SR20 down 4 fatalities

It will be interesting to watch the outcome, especially in light of the fact that there was a CFI on board, who, one would think, would have prevented a stall/spin situation (if thats what occurred). Given the damage in the posted picture it seem the impact was a more than regular 'engine out glide angle'.
 
It was very gusty in College Station yesterday morning. Swirling winds and low level shear may have played a role. Sad no matter why.
 
Is there an inherent design flaw with Cirrus aircraft that there are so many crashes?
 
bikert said:
Did he? How can you tell? I think I see where the chute comes out of.
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See the hole in the top of the fuselage right above the "4" in the tail number?
That is where the rocked busted through. That portion is designed to bust out when the rocket fires.
You can see some of the lines coming out of the hole, draped over the front.

Looks like he must have pulled just before impact as I don't even see the chute itself.

All speculation of course. but that is what it looks like.
 
Is it possible that the impact knocked the cover off where the chute comes out and due to the nose "separation" it just pulled the cables out of the fuselage?

I know the nose has the other half of the cables for the chute..if that separated enough it could yank the other part free.

Still, it's a good point, he had a chute, either he was too low to pull or forgot about it, or he DID pull and it was too late.
 
Caramon13 said:
Is it possible that the impact knocked the cover off where the chute comes out and due to the nose "separation" it just pulled the cables out of the fuselage?.
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I'm wondering that too. Or as you wrote, pulled too late.
 
Not his kids, daughters of his girl friend. Let the lawsuits begin.
 
midcap said:
Is there an inherent design flaw with Cirrus aircraft that there are so many crashes?
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Not a flaw per se. But with any aircraft and wing design there are tradeoffs. Cirrus traded some low speed stability and forgiveness for speed. If the pilot isn't on their game this can bite you and often does especially when you mix inexperience and shiny G1000 syndrome in. Some subscribe to the belief that the 'chute provides the pilot with bravado.

Ultimately wing design is a game of tradeoffs and what they chose isn't inherently forgiving.
 
Mtns2Skies said:
Not a flaw per se. But with any aircraft and wing design there are tradeoffs. Cirrus traded some low speed stability and forgiveness for speed. If the pilot isn't on their game this can bite you and often does especially when you mix inexperience and shiny G1000 syndrome in. Some subscribe to the belief that the 'chute provides the pilot with bravado.

Ultimately wing design is a game of tradeoffs and what they chose isn't inherently forgiving.
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thanks for the reply, that makes a lot of sense now. I asked because these crashes seem to be different than the old Split tale bonanza crashes back in the day.
 
I don't know the SOP, but it's possible rescue responders fired the rocket so that it would no longer be a hazard while they worked.
 
midcap said:
thanks for the reply, that makes a lot of sense now. I asked because these crashes seem to be different than the old Split tale bonanza crashes back in the day.
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Maybe speed or lack of slower speed forgiveness.
A Cessna and Bo both went down yesterday. No fatalities.
But maybe Cirrus gets discussed more because there are strong opinions about it.

http://www.wuft.org/news/2016/02/28/plane-lands-on-waldo-road-south-of-gainesville-regional-airport/

http://fox59.com/2016/02/27/carmel-...ian-after-experiencing-mechanical-difficulty/
 
SixPapaCharlie said:
Maybe speed or lack of slower speed forgiveness.
A Cessna and Bo both went down yesterday. No fatalities.
But maybe Cirrus gets discussed more because there are strong opinions about it.
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Energy is related exponentially to velocity. IOW If you are going twice as fast there is four times the energy. Cessna's and bo's have relatively fatter wings and lower stall speeds so when they impact they'll be going slower and thus more survivable.

Again, it's not a flaw of cirrus necessarily, just the tradeoffs they chose.
 
Mtns2Skies said:
Energy is related exponentially to velocity. IOW If you are going twice as fast there is four times the energy. Cessna's and bo's have relatively fatter wings and lower stall speeds so when they impact they'll be going slower and thus more survivable.

Again, it's not a flaw of cirrus necessarily, just the tradeoffs they chose.
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very interesting, "the more you know"
 
SixPapaCharlie said:
Maybe speed or lack of slower speed forgiveness.
A Cessna and Bo both went down yesterday. No fatalities.
But maybe Cirrus gets discussed more because there are strong opinions about it.

http://www.wuft.org/news/2016/02/28/plane-lands-on-waldo-road-south-of-gainesville-regional-airport/

http://fox59.com/2016/02/27/carmel-...ian-after-experiencing-mechanical-difficulty/
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possibly, like you said there are definitely strong opinions about the Cirrus aircraft.
 
There was no chute pull
Well regarded and seasoned Texas flight instructor and family friends on board.
Potential base to final stall spin in wind shear.
RIP
 
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Dang, that hits close to home. The winds here in CTX weren't too bad yesterday morning but maybe Navasota was windier, no idea. Bad windshear is no fun with sufficient airspeed, the risk could be mitigated.

Definitely sucks to see another loss of life. (whether children or adults, let's not start another debate on who's more important)
R.I.P.

Very curious what the NTSB will be able to piece together. The absence of FDRs and CVRs in small GA aircraft does not make their job exactly easy.
 
midcap said:
Is there an inherent design flaw with Cirrus aircraft that there are so many crashes?
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As others have said, not a design flaw, per sé.

But the same design that makes the wing stall resistant can make the stall more dramatic if pushed.

I've probably done a couple hundred stall series in Cirrus aircraft, and the stall behavior always seemed benign to me. But there were enough tales of very dramatic wing drops out of a stall that I treated them with a lot of respect. And tried to do the at least 4,000' agl with the chute always in mind.

There are two pretty dramatic video reconstructions of Cirrus spins from low altitude, resulting in fatalities. Let me know if you haven't seen them and I'll try to seek them out.
 
midcap said:
Is there an inherent design flaw with Cirrus aircraft that there are so many crashes?
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No, just with their marketing, geared towards those with lots of money and no flight time, in a high performance aircraft. Doesn't surprise me, play stupid games, win stupid prizes.
 
KSCessnaDriver said:
No, just with their marketing, geared towards those with lots of money and no flight time, in a high performance aircraft. Doesn't surprise me, play stupid games, win stupid prizes.
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you do know that the average cirrus pilot has over 500 hours, right? you also know that the cirrus of today is the bonanza of yesterday, right? they didn't get the doctor killer moniker because the poor were crashing them...
 
The winds here weren't that bad then, but it could have been worse there. Saturday afternoon I was flying back from Brenham and it was a rather rough ride near Navasota, though. It settled down as we got closer to Houston.
 
retailguy said:
you do know that the average cirrus pilot has over 500 hours, right? you also know that the cirrus of today is the bonanza of yesterday, right? they didn't get the doctor killer moniker because the poor were crashing them...
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Exactly my point, more money than brains & skill, I'm surprised they don't crash more.
 
KSCessnaDriver said:
Exactly my point, more money than brains & skill, I'm surprised they don't crash more.
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There was a CFI on board right?
So as far as skill....

I mean any pilot's first time in a Cirrus (or any new plane) with a CFI is predicated upon bringing someone w/ that extra needed skill you might be lacking.

It would be one thing if this pilot took the plane and said "I don't need help" and crashed.
This pilot did the right thing. He seems to have known his limitations and brought a CFI along.

What more do you want? I wish the kids weren't on board but other than that. This is what people do, they get transition training.
You criticize a pilot for his lack of skill and he was getting training.

This is nonsense.
 
retailguy said:
you do know that the average cirrus pilot has over 500 hours, right? you also know that the cirrus of today is the bonanza of yesterday, right? they didn't get the doctor killer moniker because the poor were crashing them...
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Probably a lot of cross-country, trips, less time on flying around the envelope.
 
SixPapaCharlie said:
There was a CFI on board right?
So as far as skill....

I mean any pilot's first time in a Cirrus (or any new plane) with a CFI is predicated upon bringing someone w/ that extra needed skill you might be lacking.

It would be one thing if this pilot took the plane and said "I don't need help" and crashed.
This pilot did the right thing. He seems to have known his limitations and brought a CFI along.

What more do you want? I wish the kids weren't on board but other than that. This is what people do, they get transition training.
You criticize a pilot for his lack of skill and he was getting training.

This is nonsense.
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I want Cirrus to stop their marketing, which is indirectly killing people. Hopefully, one of these fatals ends up with a massive lawsuit to their Chinese overlords. Until the marketing to extremely low time pilots of high performance airplanes ends, you will end up with this crap. Anytime I hear of a GA crash, first guess is a Cirrus, and generally, its right.

Did the right thing? Obviously not, or they wouldn't be dead.
 
KSCessnaDriver said:
I want Cirrus to stop their marketing, which is indirectly killing people.
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All airplane marketing since the beginning of the airplane has killed people indirectly.

Ask Thomas Selfridge if he believed Orville and Wilbur that it was safe.

Or anyone who knows Cessna Land-O-Matic landing gear... Doesn't.

Cirrus is simply this generation's popular aircraft among those with the means to fly. Their marketing is no different than any other company.

Boeing and Airbus say they're totally safe too. How well does that work back into Boeing's overall history from the beginning?
 
Now we're blaming airplane crashes on MARKETING? Good grief.

This is the way Cessna used to market their airplanes. It's much more "aggressive" than what Cirrus is doing today -- and I see nothing wrong with it:


Airplanes are time machines. Some people have trouble with them. That's not Cirrus's fault.
 
That video is awesome.

Nowadays the math would be a little different:

"So Tom showed me how to convince my wife that we could take the hit financially. He showed me it could be done with only needing to take out a 3rd mortgage on the house and not telling her. We found ways I could completely hide the costs of flying for 3 or 4 years before she realizes we are bankrupt. Those are going to be the best 3 years. Then Tom went on to explain when she divorces me, she can't rake me over the coals because she gets half of everything but half of zero is zero."
 
mkosmo said:
The winds here weren't that bad then, but it could have been worse there. Saturday afternoon I was flying back from Brenham and it was a rather rough ride near Navasota, though. It settled down as we got closer to Houston.
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They went down Sunday, not Saturday. Conditions were benign Saturday in the area. Sunday started out the same, but became windy and very gusty.
 
Jay Honeck said:
Now we're blaming airplane crashes on MARKETING? Good grief.

This is the way Cessna used to market their airplanes. It's much more "aggressive" than what Cirrus is doing today -- and I see nothing wrong with it:


Airplanes are time machines. Some people have trouble with them. That's not Cirrus's fault.
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I think this video is the answer to revive GA.
 
SixPapaCharlie said:
There was a CFI on board right?
So as far as skill....

I mean any pilot's first time in a Cirrus (or any new plane) with a CFI is predicated upon bringing someone w/ that extra needed skill you might be lacking.

It would be one thing if this pilot took the plane and said "I don't need help" and crashed.
This pilot did the right thing. He seems to have known his limitations and brought a CFI along.

What more do you want? I wish the kids weren't on board but other than that. This is what people do, they get transition training.
You criticize a pilot for his lack of skill and he was getting training.

This is nonsense.
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That's why I asked about the Cirrus. CFI on board and all.
 
PPC1052 said:
I think this video is the answer to revive GA.
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I agree. The fact that the aircraft manufacturers have essentially given up marketing to non-pilots speaks volumes about how they view the future of GA.

While the numbers would have to be tweaked, the overall message of the video remains the same: Flying is easy, safe, fun, and saves time. Until we stop making piloting out to be some sort of superhuman activity, GA will shrink.

And before you trot out the "Look at this accident that proves flying is not safe" argument, I don't see Chevrolet withdrawing from the sports car market because of all the Corvettes crashing. "Safe" is a relative term, and until we reassert the fact that no motor vehicle is safe when improperly operated, we are doomed.
 
Jay Honeck said:
I agree. The fact that the aircraft manufacturers have essentially given up marketing to non-pilots speaks volumes about how they view the future of GA.

While the numbers would have to be tweaked, the overall message of the video remains the same: Flying is easy, safe, fun, and saves time. Until we stop making piloting out to be some sort of superhuman activity, GA will shrink.

And before you trot out the "Look at this accident that proves flying is not safe" argument, I don't see Chevrolet withdrawing from the sports car market because of all the Corvettes crashing. "Safe" is a relative term, and until we reassert the fact that no motor vehicle is safe when improperly operated, we are doomed.
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I don't dispute the marketing points you make. I just think that the style of the video is so awesomely out of date.
 
PPC1052 said:
I don't dispute the marketing points you make. I just think that the style of the video is so awesomely out of date.
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No doubt! But that's the way the world really was in the early 60s. Those couples could easily be my parents, from the smoking to their clothing, furniture, and speech patterns.

The only unrealistic thing? I didn't see any martinis in the video. As any Mad Men fan knows, that generation knew how to party, and did so daily.
 
I really enjoyed that video. The media really makes a big deal out of ga accidents these days. I don't think most people comprehend how much planes are used in people's day to day life style.
I have one friend who lives 5 minutes from an airport and works 2.5 hours away (in traffic) 5 minutes from an airport. I have taken him flying and told showed him how even a small plane like a 150 would get him there in only 30 minutes but he just doesn't think it's for him.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
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