Bowie did it better...
Lesson 1: Carb ice can be insidious. Based on my training, I expected the engine would run rough, I'd pull carb heat, life would be grand. None of that happened. I really don't understand carb ice.
Lesson 2: Being lucky is a good thing.
Lesson 3: Landing in a pasture is not something you really get to train on.
Lesson 4: Even though roads are generally a bad place to land, you should at least look at them.
Lesson 5: First responders are awesome.
Lesson 6: The NTSB and FAA have been great to work with.
Lesson 7: You can make yourself nuts playing 'coulda shoulda woulda'...but there's no do-over for a crash.
Lesson 8: You news people...it was not an 'Attempted' emergency landing...it was an actual landing...you know...the whole 'do or do not, there is no try' thing?
I was flying from KGVL to 1A5 (Macon County NC) doing follow the road navigation. It was a beautiful day, just above freezing when I left at 9 am with temps rising during the flight. Total time for the flight was just about an hour.
I was about 10 miles south of the airport at 4500 and pulled the throttle from 2350 to about 2200 to begin a slow descent to pattern altitude. This is the same thing I do on nearly every flight and had done several times during this flight during short descents. I don't pull carb heat unless the engine gets rough or at the point I am abeam the numbers and drop the to 1500 rpm for my descent to the runway.
The engine never got rough. I'm not even sure how I realized it wasn't running (perhaps I added throttle to change my descent rate?). First reaction: This is NOT happening. Second reaction: pull carb heat, full rich, make sure fuel is on. Expectation: Engine will crank right up. Reality: it had been either running at no load or off long enough for the exhaust manifold to cool down so carb heat was non-existent. I tried mucking with the throttle, the mixture, and turned the starter...no go.
Ohhhh kay. Find a place to land. I'm just off US 441 but, based on the idea that roads are rarely a good idea, I didn't even look at it. It had been very busy all the way up from Toccoa so I figured it was not a good choice. Most fields nearby had cows or power lines. One field to the west of 441 looked clear so I made for that. I was low enough I just did a cross-wind/downwind/turn to final approach. There were sparse trees on the south end and a wall of trees on the north; I was landing south to north.
As I was about to turn final, I remembered to call a mayday. The airport is behind a hill and I later learned that they really didn't hear my call. Luckily, a Duke Energy chopper was in the area, heard the call, relayed it to the airport, then let me know he was on his way toward me.
The turn to final was like every other engine out I'd practiced; too high and too fast. I pulled full flaps over the trees but, by this time, was starting to get tunnel vision and forgot to try a forward slip to kill altitude.
By the time I was parallel to the building on the east side of the field, I was looking at a wall of trees, was still too fast and too high. When I looked at CloudAhoy later, I was doing about 60 knots ground speed and if I'd stayed with the original plan, I'd not be writing this. There was clear land to the east of my path so I banked right to miss the tree line.
One of my wheels (probably right main) dug an 11' gash in a berm on the west side of 441 them bounced me up into the air where I arced over 441, then down and hit a berm on the east side of the highway. The prop got caught in barb wire and the plane flipped. This flight path killed off nearly all the kinetic energy in the plane. I hit the berm at somewhere between 15 and 30 knots and never even kicked off the ELT (starts at a 4G hit).
Open door, undo harness, fall on head, climb out.
I didn't hit any cars. I don't think anyone had to make a panic stop, and I didn't get t-boned by a semi. When I flipped, the tail missed the power line over the fence.
Before I exited the plane, people from 441 were heading to make sure I was OK and I could hear the emergency vehicles coming. The Duke chopper was overhead and stayed around until he knew he wasn't needed. The cows in the field stopped by to say hi before the ranch hand moved them to another pasture.
I went back to the site a week later and discovered that just past the building on the lot I was trying to land on there was a 2-ish foot bank with at least one large metal pipe sticking up. If I'd managed to get on the ground, I'd most likely have hit the bank and the pipe.
The field was about 1500' tree line to tree line with the bank maybe 100' from the trees. I'd have had to totally stick the landing to save the plane. I am no Chuck Yeager...
441 might have been an option. The road, for much of its length through GA, SC, and NC is crossed by power and telephone lines every 100 yards or so. The section I was near was clear. If traffic had been light, it would have been a good place to land.
If I'd been a bit further north, I'd have been totally screwed as I'd have been into the town of Franklin without enough altitude to get to the airport.
If I'd been a bit further south, it would have been more difficult a the fields were rougher and tended to either have livestock or power lines.
I count myself as a very lucky person to be here today. I had a few bruises and scrapes but nothing that required more than a bit of gauze. I didn't hit any property (other than 2 6' strands of barb wire), any cars, any people, any cows, or any power lines. My glasses got scratched and a bit bent. My iPad was fine. My phone (which had been on the right seat) landed inside the instrument panel and was fine.....
And with that, I am leaving aviation at least for a while. I'm not having panic attacks when I think about flying but my desire to fly has just evaporated. One day, I may wake up and decide I really want to be back in the air but for now, I am done.
Here are links to the after crash photos and the CloudAhoy 'video'. The best way to look at the flight is to move to about 48 minutes into the flight, switch the view options to 3D cockpit with satellite and glass cockpit layer. You can slide the left panel out of the way and kill any graphs in the main window.
The turn to final jitters in the 'video' but that's just some artifact. The building and trees are not realistically rendered (no height). You also don't see the 'flip' at the end. Other than that, it's pretty damned realistic.
If you go back to the top down view you can see the flight path and the options I had available for landing.
CloudAhoy
Accident Photos
Lesson 1: Carb ice can be insidious. Based on my training, I expected the engine would run rough, I'd pull carb heat, life would be grand. None of that happened. I really don't understand carb ice.
Lesson 2: Being lucky is a good thing.
Lesson 3: Landing in a pasture is not something you really get to train on.
Lesson 4: Even though roads are generally a bad place to land, you should at least look at them.
Lesson 5: First responders are awesome.
Lesson 6: The NTSB and FAA have been great to work with.
Lesson 7: You can make yourself nuts playing 'coulda shoulda woulda'...but there's no do-over for a crash.
Lesson 8: You news people...it was not an 'Attempted' emergency landing...it was an actual landing...you know...the whole 'do or do not, there is no try' thing?
I was flying from KGVL to 1A5 (Macon County NC) doing follow the road navigation. It was a beautiful day, just above freezing when I left at 9 am with temps rising during the flight. Total time for the flight was just about an hour.
I was about 10 miles south of the airport at 4500 and pulled the throttle from 2350 to about 2200 to begin a slow descent to pattern altitude. This is the same thing I do on nearly every flight and had done several times during this flight during short descents. I don't pull carb heat unless the engine gets rough or at the point I am abeam the numbers and drop the to 1500 rpm for my descent to the runway.
The engine never got rough. I'm not even sure how I realized it wasn't running (perhaps I added throttle to change my descent rate?). First reaction: This is NOT happening. Second reaction: pull carb heat, full rich, make sure fuel is on. Expectation: Engine will crank right up. Reality: it had been either running at no load or off long enough for the exhaust manifold to cool down so carb heat was non-existent. I tried mucking with the throttle, the mixture, and turned the starter...no go.
Ohhhh kay. Find a place to land. I'm just off US 441 but, based on the idea that roads are rarely a good idea, I didn't even look at it. It had been very busy all the way up from Toccoa so I figured it was not a good choice. Most fields nearby had cows or power lines. One field to the west of 441 looked clear so I made for that. I was low enough I just did a cross-wind/downwind/turn to final approach. There were sparse trees on the south end and a wall of trees on the north; I was landing south to north.
As I was about to turn final, I remembered to call a mayday. The airport is behind a hill and I later learned that they really didn't hear my call. Luckily, a Duke Energy chopper was in the area, heard the call, relayed it to the airport, then let me know he was on his way toward me.
The turn to final was like every other engine out I'd practiced; too high and too fast. I pulled full flaps over the trees but, by this time, was starting to get tunnel vision and forgot to try a forward slip to kill altitude.
By the time I was parallel to the building on the east side of the field, I was looking at a wall of trees, was still too fast and too high. When I looked at CloudAhoy later, I was doing about 60 knots ground speed and if I'd stayed with the original plan, I'd not be writing this. There was clear land to the east of my path so I banked right to miss the tree line.
One of my wheels (probably right main) dug an 11' gash in a berm on the west side of 441 them bounced me up into the air where I arced over 441, then down and hit a berm on the east side of the highway. The prop got caught in barb wire and the plane flipped. This flight path killed off nearly all the kinetic energy in the plane. I hit the berm at somewhere between 15 and 30 knots and never even kicked off the ELT (starts at a 4G hit).
Open door, undo harness, fall on head, climb out.
I didn't hit any cars. I don't think anyone had to make a panic stop, and I didn't get t-boned by a semi. When I flipped, the tail missed the power line over the fence.
Before I exited the plane, people from 441 were heading to make sure I was OK and I could hear the emergency vehicles coming. The Duke chopper was overhead and stayed around until he knew he wasn't needed. The cows in the field stopped by to say hi before the ranch hand moved them to another pasture.
I went back to the site a week later and discovered that just past the building on the lot I was trying to land on there was a 2-ish foot bank with at least one large metal pipe sticking up. If I'd managed to get on the ground, I'd most likely have hit the bank and the pipe.
The field was about 1500' tree line to tree line with the bank maybe 100' from the trees. I'd have had to totally stick the landing to save the plane. I am no Chuck Yeager...
441 might have been an option. The road, for much of its length through GA, SC, and NC is crossed by power and telephone lines every 100 yards or so. The section I was near was clear. If traffic had been light, it would have been a good place to land.
If I'd been a bit further north, I'd have been totally screwed as I'd have been into the town of Franklin without enough altitude to get to the airport.
If I'd been a bit further south, it would have been more difficult a the fields were rougher and tended to either have livestock or power lines.
I count myself as a very lucky person to be here today. I had a few bruises and scrapes but nothing that required more than a bit of gauze. I didn't hit any property (other than 2 6' strands of barb wire), any cars, any people, any cows, or any power lines. My glasses got scratched and a bit bent. My iPad was fine. My phone (which had been on the right seat) landed inside the instrument panel and was fine.....
And with that, I am leaving aviation at least for a while. I'm not having panic attacks when I think about flying but my desire to fly has just evaporated. One day, I may wake up and decide I really want to be back in the air but for now, I am done.
Here are links to the after crash photos and the CloudAhoy 'video'. The best way to look at the flight is to move to about 48 minutes into the flight, switch the view options to 3D cockpit with satellite and glass cockpit layer. You can slide the left panel out of the way and kill any graphs in the main window.
The turn to final jitters in the 'video' but that's just some artifact. The building and trees are not realistically rendered (no height). You also don't see the 'flip' at the end. Other than that, it's pretty damned realistic.
If you go back to the top down view you can see the flight path and the options I had available for landing.
CloudAhoy
Accident Photos
