Darwin Award Apprentice - Landing on Residential Street

WakeNCAgent

WakeNCAgent

Pre-takeoff checklist
Joined
Dec 13, 2012
Messages
133
Location
Raleigh, NC
Display Name
Display name:
Louis
I heard about this story but didn't believe it could be true. This student pilot mistook a residential tree-lined street for the airport which was just 1.5 miles away. How is this even possible? If you look at the street scene photos in the Kathryn's report you will see just how large and close to the street the trees were. It's an incredible story.

Be sure to scroll to the bottom of the Kathryn's report for the pilot's comments. Classic!

NTSB Report:
http://www.ntsb.gov/aviationquery/brief2.aspx?ev_id=20111122X34719&ntsbno=ERA12CA082&akey=1

Kathryn's Report:
http://www.kathrynsreport.com/2011/11/cirrus-sr22-gps-error-student-pilot.html
 
I was baffled until I read 23 yr old student pilot.
I'm not gonna lie. I am still a little baffled just a little less so.
 
2007 model. All glass? Following the magenta line?

People have driven their cars into lakes following the TomTom sitting on the dash. Probably the same difference here.

All certainly seem to be Darwin candidates.
 
Of course, this was from 2011, so this student pilot may actually be a licensed pilot by now. Or he may be dead.
 
Nothing unusual. People have been known to turn precisely when their GPS says to and found themselves on railroad tracks facing a train.

Some folks just ain't too bright. :mad2:
 
Probably flying a bunch of people on a Airbus today.
 
Mistook an airport for a street once (damn thing was NARROW) but not the other way around. Look at it this way, no one was hurt, the Cirrus doesn't look too banged up, and I bet he never does it again. I've seen dumber pilot tricks.
 
https://goo.gl/maps/Mdz5h

I wonder what direction he was coming from? I didn't read the reports that closely.

If he came in from the east, the magenta line could have been right over top of the road and it ran in the same direction as the rwy. Or he could have been zoomed out to a 200 mile range, too.
 
I have circled airports a few times goin "I know it's down there but I don't see it"
But I can't imagine landing not knowing for sure if this is a runway or a road.
 
Psychological traits at play here:

Task fixation.

Confirmation bias.

I'm sure there are others.

For those who think they're immune to this sort of thing, good luck to you.

In any case, another argument for overflying the field and checking thing out as a general habit. Not to say that was not done in this case, but its a good way to get the lay of the land and might have nipped this mishap in the bud.
 
FastEddieB said:
I imagine the pilot in question would have said the same thing.

Sometimes, "I can't imagine..." simply shows a lack of imagination! ;)
Click to expand...


HAHA I am sure there will be days when I have to eat my words.
I hope it's never in a plane.
 
From the article:
Dave Torro saw the plane land in his neighborhood and tells 10 News he spoke with the pilot afterwards. According to Torro, the pilot was from China and did not speak English well.​

​
​
"He said, 'We land here all the time ... this is Pilot Country.' And I'm like, 'No. It's not. This is a horse community and you got them mixed up,'" Torro recalls.
​
Click to expand...

​
 
There is nothing like knocking over a mailbox with your wingtip to alert you to the notion that you may have made a slight navigational error. :rolleyes:
 
This was in 2011. He's now a captain for Asiana airlines.
 
WakeNCAgent said:
I heard about this story but didn't believe it could be true. This student pilot mistook a residential tree-lined street for the airport which was just 1.5 miles away. How is this even possible? If you look at the street scene photos in the Kathryn's report you will see just how large and close to the street the trees were. It's an incredible story.

Be sure to scroll to the bottom of the Kathryn's report for the pilot's comments. Classic!

NTSB Report:
http://www.ntsb.gov/aviationquery/brief2.aspx?ev_id=20111122X34719&ntsbno=ERA12CA082&akey=1

Kathryn's Report:
http://www.kathrynsreport.com/2011/11/cirrus-sr22-gps-error-student-pilot.html
Click to expand...

I don't know if this will work, but judging from this Google Earth picture, the trees appear mostly concentrated at the ends of the straight portion of road.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/C...2!3m1!1s0x88c2a479ae33ff17:0xca46c88f682210ca

It looks like where he landed, there is a straight section of the road with a few houses and trees on either side. Note the airpark slightly to the west. It's an airport community with, wait for it, houses and trees on either side of the runway.

Yeah, the road is missing all the markings and other indicia of an airport, and the airport looks much more like an airport than a road, but in context, this makes a little bit more sense. Still a major **** up of course.
 
Last edited:
Lindberg said:
I don't know if this will work, but judging from this Google Earth picture, the trees appear mostly concentrated at the ends of the straight portion of road.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/C...2!3m1!1s0x88c2a479ae33ff17:0xca46c88f682210ca

It looks like where he landed, there is a straight section of the road with a few houses and trees on either side. Note the airpark slightly to the west. It's an airport community with, wait for it, houses and trees on either side of the runway.

Yeah, the road is missing all the markings and other indicia of an airport, and the airport looks much more like an airport than a road, but in context, this makes a little bit more sense. Still a major **** up of course.
Click to expand...

Are GPS units always reliable? Well, maybe not the GPS signal, but the software that interprets it? I ask because many people, including me, have been led astray by the GPS units we use for driving. i've been told to drive in directions counter to my destination and told that i was AT my destination when i wasn't even close to it.

Just wondering if GPS software for aviation has led to the same situation for pilots.
 
bbridges51 said:
Are GPS units always reliable? Well, maybe not the GPS signal, but the software that interprets it? I ask because many people, including me, have been led astray by the GPS units we use for driving. i've been told to drive in directions counter to my destination and told that i was AT my destination when i wasn't even close to it.

Just wondering if GPS software for aviation has led to the same situation for pilots.
Click to expand...

I know of several locations in my Garmin Nuvi database that are incorrect. The GPS does its job, the mapping/directions system does its job, but the address in the database is wrong. Yes, I've reported it, no it hasn't been changed. And yes, I found out the hard way when I was trying to meet my family for dinner in a town I was unfamiliar with and it took me multiple miles away to "xxx Street" instead of "xxx Place", or "xxx Terrace", or something like that. All the shops in that particular strip mall were labeled as one thing but the actual internal database said something else.

I don't know where Garmin gets their aviation database info or how well it's been checked.
 
The 23-year-old student pilot said his GPS indicated Citation Road in the Pasco Trails subdivision was a landing strip.

Pink line fever.
 
That does NOT look like a runway and there is a very obvious runway nearby that is relatively wide, not tree-lined, with taxi connectors. This kid wasn't looking around or really using his brain much.

Must be Captain Sum Ting Wong from the Asiana crash.
 
maybe he saw a street hockey game he wanted to get in on
 
Isn't this the pilot who got hired to fly the Boeing Dreamlifter?
 
Cpt_Kirk said:
Chinese. Hockey.

Sure.
Click to expand...

...and he'd need a mullet...

attachment.php
 

Attachments

  • Hockey Hair.jpg
    Hockey Hair.jpg
    8.2 KB · Views: 180
Not many runways have large canopy trees growing *over* them...
 
WakeNCAgent said:
I heard about this story but didn't believe it could be true. This student pilot mistook a residential tree-lined street for the airport which was just 1.5 miles away. How is this even possible? If you look at the street scene photos in the Kathryn's report you will see just how large and close to the street the trees were. It's an incredible story.

Be sure to scroll to the bottom of the Kathryn's report for the pilot's comments. Classic!

NTSB Report:
http://www.ntsb.gov/aviationquery/brief2.aspx?ev_id=20111122X34719&ntsbno=ERA12CA082&akey=1

Kathryn's Report:
http://www.kathrynsreport.com/2011/11/cirrus-sr22-gps-error-student-pilot.html
Click to expand...


Obviously a poor design of the aircraft. The automation was obviously too convoluted, bad human factors in the overall design, as well as inadequate pilot training by not giving realistic simulations of how not to line up and land on a street.

We can also blame ATC for not "stepping up" and realizing he wasn't going to land on an airport and intervening.

:rolleyes2:

:rofl::rofl:
 
WakeNCAgent said:
I heard about this story but didn't believe it could be true. This student pilot mistook a residential tree-lined street for the airport which was just 1.5 miles away. How is this even possible? If you look at the street scene photos in the Kathryn's report you will see just how large and close to the street the trees were. It's an incredible story.

Be sure to scroll to the bottom of the Kathryn's report for the pilot's comments. Classic!

NTSB Report:
http://www.ntsb.gov/aviationquery/brief2.aspx?ev_id=20111122X34719&ntsbno=ERA12CA082&akey=1

Kathryn's Report:
http://www.kathrynsreport.com/2011/11/cirrus-sr22-gps-error-student-pilot.html
Click to expand...

Some people should just not fly a plane. The judgement and decision making here is all I would need to see.

Son, let me show you how an XBox works...
 
'We land here all the time ... this is Pilot Country [Airport].'

So he's been there before, and still mixed it up with a street?
 
You tell me - which of the following is an airport

attachment.php


attachment.php
 

Attachments

  • airport or not.JPG
    airport or not.JPG
    31.2 KB · Views: 147
  • airport or not2.JPG
    airport or not2.JPG
    41.7 KB · Views: 145
Last edited:
RotorAndWing said:
Obviously a poor design of the aircraft. The automation was obviously too convoluted, bad human factors in the overall design, as well as inadequate pilot training by not giving realistic simulations of how not to line up and land on a street.

We can also blame ATC for not "stepping up" and realizing he wasn't going to land on an airport and intervening.

:rolleyes2:

:rofl::rofl:
Click to expand...

Yeah, I mean, isn't that why they are called "controllers"? :lol::lol::lol:
 
And student pilots wonder why their instructor recommends joining the traffic pattern on downwind, checking the windsock and also runway numbers while abeam before starting the descent. :)

I agree, he definitely deserves a job with Asiana Airlines.

Though I am still waiting for the "chute" jokes. This is a Cirrus afterall, no? :rofl:
 
Well at least he didn't try a touch and go.
 
BigBadLou said:
And student pilots wonder why their instructor recommends joining the traffic pattern on downwind, checking the windsock and also runway numbers while abeam before starting the descent. :)

I agree, he definitely deserves a job with Asiana Airlines.

Though I am still waiting for the "chute" jokes. This is a Cirrus afterall, no? :rofl:
Click to expand...

Are we sure................. :dunno: It didn't burst into flames on contact with the mailbox...:rolleyes: :D
 
I figure it has a decent GPS. Surely he must have noticed there was still a little distance remaining on the Garmin when he came in on "final"
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top