Piper / PA-28RT-201T crash 4/20/2021 Preliminary

Mrtibs

Mrtibs

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Tibs
The preliminary report on this accident has me seriously confused.

Why would a CFI authorize a student pilot to fly hundreds of miles on a solo cross country?

The CFI thought it would be ok as long as student pilot left in the early afternoon and signed off on the flight!

"There are Old pilots and there are Bold pilots but there are no Old Bold pilots!"
 

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Not much is said of the passenger that was killed in this crash flying with the student pilot.

I also wonder why an instructor would sign off a student for a three hour flight of over 500 miles knowing that bad weather was forecast?

The student pilot had over 90 hours so there's that ...
 
The passenger was the student pilot's 70+ yrs old mother.
 
Daleandee said:
Not much is said of the passenger that was killed in this crash flying with the student pilot.

I also wonder why an instructor would sign off a student for a three hour flight of over 500 miles knowing that bad weather was forecast?

The student pilot had over 90 hours so there's that ...
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I saw two comments from Facebook - Aviation Accidents

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So unnecessary.

I had a guy ask me about being a pilot before. He was pretty interested, after describing how to get a license he asked me, " is there a lot of book learning and studying, I'm not into that." I told him there was, without it you can learn enough to kill yourself,but the studying part wasn't too bad if you're not in a rush. He decided he couldn't be bothered.
 
Wow this one is strange but nothing surprises me anymore...the departure was local to me I will have to ask around.
 
Correct me if I am wrong, but it is illegal for a student pilot to carry a passenger, right?
 
Mrtibs said:
Why would a CFI authorize a student pilot to fly hundreds of miles on a solo cross country?
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Inexperience or indifference?

He's about to get a lesson via the backroom of the FAA about it, though. I can't fathom signing this XC with incoming weather under any circumstances. The story about a sick relative is just another red flag and would warn me off of signing it -- and tell the dude to get onto a Delta flight.

Shame.
 
Somedudeintn said:
Yes, you are correct. It is also illegal to fly in IMC while VFR. Unfortunately not all follow the rules.
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Roger, but IMC entry can be accidental, while a passenger is a deliberate decision.

Worst part of it is the poor lady trusting her son. What an ass.
 
Ed Haywood said:
Roger, but IMC entry can be accidental, while a passenger is a deliberate decision.

Worst part of it is the poor lady trusting her son. What an ass.
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When I was a student, there was zero chance of hitting IMC whilst solo, because of the rules our flight school had laid down. But, hey, I tend to follow most rules.
 
Daleandee said:
Not much is said of the passenger that was killed in this crash flying with the student pilot.

I also wonder why an instructor would sign off a student for a three hour flight of over 500 miles knowing that bad weather was forecast?

The student pilot had over 90 hours so there's that ...
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What was the weather for three or four hours prior to actual flight, when he should have been in the air?
 
I'm surprised no one is giving the CFI any grief. Why would anyone want blood on their hands? If this guy was such a pompous character why is the CFI signing him off on very long cross country flights.. and clearly turning the other way with all his allegedly well known transgressions?

Sucks, but it's more angering than sad. People like him make the flying perception that much worse for the rest of us.

If not criminal, the CFI should certainly be put under a strong review. This accident was almost 100% preventable.
 
wsuffa said:
This is why new regulations are created. We all pay for this sort of stuff.
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Why? I think there are plenty of regulations that covered this flight. He violated all of them.
 
Tantalum said:
I'm surprised no one is giving the CFI any grief....If not criminal, the CFI should certainly be put under a strong review. This accident was almost 100% preventable.
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It’s obvious the CFI is not in a good place now. Perhaps the student pilot was unscrupulous enough to find a novice CFI that was not familiar with him like the others. Regardless a CFI should know better and should not have signed off on this. It does surprise me that the student pilot even bothered to get the XC endorsement. Maybe he was thinking one of the locals would rat on him, if he disregarded the sign-offs too.
 
Tantalum said:
I'm surprised no one is giving the CFI any grief. Why would anyone want blood on their hands? If this guy was such a pompous character why is the CFI signing him off on very long cross country flights.. and clearly turning the other way with all his allegedly well known transgressions?

Sucks, but it's more angering than sad. People like him make the flying perception that much worse for the rest of us.

If not criminal, the CFI should certainly be put under a strong review. This accident was almost 100% preventable.
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TrueCourse said:
It’s obvious the CFI is not in a good place now. Perhaps the student pilot was unscrupulous enough to find a novice CFI that was not familiar with him like the others. Regardless a CFI should know better and should not have signed off on this. It does surprise me that the student pilot even bothered to get the XC endorsement. Maybe he was thinking one of the locals would rat on him, if he disregarded the sign-offs too.
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I'm thinking this guy was very persuasive, unfortunately the CFI will have to live with this.
 
I mean.. there's "I'm new to this and we he was a nice guy and I didn't know any better" vs "yeah, I think it makes sense for a student to fly 500 miles into dubious weather conditions"
 
I would heavily question this CFI's judgement just based on that fact alone.
 
Tantalum said:
I would heavily question this CFI's judgement just based on that fact alone.
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I'm thinking the CFI may have been brow beaten into it, that the only reasonable explanation I can see. But even that becomes a judgement issue.
 
midwestpa24 said:
Why? I think there are plenty of regulations that covered this flight. He violated all of them.
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Since when did that stop a politician? Yes he violated all those that applied. Clearly it wasn't enough, so we need more in the eyes of many politicians.

I could rattle off a bunch of laws in various other areas that were created because people violated the existing laws, but I'm not going to do so because it would take us squarely into "spin" territory and get the thread locked.
 
Kenny Phillips said:
What was the weather for three or four hours prior to actual flight, when he should have been in the air?
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The report really didn't give that info. But it seemed that an earlier departure time and day VFR was the expectation that the CFI was signing off on. From the report:

The flight instructor stated that “it was supposed to be a daytime flight” and he expected the pilot to depart no later than 1300 or 1400, due to the weather coming in later in the day and nighttime conditions.
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Tantalum said:
This accident was almost 100% preventable.
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While I agree with you, this particular accident was appears to not have been preventable with the person/pilot involved. It sounds as if the person involved was going no matter what and no rules, talk of weather or anything short of physical violence was going to stop him. Just really sad he took his mom out with him.

I know of another person in Alaska that had their own rules to flying. A few ''interventions'' were held to try to talk her into changing her view. I mean this person would land or take off without talking on the radio no matter if another plane was using the runway or not. It was to the point others would announce her position for the safety of others. It all came to an end one afternoon in the Arctic Ocean, with her mother sitting right seat. The plane, C-F406 was found but was unable to be recovered.

https://aviation-safety.net/database/record.php?id=20030817-0
 
PaulS said:
So unnecessary.

I had a guy ask me about being a pilot before. He was pretty interested, after describing how to get a license he asked me, " is there a lot of book learning and studying, I'm not into that." I told him there was, without it you can learn enough to kill yourself,but the studying part wasn't too bad if you're not in a rush. He decided he couldn't be bothered.
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A lot of book learning and studying ? Perhaps as compared to a preschool but that’s about that ...
 
Warmi said:
A lot of book learning and studying ? Perhaps as compared to a preschool but that’s about that ...
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Might as well be a phd in quantum physics if you are unwilling to crack a book, or video.
 
Kenny Phillips said:
What was the weather for three or four hours prior to actual flight, when he should have been in the air?
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sunny and clear. I don’t think the cfi was particularly negligent in signing off a very long XC for a 90 hour student. In the daytime, with known good weather, it is a learning opportunity.

But when the student is a scofflaw anyway, does it even matter?
 
I’m sure at some point we’ve all had the pleasure of dealing with ****oles like this guy in some form or fashion. For most of my life I’ve chosen to just ignore them whenever I come in contact with them. Maybe it’s because I’m getting older or maybe because it seems to be happening on an ever increasing rate that I’m not going to keep ignoring it. It’s time to start calling these idiots out. I’ve never been “that guy” but I’m seeing to many people doing asinine things these days. Sometimes nature has a way of flushing crap like this guy down the toilet. Unfortunately he took his mother with him
 
Daleandee said:
The report really didn't give that info. But it seemed that an earlier departure time and day VFR was the expectation that the CFI was signing off on. From the report:
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This is where instructors have to be willing to write limitations into their endorsements...
 
RyanShort1 said:
This is where instructors have to be willing to write limitations into their endorsements...
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We agree. But as others have argued, quite successfully I might add, this guy wasn't about following the rules. Everskyward just asked my question about why he even bothered to get the endorsement at all. Maybe it was to make his mom feel comfortable about flying with him. Sad if that's true ...
 
Everskyward said:
Do you think that would have stopped this pilot? I'm surprised he bothered getting an endorsement at all.
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Having the discussion about the limitations is a step in the process. My guess is that it probably wouldn't stop this outcome in particular, but it also would provide a layer of protection for the CFI from the FAA and legal stuff. If you don't do it, there's no way of knowing... and then there are the guys that do go ahead and "just do it." Found out a student of mine had been taking his plane X/C to Austin without a signoff back when I was teaching at 5C1. Think he has his license now, but that was when I quit teaching him.

ETA: Wow... just Googled my former student and he's apparently in prison for bank and tax fraud. Technically he still owes me $400, too...
 
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RyanShort1 said:
Having the discussion about the limitations is a step in the process. My guess is that it probably wouldn't stop this outcome in particular, but it also would provide a layer of protection for the CFI from the FAA and legal stuff. If you don't do it, there's no way of knowing... and then there are the guys that do go ahead and "just do it." Found out a student of mine had been taking his plane X/C to Austin without a signoff back when I was teaching at 5C1. Think he has his license now, but that was when I quit teaching him.

ETA: Wow... just Googled my former student and he's apparently in prison for bank and tax fraud. Technically he still owes me $400, too...
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Go for it when he gets out. It might be Judge Judy worthy
 
RyanShort1 said:
ETA: Wow... just Googled my former student and he's apparently in prison for bank and tax fraud. Technically he still owes me $400, too...
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I don't think you're going to get your money.
 
From the report, “The flight instructor reported that the pilot told him the purpose of the trip was to visit a family member that had recently been admitted to the hospital. “

Hindsight and all that, but that statement indicates to me a higher than normal amount of personal stress on the mishap pilot for this flight. I don’t know that not endorsing the pilot for the flight would have made a difference, but there just seems to be a lot of questionable decision-making by the CFI with a 90-hr student/owner.
 
The "90 hour student" part troubles me. I realize there are some folks that get in situations that can require a drawn out process but I also know a couple of students that have a bunch of hours and one of them has yet to even solo. When talking with him I suspect I know why that is ... :rolleyes:
 
TCABM said:
but there just seems to be a lot of questionable decision-making by the CFI with a 90-hr student/owner.
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Yeah.. that should have "stay away" screaming for any potential cfi
 
Daleandee said:
The "90 hour student" part troubles me....
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With just the facts of a 2019 purchase, high-performance complex aircraft, it doesn’t surprise me at all to see a 90-hr student without even knowing the avionics package and taking into consideration what 2020 looked like.
 
Daleandee said:
The "90 hour student" part troubles me. I realize there are some folks that get in situations that can require a drawn out process but I also know a couple of students that have a bunch of hours and one of them has yet to even solo. When talking with him I suspect I know why that is ... :rolleyes:
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In fairness, I helped a guy get to a checkride that had about that many hours after being cycled in what appeared to be a "milking" fashion by a Part 141 school. I finished him up in about 10 hours. It's hard to know for sure who's at fault when you are just the next CFI they talk to, and you don't have more, or enough background info. For all we know, the guy might have told the CFI convincing stories that seemed legit.
 
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