Instructor jumps: Sad

I mean, I've had students that tried to kill me but never made me want to jump out. And why would you want to traumatize and potentially injure or kill the student in the process?
 
Wow that seems like an extremely irrational decision. Luckily the student was a rated pilot.
 
How do you open a door enough in flight to get out? I would think the plane would have to be in slow flight.
 
Lowflynjack said:
How do you open a door enough in flight to get out? I would think the plane would have to be in slow flight.
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Since you only need to do it once, any amount of effort is allowed. But, seriously, mess with the doors on a 150-172; you can fly it with them. You can open them enough to get out, but it's best done at slow speed.
 
Well, sue the estate for a dual time given signature up to the point of departure, the rest regular pic. Not complicated! Ha!

Oooph, ya, weird one. Kicking the rudder would make the departure manageable. I’ve done it to reseat a door.

The whole mental health thing is just getting tougher and tougher. I cannot even fathom a reasonable way to screen for this sort of situation. Of course, pretty darn rare. Making it more of a data point right now than much else.
 
Tools said:
The whole mental health thing is just getting tougher and tougher. I cannot even fathom a reasonable way to screen for this sort of situation. Of course, pretty darn rare. Making it more of a data point right now than much else.
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As with anything / any error, it can be reduced but it will never be eliminated. Which is why we'll probably always have at least two in the cockpit in a commercial airliner.

Now the student / pilot being instructed has to live with this.

As tragic as this was, at least he didn't kill the student.
 
Lowflynjack said:
How do you open a door enough in flight to get out? I would think the plane would have to be in slow flight.
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Fluid rolling movement with feet on the center pedestal and using kinetic energy. It’s not exactly like it’s a fast aircraft to begin with.
 
Lowflynjack said:
How do you open a door enough in flight to get out? I would think the plane would have to be in slow flight.
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A colleague of mine did this many years ago, but he was the student. He asked the instructor to demonstrate a steep turn, and when the roll was established he undid his seatbelt and let gravity help him out the door. (He had been accused of stealing a laptop from work, and somehow decided this was the best way to deal with the situation.)
 
Jim_R said:
A colleague of mine did this many years ago, but he was the student. He asked the instructor to demonstrate a steep turn, and when the roll was established he undid his seatbelt and let gravity help him out the door. (He had been accused of stealing a laptop from work, and somehow decided this was the best way to deal with the situation.)
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That is sad on top of sad.
 
WDD said:
...As tragic as this was, at least he didn't kill the student.
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I'd say it was a damned lucky thing the student had the presence of mind and cool headedness to continue the flight and land safely. I think it could have easily ended much differently. What an absolute turd to subject another person to be witness to his suicide.
 
wilkersk said:
I'd say it was a damned lucky thing the student had the presence of mind and cool headedness to continue the flight and land safely. I think it could have easily ended much differently. What an absolute turd to subject another person to be witness to his suicide.
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You're trying to rationalize the behavior of a suicidal individual. Only a person that has had a close relative or friend commit suicide gets a window into that dark hole, and even then it's almost impossible to understand.
 
Tools said:
I cannot even fathom a reasonable way to screen for this sort of situation
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We're going to go on. Cells.

They were all put together at a time. Cells.

Millions and billions of them. Cells.

Were you ever arrested? Cells.

Did you spend much time in the cell? Cells.

Have you ever been in an instituion? Cells.

Do they keep you in a cell? Cells.

When you're not performing your duties do they keep you in a little box? Cells.

Interlinked.

What's it like to hold the hand of someone you love? Interlinked.

Do they teach you how to feel finger to finger? Interlinked.

Do you long for having your heart interlinked? Interlinked.

Do you dream about being interlinked?

Have they left a place for you where you can dream? Interlinked.

What's it like to hold your child in your arms? Interlinked.

What's it like to play with your dog? Interlinked.

Do you feel that there's a part of you that's missing? Interlinked.

Do you like to connect to things? Interlinked.

What happens when that linkage is broken? Interlinked.

Have they let you feel heartbreak? Interlinked.

Did you buy a present for the person you love? Within cells interlinked.

Why don't you say that three times? Within cells interlinked. Within cells interlinked. Within cells interlinked.
 
wilkersk said:
I'd say it was a damned lucky thing the student had the presence of mind and cool headedness to continue the flight and land safely. I think it could have easily ended much differently. What an absolute turd to subject another person to be witness to his suicide.
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My understanding is the "Student" was a licensed pilot. This was not a discovery flight.
 
AV8R_87 said:
We're going to go on. Cells.

They were all put together at a time. Cells.

Millions and billions of them. Cells.

Were you ever arrested? Cells.

Did you spend much time in the cell? Cells.

Have you ever been in an instituion? Cells.

Do they keep you in a cell? Cells.

When you're not performing your duties do they keep you in a little box? Cells.

Interlinked.

What's it like to hold the hand of someone you love? Interlinked.

Do they teach you how to feel finger to finger? Interlinked.

Do you long for having your heart interlinked? Interlinked.

Do you dream about being interlinked?

Have they left a place for you where you can dream? Interlinked.

What's it like to hold your child in your arms? Interlinked.

What's it like to play with your dog? Interlinked.

Do you feel that there's a part of you that's missing? Interlinked.

Do you like to connect to things? Interlinked.

What happens when that linkage is broken? Interlinked.

Have they let you feel heartbreak? Interlinked.

Did you buy a present for the person you love? Within cells interlinked.

Why don't you say that three times? Within cells interlinked. Within cells interlinked. Within cells interlinked.
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Trying to remember. Bladerunner 2049?
 
I hope they do a proper autopsy on that body. Sounds like a more than fair chance of foul play to me.
 
Web
Lowflynjack said:
How do you open a door enough in flight to get out? I would think the plane would have to be in slow flight.
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During my PP training in the 80's an instructor had me trim the 150 for level flight, then we proceeded to do turns by pushing open our doors- it was surprisingly easy to get them pushed out around 20-30 degrees- or at least enough for something get through/go out. We also did climbs and descents by sliding our seats. We may have trimmed for slow flight for the turns though I can't remember.
 
How many people have jumped from a C150?
Sure it’s been done plenty but still a pretty small club.
 
From what I am told, the problem with C150 doors isn't opening one in flight. It is keeping both closed at takeoff.
 
Dave Theisen said:
I think the only thing harder than jumping out of a C-150 is trying to push someone out of a C-150.
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Yeah, I think even if someone somehow managed to successfully shove me out of a 150/152, the results of my defensive efforts would be readily apparent on the surviving occupant.
 
If I incapacitated you first, I'm confident I could get you out of a 150 while flying.
 
Jim_R said:
Yeah, I think even if someone somehow managed to successfully shove me out of a 150/152, the results of my defensive efforts would be readily apparent on the surviving occupant.
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I’d be more impressed by the person that got you in a 150. :)
 
Dave Theisen said:
I’d be more impressed by the person that got you in a 150. :)
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I have an experience around that. I promised to give a friends grandmother a flight in a buddies 150. She had a son that was a pilot decades ago who had taken her flying, but he died young. She wanted to fly again as a memorial and she remembered enjoying it.

I didn’t think to ask at the time, but she got out of the car - with help - with a tank of oxygen barely able to walk with the aide of a walker. She was in her late 80s. It took two of us to get her in and three of us to get her back out again.

But it was totally worth it. She giggled through the entire flight. I had told the family I’d do a quick flight to the coast and back but she was having so much fun we did a couple of low passes for them to video before we stopped. I thought we might injure her getting her out, but we got it done.
 
It's sad, and fortunately unusual as to the method. Where I went to school it was just buildings they jumped off of, and information about them was very limited so as to not inspire more.

There's a natural tendency to want an answer to "why?" but there's no way to get an understanding of it in today's world. It'll be nice if we can get to the point where it's as simple as fixing a broken bone usually is now. Get an image, put it together so it can heal, rest and follow up. This and cancer, we're almost at the point of people who see a glass coke bottle for the first time, and wonder what the heck it is.
 
Albany Tom said:
There's a natural tendency to want an answer to "why?" but there's no way to get an understanding of it in today's world.
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Having read private journals by a loved one who did, and talked with families of others who did, the answer in many cases is psychosis ... a loss of contact with reality.

Various things can make your brain misfire. Substance abuse, depression, anxiety, mental illnesses; these things change the chemical balance in your brain. Those chemicals don't just affect your emotions, they affect your thought processes. You can lose the ability to differentiate objective reality from delusions and paranoia. In some terrible percentage of cases, those delusions and paranoia lead to death before they can be caught.

The fundamental challenge in trying to answer "why" is we try to find a rational reason. But there is often no rationality to it. It seems senseless because it literally is.
 
I did a quickie search on the NTSB database, looking for "Suicide." Had 28 hits, for the 2008-2024 time period. Surprisingly, not all the cases resulted in a fatality.

The NTSB ruled the Probable Cause as suicide all but eight of the cases. Seven included the pilot's medical history which either mentioned past incidents, or that the pilot was suffering from a medical condition/taking medications that could have made them prone to suicide.

The eighth case shows the danger of relying on keywords without verification:

A person representing N9299N called the Raleigh Automated Flight Service Station at 1427 to obtain a briefing. The caller stated he was trying to “figure out” when he could return to CAK and was “looking at the possibility” of a departure time of 1500. The briefer asked: “Would you like a standard briefing and just cover everything or you need to just to kind a hit the highlights ?” The caller replied: “ …I don't want to waste your time. Let's figure out if this sounds like a suicide mission or not...."

(CEN09FA099)

Ron Wanttaja
 
Another drove this... .
nuova fiat 500D.jpg
 
I don't wish anything related to that tragedy on anyone. Just horrible all around.

It is particularly cruel how aviation related regulations are such an obstacle to people getting help. Doubly so when you consider those most at risk make up the bulk of GA pilots are the most at-risk group (55+( Yes, I know that median has skewed down a bit over time)).

Please talk to someone if you are flying through turbulence in life.
 
Hengelo said:
I don't wish anything related to that tragedy on anyone. Just horrible all around.

It is particularly cruel how aviation related regulations are such an obstacle to people getting help. Doubly so when you consider those most at risk make up the bulk of GA pilots are the most at-risk group (55+( Yes, I know that median has skewed down a bit over time)).

Please talk to someone if you are flying through turbulence in life.
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Have you ever in your life is a broad question.
 
There are so many things wrong with the screening process it's hard to point at one worse than others. The whole thing strikes me as cack-handed; probably starting with it being self-reported.
bonefishpete said:
Have you ever in your life is a broad question.
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