right now Babar I think is hoping the mech finds SOMETHING as once's confidence in the mount is well....er, not quite solid after one of these.....
tonycondon
Gastons CRO (Chief Dinner Reservation Officer)
great writeup. thanks for joining us, stick around a while.
my first flight in the 421, we lost the right engine just out of the blue, no warning. got it restarted and it ran fine. put some isopropyl or some sort of anti-ice in the tank when we landed and it had no more problems. the problems that leave no evidence are the worst kind...
my first flight in the 421, we lost the right engine just out of the blue, no warning. got it restarted and it ran fine. put some isopropyl or some sort of anti-ice in the tank when we landed and it had no more problems. the problems that leave no evidence are the worst kind...
B
bee_pilot
Guest
I had sumped before take-off as part of my pre-flight and the first thing the mechanic did when he got there was he sumped also and we found no water either time. If it was induction ice, if I had tried a third time, it may have started, because I had alternate air on for a bit - twice and the fuel boost pump had been on too, but at 3000 feet I was getting cold feet. So, I did not try a third time. The fuel servo unit had been rebuilt two months ago, but did not mal-function since or even in the flight from I-70 to our home base. The mechanic did not find any evidence of induction ice either.
The fAA inspectors also sumped yesterday in our hanger and found no water. The alternate air cable and butterfly worked flawlessly.
I want to know what caused this before I put my family in that plane.
The fAA inspectors also sumped yesterday in our hanger and found no water. The alternate air cable and butterfly worked flawlessly.
I want to know what caused this before I put my family in that plane.
bbchien
Touchdown! Greaser!
...ask me how I know about this sort of problem.....sigh.
rottydaddy
En-Route
It's really not funny. Well it is funny, just not "ha-ha" funny.lmao
We are surrounded by these disciples of Chicken Little, and they are closing in.
Think about what happened to Meigs, and how the perps got away with it scot-free, even though that unannounced, secret, and totally illegal demolition could have caused a disaster.
I think I may drop by that there site, but first I need to find some good pics of auto wrecks, along with noise-level charts of urban ground traffic.
K
KennyFlys
Guest
Bee, Kudos for getting on the ground safely without further incident to yourself and others. Like others, I'll be interested in your findings.
Welcome to the board!
Welcome to the board!
gibbons
En-Route
That right there is good advice!
You did good keeping your head and not hurting anyone or bending anything. Best of luck finding out the cause.
t0r0nad0
Pattern Altitude
Great job, Bee! Welcome to POA and stick around for a while!
C
Curly
Guest
This is interesting. I got a phone call from an acquaintance in IN on Wednesday night. He told me that HE was flying the plane (solo - w/o any instructor b/c he has a permit) and that he amazingly landed this plane on the highway. I didn't believe him, checked it out on the internet myself and low and behold find this post from you! Thank you! For the life of me I cannot figure why an adult man (my acquaintance) would lie about something like this. Good grief!
Thanks again for the 'proof' I needed to blow him out of the water about his story.