Fatality Crash KHOU looks like a Cirrus

sad story, I wonder if her patience ran low and tried to hurry the landing.

Is it a common thing for single engine GA aircraft to land at HOB?

Was there a smaller airport in the area with less traffic that would have worked?
 
"NTSB investigator Tom Latson said the rocket motor deployed but the parachute never did and it's unclear whether the deployment was before or during the crash."

"I was changing a tire when the airplane was coming out. The engine was sputtering. And two seconds later, it just shut off and you heard the airplane crash,” said a man working at Cantu’s Auto Care.

"You ever listen to those guys playing with toy airplanes? How the spit and sputter. That's what he sound like," said eyewitness Don Howard.

That sound was corroborated by others nearby.
 
tuwood said:
I'm still a newbie myself, but I feel the "keep it in tight" instructions led her to stay tight with the runway on her downwind at a half mile. This then made it near impossible for her to get down on the runway.
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"Unable".
 
Very sad situation, condolences to the family and friends.

What can we learn? It was a long flight with stress related to a family cancer crisis. This should raise concerns before any flight planning. The initial final approach to rwy 4 was too slow, and possibly too high and long, to sequence between busy airliners, on final. Rwy 4 is the longest and was the optimum rwy: wind check was 080 at 13 gusts to 18. Houston Hobby is a major hub for SWA and other airlines. You can hear this sequencing stress developing, with experience, but the task saturated student pilot has a full plate just doing the basics. There is no processing capacity left for pilot, but others may have detected the stress.

The pilot was rattled by the initial go around and then accepts the crosswind runway and (out of limit? personal mins?)winds without processing the information. She seems to hear this as an ATC directive, when in fact it was posed as a question: "can you accept 35 winds 100 at -- gusts --". At this point perhaps she should have diverted to a quiet uncontrolled field like Pearland less than 5 minutes south and KAXH about 7 min with favorable winds to rwy 9. It is evident that she did not understand or process the winds because she drifts across the final approach course to 35 while on downwind. there seems to be three aborted approaches to 35. The controller is very patient and reassuring throughout, but he cannot instruct the pilot or divert the busy flow into Hobby at this point. Hindsight is 20-20.
What was the pressure to land at Hobby? We cannot rescue this family, but think about what you would do, and how to plan ahead. (Somebody once said "don't risk yourself or your family for a rental car reservation") Perhaps the pilot was not recently proficient at such a busy airport. The home base at Norman may not have been so constrained. Sometime siblings or spouses in the cockpit can add to the pilots workload? Nobody's fault, but something to consider in a task saturation condition like this. I think there was a shift change or a supervisor attempted to intervene for the tower controller. I think this was a good move and crew concept. If you have an experienced or senior copilot, wouldn't you ask him or her to try after the third missed?
helpful data:
https://aviation-safety.net/wikibase/wiki.php?id=188000
http://www.kathrynsreport.com/2016/06/cirrus-sr20-n4252g-safe-aviation-llc.html
http://archive-server.liveatc.net/khou/KHOU-Jun-09-2016-1730Z.mp3
188000_575a9108f0c27ghggh1.jpg
 
I know I'm gonna get flak from this, but I can't see any advantage to landing at a large, busy class B in a light GA airplane when there are so many other options...
 
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Mike Smith said:
Just like everyone else's speculation. That's all this thread is, we all know we are speculating and that no one knows, but we can learn even by speculating.
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Maybe, but going so far as to call out a dead pilot as exhibiting poor airmanship is not only speculation but distasteful to say the least.

This is the quote I was referring to

this looks like a simple case of poor airman ship
 
FlySince9 said:
I know I'm gonna get flak from this, but I can't see any advantage to landing at a large, busy class B in a light GA airplane when so many other options...
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Sometimes it can be closer to where you need to be but most of the time there are other options like you said. Class B airports are no different. Make sure you're ready when you get there and do your homework.
 
FlySince9 said:
I know I'm gonna get flak from this, but I can't see any advantage to landing at a large, busy class B in a light GA airplane when so many other options...
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I agree. I'm not a big fan when someone mentions landing at one of the big, busy Class Bravo's for the sole purpose of being able to say they did it. great, you did it. I'm sure all the big iron is really happy for you. but I mean, everyone has a right to, just not on my list of things I need to do. in this case they might have had an actual reason to (family medical issue) but if there were other, smaller options that would be my preference.
 
Lowflynjack said:
Imagine you're frustrated and nervous, you can't get down and it's a busy airport. Then the tower gives you these complicated instructions. From where she was when she crashed, to comply with is directions, she would have to make more than 180 turn to fly back in to get in a "nice tight pattern" and "keep it in tight" for a "downwind for only four". Then to make it more complicated, he tells her he might swing her around to 35. I'm not blaming the controller, he had been more than helpful to her, even trying to reassure her. I do understand her confusion though.
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Assuming this is the case, it's common.

The single most difficult and most important decision a pilot can make is knowing when to "punt". One of my minor rants is the emphasis we make on the go/no-go decision because we tend to de-emphasize the equally important continue/divert one. "Divert" doesn't necessarily mean a different airport. It also means such things as heading away from the traffic pattern to deal with a landing gear problem, requesting delaying vectors or a hold to decide on alternatives after a missed, to regroup in the case of any confusion.

There's a thread going on right now in which a controller asks about what controllers can do to help in an emergency. "Help me with what I need and don't bother me otherwise" seems to be the predominant theme. Controllers might or might not be pilots. Their job is to separate traffic and help out when and if they can.

One can always find fault with a controller's "failure" to take over a pilot's decision-making but I'm not sure taking over pilot decision-making is or even should be part of their job.
 
eman1200 said:
I agree. I'm not a big fan when someone mentions landing at one of the big, busy Class Bravo's for the sole purpose of being able to say they did it. great, you did it. I'm sure all the big iron is really happy for you. but I mean, everyone has a right to, just not on my list of things I need to do. in this case they might have had an actual reason to (family medical issue) but if there were other, smaller options that would be my preference.
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looking at a map sugar land regional is only a 7-10 minute further drive to MD Anderson than HOU and only has one runway. 8000 feet so plenty a room for a GA single.

That's the route I would have taken. Not only because of the air traffic, but the actual vehicle traffic around HOU is not the best.
 
The critical exchange occurs at 17:22:55 when the tower calls "Cirrus 52 Golf Tower".
I suspect the controller has recognized the task saturation and waits for the pilot to answer. Aviate, navigate, communicate. It is hard to listen, retrospectively, as these three priorities degrade from right to left.
Only then does he (1)issue the go around directive, (2)gives the reasoning, (3)gives the next step for downwind to 35, gives missed approach instructions (4)rwy hdg, (5)maintain VFR, and then (6)gives the winds and (7)asks if she can accept 35. He has issued seven separate pieces of info (which are required by regulation- he has no options here). The pilot only reads back two or three of seven, "go around, rwy 35, and turn downwind", and these may be lower priority of all these elements. Tower catches the error here and calmly reminds "runway heading". His workload is now starting to stack up. We cannot hear all he is hearing but approach probably has two more fast airliners turning final for 4, and he's trying to get the student out of the stress zone onto 35. This was common strategy for students as long as 50 years ago when I was there, in this scenario, but the gusty crosswinds have aggravated this strategy. The controller cannot divert this pilot-- that must be requested by the PIC. The time for repeating the winds again, or having a CFI debrief about diverts, or crosswinds, or wake turbulence, or fuel exhaustion have been exhausted already.
This is instrument rating or at least commercial pilot level of workload. Even with these ratings, regular practice and experience is necessary.
 
mryan75 said:
"Unable".
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Some very hard words for "low time" guys to utter.

One thing I've always taught my students is don't let ATC kill you.

When you're "up there" sweating it out, he's down there sitting in the AC.
 
FlySince9 said:
I know I'm gonna get flak from this, but I can't see any advantage to landing at a large, busy class B in a light GA airplane when so many other options...
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midcap said:
I asked that question earlier.
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Well, to start with, the "large busy Class B" in this case is KIAH, Houston International, although Hobby is within the Class B airspace. There are Class C and even Class D airports around much busier. For example, I flew out of a Class D for 20 years with about 100,000 more annual operations than KHOU. And it's certainly not the only one.

Personally, flying into the Houston area, I would not hesitate using Hobby if my ground destination was the most convenient for my trip. Not so much with Class Bs but I've found many places where landing at a metropolitan Class C (many of which are busier than KHOU) was much better than the local Podunk or even "Executive" alternate including proximity, transportation availability and even overall cost.

But for a more general answer, there is just as much wrong with this as landing at a rural nontowered airport with a runway shorter than you are used to when all you have done before is fly out of mid-sized Class Ds. IOW, absolutely nothing so long as you know what you are doing.
 
bikert said:
This looks like a simple case of speculation.
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Well, pretty much all accidents are speculations until the official report comes out. Everyone on here has pretty much speculated pilot error, in a tasteful manner I would add. Should we sugar coat an obvious observation out of respect for the dead?

Even if it were mechanical, the judgment (go arounds) leading up to the accident doesn't exactly exude good airmanship.
 
Velocity173 said:
Should we sugar coat an obvious observation out of respect for the dead?
Even if it were mechanical, the judgment (go arounds) leading up to the accident doesn't exactly exude good airmanship.
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Since when is it bad judgement or a sign of poor airmanship to do a go around?

I don't see any "obvious observations" here other than that she was having a hard time. No one here knows why she was - whether it was her skill, the wind, the airport, the traffic, her passengers, something with the plane, or a combination of multiple things, etc.
 
midlifeflyer said:

Well, to start with, the "large busy Class B" in this case is KIAH, Houston International, although Hobby is within the Class B airspace. There are Class C and even Class D airports around much busier. For example, I flew out of a Class D for 20 years with about 100,000 more annual operations than KHOU. And it's certainly not the only one.

Personally, flying into the Houston area, I would not hesitate using Hobby if my ground destination was the most convenient for my trip. Not so much with Class Bs but I've found many places where landing at a metropolitan Class C (many of which are busier than KHOU) was much better than the local Podunk or even "Executive" alternate including proximity, transportation availability and even overall cost.

But for a more general answer, there is just as much wrong with this as landing at a rural nontowered airport with a runway shorter than you are used to when all you have done before is fly out of mid-sized Class Ds. IOW, absolutely nothing so long as you know what you are doing.
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that makes sense, I wonder is the pilot ever flew into HOU before?
 
Cajun_Flyer said:
Since when is it bad judgement or a sign of poor airmanship to do a go around?

I don't see any "obvious observations" here other than that she was having a hard time. No one here knows why she was - whether it was her skill, the wind, the airport, the traffic, her passengers, something with the plane, or a combination of multiple things, etc.
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Because the fact she couldn't get her aircraft down. That's pilot error or poor airmanship. It's not like she was going into some small grass strip where you need to nail your altitude and speed. She was going into a massive airfield with long runways and good visual cues.

Last month I came into a field and didn't judge my flare properly, landed hard and popped a tire in the process. I exhibited poor airmanship. I don't put the blame on anyone other than myself. We have to be our harshest critics. if we're not, then we're not going to learn anything from our mistakes.
 
Heard this on the news this morning. "The airplane had an emergency parachute but it did not deploy".

Sigh...
 
The first go around was directed because of speed conflict on rwy 4 with an airliner. It was a good call, in general, but the sequence from here leads to the mishap. Please listen to how she accepted the high crosswind runway 35. It sounds unprocessed, interpreted incorrectly by PIC as a directive, rather than what it was: a request from the controller. This is what saturation of workload does. We try to follow what we think we heard, from authority, rather than process the question(which was never answered). In USN we called this "loosing the bubble"(shrinks call it loss of situational awareness LSA) and no pilot is immune. This is the important general teaching/learning point here. In the usual Naval scenario, not speculating about this particular mishap, LSA degenerates until there is loss of spatial orientation(LSO) and resulting loss of control, departure from controlled flight, etc.
PrattVegas: You are correct about student pilot. The comments may have been about the controllers technique, as though he recognized he was talking to a "task saturated pilot"- so that might be a better way to describe this. And it is a positive in an otherwise sad story. But this can happen to any of us, not just the student. That should be the learning point, sadly. Also, agree that the facts are incomplete, but the workload saturation (human factor) will remain, even if other, presently unknown factors emerge. I think these scenarios can be leveraged, for learning, when the visibility is high, because any of us may be faced with a similar scenario tomorrow, and awaiting the report might either be forgotten or too late.
 
midlifeflyer said:
One can always find fault with a controller's "failure" to take over a pilot's decision-making but I'm not sure taking over pilot decision-making is or even should be part of their job.
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Definitely not ATC's job to make PIC decisions for the pilot. However, and this would be highly subjective, when a controller determines that a pilot is not capable of safely landing an airplane, maybe they should have some kind of authority (under some special FAA rule) to be able to order/overrule the pilot to divert or something else (as deemed necessary and safer) to bring to situation to a successful conclusion. I'm not sure if it's fair to drop that responsibility on ATC but some pilot definitely get in over their head and need somebody to tell them what to do.

If she was used to flying at some tiny non-towered or dead class D airport and now enters this Bravo jigsaw puzzle, it's not unreasonable to think that she got in over her head. And add weather/wind factors, and that's a recipe for disaster.

The poor father already fighting cancer and now has to face the loss of 2 sons. Prayer and thoughts go out to that whole family.
 
SkyDog58 said:
Possible structural failure if she was really cranking on it though at pattern speeds, less likely. Engine sputtering if it was fuel issue?
Rocket firing and failed deployment of chute? Or just possible witness imagination which happens often.
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It looked from the first pic that the chute hatch was open
 
Velocity173 said:
Because the fact she couldn't get her aircraft down. That's pilot error or poor airmanship. It's not like she was going into some small grass strip where you need to nail your altitude and speed. She was going into a massive airfield with long runways and good visual cues.

Last month I came into a field and didn't judge my flare properly, landed hard and popped a tire in the process. I exhibited poor airmanship. I don't put the blame on anyone other than myself. We have to be our harshest critics. if we're not, then we're not going to learn anything from our mistakes.
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Fair enough, but it sounded like you were saying the decision to do a go around was a sign of poor airmanship. Sadly in this case, the go arounds were her best calls and about the only thing she seemed to be exhibiting that showed GOOD airmanship. Never wrong to do a go around if you don't feel your landing will be safe.
 
Velocity173 said:
Because the fact she couldn't get her aircraft down. That's pilot error or poor airmanship.
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Or a tailwind. Try a downwind final approach and you'll see the same thing, even on a long runway. I've done it with 5 knots and it's obvious (but still safe on a long runway). With 20 knots, there is no way. And it looks EXACTLY like the airplane "won't come down."

Labeling it as "poor airmanship" is both useless and meaningless. Obviously, it was insufficient airmanship, because it ended in a crash. So, what do you do with that information? Tell yourself you're a spectacular pilot and therefore immune? None of us are.
 
Cajun_Flyer said:
Fair enough, but it sounded like you were saying the decision to do a go around was a sign of poor airmanship. Sadly in this case, the go arounds were her best calls and about the only thing she seemed to be exhibiting that showed GOOD airmanship. Never wrong to do a go around if you don't feel your landing will be safe.
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Of course, do a go around if you're high. But to say that two go arounds and then a possible stall / spin or fuel exhuation is good airmanship or acceptable? Then no, I would disagree with that. Call it "insufficient airmanship" for those offended by the word "poor."

I think some here are equating the "poor airmanship" comment as to she shouldn't been flying that aircraft to begin with or she's a bad pilot. Not at all. There are awesome pilots that use bad judgment on occasion. That doesn't mean they shouldn't be flying. Simply means aviation is unforgiving and sometimes we put ourselves into situations based on pilot error. If you survive that error to live another day, you chalk it up as a learning experience and now you're a better pilot because of it.
 
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OkieFlyer said:
Being as she is local to my area, they ran the story on the local news. They said that she has owned the plane for over two years. I can tell you that we don't have any airspace up here as busy as Houston, so that was probably a huge part of the problem, but if she's had the plane for that long, surely she knew how to drive it.?.?
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Not necessarily. Lots of expensive aluminum and plastic at my airport owned by people that have the financial capability but not necessarily the time to fly enough to stay proficient. A lot of owners have demanding businesses and personal lives (who among us doesn't these days?) and we know which airplanes out there come out of the hangar too infrequently.
 
bikert said:
This looks like a simple case of speculation.
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Hey let's wait a couple years before the final NTSB report before discussing! End this thread now.

Or, let's keep discussing and hope some people can learn from this "speculation" and perhaps avoid a fatal accident down the road. If nothing else, everyone needs to remember if you are low you better not get too slow especially in a steep bank. That landing stall speed doesn't count when taking a steep bank angle. No matter how stressed you are keep flying the plane and think about everything else second.

If I go down in a ball of flames I hope everyone here speculates away and it can serve as an educational piece to anyone reading.
 
TexDeuce said:
Hey let's wait a couple years before the final NTSB report before discussing! End this thread now.

Or, let's keep discussing and hope some people can learn from this "speculation" and perhaps avoid a fatal accident down the road. If nothing else, everyone needs to remember if you are low you better not get too slow especially in a steep bank. That landing stall speed doesn't count when taking a steep bank angle. No matter how stressed you are keep flying the plane and think about everything else second.

If I go down in a ball of flames I hope everyone here speculates away and it can serve as an educational piece to anyone reading.
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That would be useful if it had a relationship to real risks and real accident causes.

Not clear at all with the minimum information here. For all we know, the trim tab fell off. No evidence of that except the stall, yet the board immediately starts chanting "poor airmanship" without knowing if airmanship really was substandard. A strong downdraft or perhaps wake turbulence encounter might cause the crash without the pilot screwing up.

There really isn't much use to the rampant speculation. It says much more about what some pilots are afraid of than what the real risks are.

The NTSB preliminary report won't take anywhere near a few years. And when the final report does come out, it WILL be useful. Do you read old reports? Why is this unknown crash more useful than an known and fully analyzed crash from a few years ago? It's not like those don't exist.
 
MAKG1 said:
That would be useful if it had a relationship to real risks and real accident causes.

Not clear at all with the minimum information here. For all we know, the trim tab fell off. No evidence of that except the stall, yet the board immediately starts chanting "poor airmanship" without knowing if airmanship really was substandard. A strong downdraft or perhaps wake turbulence encounter might cause the crash without the pilot screwing up.

There really isn't much use to the rampant speculation. It says much more about what some pilots are afraid of than what the real risks are.

The NTSB preliminary report won't take anywhere near a few years. And when the final report does come out, it WILL be useful. Do you read old reports? Why is this unknown crash more useful than an known and fully analyzed crash from a few years ago? It's not like those don't exist.
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You are aware that you can scroll right past these post don't you? You are not required to be the hall monitor of speculation. I find that I learn quite a bit from these types of threads, even more so when the NTSB reports come out and I compare the speculation to the findings. I think most, if not all, know what the real risks are.
 
Listen, as long as the comments aren't vulgar or tasteless then there's nothing wrong with "I think" speculation. If an experienced pilot has a theory or speculation about an accident, then I want to hear about it.

If you have problems with pilots analyzing accidents based on limited evidence, then turn the page.
 
Conversation Spurs discussion which hopefully Spurs thought and insight. Pilots have always done this. Only the communications medium has changed. Today there is so much info available a good discussion will hopefully make others go seek more info.


This space intentionally left blank for future sarcasm.
 
Just an observation/question for the experts regarding the in-air vs. impact chute deployment question: If you look at this image, it appears that the strips that cover the CAPS embedded airframe harness have not fully delaminated from the fuselage (i.e. near the CAPS cover). The front riser has been torn upward causing a partial delamination but the rear portion of the cover is still attached. This tearing could have occurred when the aircraft impacted (nose-low) and the entire nose of the aircraft, along with the riser attach points, were forced upward by the impact. Since the entire top of the cockpit section has been compromised by the impact, and since that’s where the CAPS activation handle is physically located, it seems possible that the impact itself caused the deployment and that the CAPS was not deployed by the pilot -or- if they did pull the handle, it was too late in the stall/spin to have any effect. EDIT: I also didn’t see a deployed chute anywhere in any photos, so is it safe to assume that regardless of what point in time the rocket went off, the chute didn’t go with it?

I have only a little time in the Cirrus and have not done any stall spin training, but if you watch the video of the Cirrus CAPS testing with the early model SR20, there’s a documented (in the video), pronounced stall spin that quickly puts the aircraft very nose-low and eats up a lot of altitude (as most stall/spin situations do).

A tragedy either way. RIP.
 
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Mike Smith said:
You are aware that you can scroll right past these post don't you? You are not required to be the hall monitor of speculation. I find that I learn quite a bit from these types of threads, even more so when the NTSB reports come out and I compare the speculation to the findings. I think most, if not all, know what the real risks are.
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Yup, you have a scroll bar as well.

Don't like me commenting on it? Tough. It's useless, and I'll call it useless.
 
This thing is a total crap sandwich for sure.

Just a reminder that we all know, but bears repeating... It doesn't matter if it's a Cirrus. Low and slow in the pattern is a critical phase of flight and must be treated as such, and it doesn't matter in the slightest what any controller is babbling in your ear if the airplane can't be made to maintain airspeed ahead of all other competing priorities. And if you're overloaded, you have to recognize it and fly the airplane first.

Secondarily to get the controller off of your back...

"Standby", "unable", and if you're loathe to that simplicity or lack of action verbs, "Request vectors away from the airport to reconfigure..." are always always always available to any pilot.

Do it. It's way way way better than being dead. And people do get so comfortable in the pattern from doing lots and lots and lots of pattern work, that they forget it's where a lot of aviators get killed. Low and slow and maneuvering is not a good time or place to be distracted or too busy, but we remember the days when we learned in a traffic pattern when we felt overloaded with it all, as students, and it feels way too "natural" so our hackles don't go up when it's getting squirrelly.

The other night I botched a pattern in the twin and simply announced, "I'm going around..." Instructor said he thought the decision was sound, but said, "I want to see you fix it, so proceed..." I made a mental note that the go-around if he wasn't sitting there was the RIGHT thing to do and then fixed the approach. Be careful of this. We've all had instructors do this and they want to give us a challenge, but when not in the training environment, don't give yourself a challenge because you've "fixed it before". Get out of there and set it all up again. Don't memorize and internalize the wrong behavior.
 
There were a lot of mistakes made, but I'm siding with the pilot.
You are low and slow, being told to keep it tight, speed it up, and look for an inbound 727. Suddenly your focus is no longer 100% on your airplane, you are worried about getting run over by some heavy metal.
Recipe for disaster.
JMHO: When is the last time an instructor taught you how to tell ATC to stuff it? When was the last time you were even taught you could tell ATC to stuff it and live to tell the tale?
Most new pilots have no idea you are even allowed to do something like that. A few lines in the AIM are useless compared to someone in authority taking you through the process with some scenario training.
 
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