New PC12 Ditched Halfway to Hawaii

I'd look for a friendly aircraft carrier, and do my first trap!
Sad, however, as that was an NGX. It may float for quite a while if the door was shut.
Also, two pilots was one more than is needed for that flight. They made it only half way, which is weird given the normal range of the thing. Still, against the wind, and all that.
 
Kenny Phillips said:
I'd look for a friendly aircraft carrier, and do my first trap!
Sad, however, as that was an NGX. It may float for quite a while if the door was shut.
Also, two pilots was one more than is needed for that flight. They made it only half way, which is weird given the normal range of the thing. Still, against the wind, and all that.
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Minus a tailhook, you might luck out and get a barricade ... or ditch alongside and get a helo hoist and landing on the carrier that way.
 
gkainz said:
Minus a tailhook, you might luck out and get a barricade ... or ditch alongside and get a helo hoist and landing on the carrier that way.
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Depends on your STOL capabilities. This weekend I watched a bunch of Steve Henry stuff, including ridiculous things like a 25' landing.

Pilatus, probably a bit more challenging unless the carrier could get going full steam.
 
I wonder how'd a pilot would contact the carrier's CT?
 
bflynn said:
Pilatus, probably a bit more challenging unless the carrier could get going full steam.
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The stall speed is apparently around 65-70 knots for a PC-12. An aircraft carrier at full tilt is noted as "30+ knots" .. I would assume that with a 40 knot relative speed and a deck length of 1,000 ft (roughly) the PC-12 could easily stop. Ofcourse.. since this plane was power off a lot of stuff would have to go right!

But it seems at least theoretically possible, even sans arresting cables.
 
A buddy of mine's (misawa CJs) former squadronmate had to put one in the drink when his centerline fuel switch shorted/failed closed during a fighter drag from JPN to AK. Got picked up by a Japanese research vessel. Right around here. At least he had a whole gaggle of folks (and a tanker) marking and sending posits until the maritime assets made it to the area. A man is but a speck of dust in the mighty Pacific.
 
Prett neat story. Took 20,000 feet to work the problem and 8k to safe their azzes successfully. I don’t know enough about turbines to understand why it sounded like they restarted but never got it really going until something let loose
 
Tantalum said:
The stall speed is apparently around 65-70 knots for a PC-12. An aircraft carrier at full tilt is noted as "30+ knots" .. I would assume that with a 40 knot relative speed and a deck length of 1,000 ft (roughly) the PC-12 could easily stop. Ofcourse.. since this plane was power off a lot of stuff would have to go right!

But it seems at least theoretically possible, even sans arresting cables.
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Right up until the AA missile got them, anyway.
 
hindsight2020 said:
A buddy of mine's (misawa CJs) former squadronmate had to put one in the drink when his centerline fuel switch shorted/failed closed during a fighter drag from JPN to AK. Got picked up by a Japanese research vessel. Right around here. At least he had a whole gaggle of folks (and a tanker) marking and sending posits until the maritime assets made it to the area. A man is but a speck of dust in the mighty Pacific.
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Interesting that they figured the loss down to the penny. Now that's military precision! :D
 
Tantalum said:
The stall speed is apparently around 65-70 knots for a PC-12. An aircraft carrier at full tilt is noted as "30+ knots" .. I would assume that with a 40 knot relative speed and a deck length of 1,000 ft (roughly) the PC-12 could easily stop. Ofcourse.. since this plane was power off a lot of stuff would have to go right!

But it seems at least theoretically possible, even sans arresting cables.
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The PC12 will land in considerably less than 1,000' on a calm wind day. My best in a 15 knot breeze was 500 or so, but I was also very light.

Here's a picture that was posted in the PC12 pilots group I am a part of on facebook with the caption "Bad things happen if you try to airstart above 20k"
pc12 airstart procefure.jpg


From scuttlebutt in the same PC12 groups, it sounds like potentially the ferry tank was rigged up to feed the engine directly instead of the wings. It's also possible that the high-pressure pump (Jesus pump) picked a really awful time to quit, but I've never heard of a high-pressure pump failure on a PC12. There's no way to get a relight and no backup to the pump. If they didn't blow chunks out the exhaust with the MOR lever it was either a high-pressure pump failure or fuel exhaustion. My money is incorrectly installed ferry tanks causing loss of power.

We'll never know though because the plane is down in thousands of feet of water.
 
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Tantalum said:
The stall speed is apparently around 65-70 knots for a PC-12. An aircraft carrier at full tilt is noted as "30+ knots" .. I would assume that with a 40 knot relative speed and a deck length of 1,000 ft (roughly) the PC-12 could easily stop. Ofcourse.. since this plane was power off a lot of stuff would have to go right!

But it seems at least theoretically possible, even sans arresting cables.
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And with any amount of wind, and the ship turning into that wind, you could have a reasonable touchdown speed. I've watched a PC-12 slam on the brakes and beta thrust landing on 3R at KLUK, and easily make the first turnoff, which is really an exit for the other direction. Without power, not so much.
 
"was substantially damaged when it was ditched in the Pacific Ocean about 1000 miles east of Hilo, Hawaii"

Substantially damaged? LOL. Destroyed I'd say.
 
Tantalum said:
The stall speed is apparently around 65-70 knots for a PC-12. An aircraft carrier at full tilt is noted as "30+ knots" .. I would assume that with a 40 knot relative speed and a deck length of 1,000 ft (roughly) the PC-12 could easily stop. Ofcourse.. since this plane was power off a lot of stuff would have to go right!

But it seems at least theoretically possible, even sans arresting cables.
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Taking back off again could be problematic.
 
Tarheelpilot said:
If a c-130 can land and takeoff from a carrier there is no doubt a pc-12 can do the same.
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I stand corrected on the pc-12, but can a c-130 take off from a carrier unassisted?
 
Scary thing, unless you're a mechanic you can't do much but trust the guys who installed the thing. Hope they did it right. Once you're over the drink they aren't around to assist.
 
Dave Theisen said:
Been done. Google it. It’s a cool story and the video is impressive.
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Actually had cocktails a couple years ago with Adm Flatley as we were at the same event at one of his peers houses in Charleston SC. Great guy "Three combat tours in Phantoms and all anyone wants to hear about is the C-130 landings". He was happy to tell it again though and it was a funny tale. He was a test pilot at Pax at the time and he just told his wife "have to go to the boat today" without telling her it was in a Hercules. He gave a lot of credit to co-pilot and the enlisted flight engineer for making it a non-event and said they deserved most of the credit for a smooth event. I was astounded at that! A fighter pilot giving credit to someone else! Shocking. :D

 
the writing in Kathryn report is fairly detailed, it sure seems like there was some kind of issue with the fuel going directly from the ferry tank to the engine line.. then potentially complicated by the FADEC going bananas

These ferry systems seem to be somewhat dubious.. there was the Cirrus that ditched halfway to Hawaii just last night I watched the ASI video of the guy with the Bonanza who had to manually blow the fuel from the ferry tank into the wing tanks for 4 hours over the North Atlantic..
 
Tantalum said:
the writing in Kathryn report is fairly detailed, it sure seems like there was some kind of issue with the fuel going directly from the ferry tank to the engine line.. then potentially complicated by the FADEC going bananas

These ferry systems seem to be somewhat dubious.. there was the Cirrus that ditched halfway to Hawaii just last night I watched the ASI video of the guy with the Bonanza who had to manually blow the fuel from the ferry tank into the wing tanks for 4 hours over the North Atlantic..
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Opinion: Moving fuel around ain't hard. Getting the system installed correctly and teaching the operators to use it are probably the biggest challenges.
 
Tantalum said:
the writing in Kathryn report is fairly detailed, it sure seems like there was some kind of issue with the fuel going directly from the ferry tank to the engine line.. then potentially complicated by the FADEC going bananas

These ferry systems seem to be somewhat dubious.. there was the Cirrus that ditched halfway to Hawaii just last night I watched the ASI video of the guy with the Bonanza who had to manually blow the fuel from the ferry tank into the wing tanks for 4 hours over the North Atlantic..
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Yeah, I remember the Cirrus pilot who ditched due to fuel exhaustion. I believe his main tanks ran dry and couldn't get the aux fuel tank to work. I'd rather run Aux fuel first or at least test the procedures within range of shore and have that down pat before needing to survive on it. If the system is rigged where that was not possible, better to find another solution.
 
NordicDave said:
Yeah, I remember the Cirrus pilot who ditched due to fuel exhaustion. I believe his main tanks ran dry and couldn't get the aux fuel tank to work. I'd rather run Aux fuel first or at least test the procedures within range of shore and have that down pat before needing to survive on it. If the system is rigged where that was not possible, better to find another solution.
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Indeed.. seems these are fairly homemade jury rig contraptions..
 
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