Philadelphia Crash

aterry1067 said:
*** The B-52 and C-130 enter the chat***
Click to expand...
Are they not totally factory rebuilt re engine by an owner that for all practical purposes money is no object?

Just like the Cherokee Spar ad. Aircraft manufacturers never envisioned these old planes would still be flying 50-70 years later.
 
bonefishpete said:
My son at the fight school is flying C172's that are as old as 45 years old. Myself learned to fly C150's that at the time were 2 years old and probably 200-300hours on the hobbs. Sad but here we are.
Click to expand...
As of 1 January, the average age for aircraft registered in the US is 41 years.

Ron Wanttaja
 
bonefishpete said:
Juan's channel said the Lear was 44 years old! Sorry but outside of life and death I wouldn't fly in a 44 old Lear maintenance or no maintenance.

My airport has a guy flying a part 135 65 year old Aztec to the Bahamas. A aircraft model that hasn't been built in decades with little to none factory support or parts availability. It seems ridiculous that such old planes are still in use for the simple reason that their are no new replacements that are financially viable.

My son at the fight school is flying C172's that are as old as 45 years old. Myself learned to fly C150's that at the time were 2 years old and probably 200-300hours on the hobbs. Sad but here we are.

Now don't take this wrong in that I have no problem flying old planes and had a 50 year old C182 but for the general public in for hire flights it's a disservice to the public.
Click to expand...
settle-down-v0-4oe4lhn394a91.png
 
bonefishpete said:
Are they not totally factory rebuilt re engine by an owner that for all practical purposes money is no object?
Click to expand...

wrt military aircraft, to say that money is no object is grossly ignorant of reality. For example, the C-141 was retired for a reason (compare the C-141 SLEP vs the cost of newer, more capable aircraft)
 
A family's probably been struggling to take care of their sick child for most of the child's life. They finally get a ray of hope in a transplant, go all the way to Philly to have that done, and it's apparently successful. Then they have that light smashed out in the blink of an eye. I'm having trouble wrapping my head around what that could possibly feel like. Just sadness comes to mind.

I don't get anger on this one. Well, unless you're the news media and you're making money from the deaths of children. I do understand why they want to inspire anger. But that's their job. I'm not even angry at them, most of them don't even realize what they really are or what they're doing.
 
"Heard" O2 tank exploded killing everyone before the crash.
No clue how anyone would know that.
 
SixPapaCharlie said:
"Heard" O2 tank exploded killing everyone before the crash.
No clue how anyone would know that.
Click to expand...
Speculation turns into rumors. Dad had the same thought yesterday. You see an oxygen bottle 1/4 mile away and that gets things started. Not realizing how far these high pressure bottles can go. I think it was in St Louis where a welding gas vendor had a fire and tanks were launching like missiles.

Maybe that's what happened. But how can one actually know anything at this point.
 
“absolute most horrifying way”

Cartel. Or as said in an earlier post “*space aliens to keep baby ears from getting umbraged at the no-no of critiquing dead people.”
 
hindsight2020 said:
The video from the dashcam rules out fuego on the way down, which is just most people not able to identify halo of light effect coming out of the clouds in the low pixel ring camera on IR wavelength, which is what they're referencing. Somebody up thread already posted the dash cam footage. Airplane clean as a dart.

Occam says this one is simple spatial-D LOC in IMC. Verrrrrry common in rapid transitions to IMC on initial climbout, especially with high rate climbers at low altitude. that chandelle like apogeed reversal they did is almost textbook. But I know hearing that is kryptonite to POA, so we'll have to go with *space aliens to keep baby ears from getting umbraged at the no-no of critiquing dead people.


(*catastrophic flight control failure immediately after takeoff, but not a second before or after)
Click to expand...

Before I signed on to that theory I'd want to know more about the avionics. If a TOGO or FD coupled a/p were available, why would the
PIC opt to hand fly the departure into a 700' overcast?
 
Chip Sylverne said:
Before I signed on to that theory I'd want to know more about the avionics. If a TOGO or FD coupled a/p were available, why would the
PIC opt to hand fly the departure into a 700' overcast?
Click to expand...
You can't engage the autopilot until reaching the minimum autopilot engagement altitude. I don't know what that is on the Lear but it's at least several hundred feet if not 1,000'. At that point, it's easier to hand-fly, at least through cleanup.

Our minimum engagement altitude is 400' but I can't remember anyone doing it then. Typically, we hand fly until at least 10,000', often to 18,000' or higher.
 
Chip Sylverne said:
Before I signed on to that theory I'd want to know more about the avionics. If a TOGO or FD coupled a/p were available, why would the
PIC opt to hand fly the departure into a 700' overcast?
Click to expand...
Not being argumentative, but if a two crew aircraft can not be hand flow into a 700 ft overcast and an AP is required, they shouldn’t be flying in IMC.
 
Larry in TN said:
You can't engage the autopilot until reaching the minimum autopilot engagement altitude. I don't know what that is on the Lear but it's at least several hundred feet if not 1,000'. At that point, it's easier to hand-fly, at least through cleanup.

Our minimum engagement altitude is 400' but I can't remember anyone doing it then. Typically, we hand fly until at least 10,000', often to 18,000' or higher.
Click to expand...
It’s no fun watching the airplane fly itself.
 
In the video, it looks like the valve for the O2 tank is just a few feet away. At least it looks like one to me, but could possibly be something else.
 
I'm not much into speculation, but this has a great resemblance to FlyDubai 981. If you watch that crash, they enter the clouds, seconds later, they're a smoking crater. Pilot disorientation. But that's just my speculation. Let's wait for the report.

Condolences to everyone involved.

 
Last edited:
Seventeen 55 gallon drums of debris already filled, and burned out vehicles three blocks away from the crater. That was a helluva impact and fireball.
 
Bob Noel said:
wrt military aircraft, to say that money is no object is grossly ignorant of reality. For example, the C-141 was retired for a reason (compare the C-141 SLEP vs the cost of newer, more capable aircraft)
Click to expand...
Well, they could not account for 800 billion dollars during their latest DOD audit - clearly money is no object there …
 
Warmi said:
Well, they could not account for 800 billion dollars during their latest DOD audit - clearly money is no object there …
Click to expand...

might be more accurate to say that money was clearly the objective.

(good luck getting a blank check for aircraft programs)
 
Chip Sylverne said:
Before I signed on to that theory I'd want to know more about the avionics. If a TOGO or FD coupled a/p were available, why would the
PIC opt to hand fly the departure into a 700' overcast?
Click to expand...

At the airlines, in the good old days anyway, we hand flew the airplane to at least 10000 feet to maintain some semblance of airmanship proficiency.

After a few crews at my outfit drifted off course on an RNAV departure, the CP mandated the autopilot on and coupled with NAV right at the autopilot minimum altitude of 400 feet.

That said, on a simple “Fly heading xxx, maintain xxxxx,” we still hand flew it a large majority of the time.
 
Last edited:
Hugh Despenser said:
After a few crews at my outfit drifted off course on an RNAV departure, the CP mandated the autopilot on and coupled with NAV right at the autopilot minimum altitude of 400 feet.
Click to expand...
That was at a US airline?

In any case, I doubt the Lear autopilot would be very good at being engaged at 400', before acceleration and cleanup. The newer ones can be but most of the ones I've flown are not. 757/767 was the exception.
 
"The CVR was located at the site of initial impact, at a depth of eight feet, according to investigators."

Holy cow - that's a heck of a hole. Hope they get some good info from the recorder, because figuring out the cause by examing the wreckage will be herculean. I've led missile flight failure investigations so I have at least a little idea of what it's like trying to examine debris from a flight that impacted the ground. This one sounds like a nightmare.
 
This crash has all the hallmarks of spatial disorientation on takeoff. The only question in my mind is was this simply somatogravic illusion or was there some type of system or instrumentation failure that contributed to it?

Unfortunately this type of crash has happened before, a high performance jet, on departure IFR at night. I can recall at least one or two that were even Medevac flights as well.
 
Hugh Despenser said:
But, Why is that so hard to believe?
Click to expand...
It differs significantly from my own experience with my six airlines. I've heard of similar procedures from Asian airlines but never before from a US airline.

I do, on relatively rare occasions, engage the autopilot at the minimum engagement altitude and keep it on until the minimum altitude on landing, just to stay current on how well it can do. Usually leave it off until over 10,000' and there aren't any significant turns ahead. Sometimes hand fly up to cruise altitude with the F/D off.

I don't find the early engagement of the A/P to be a workload reducer, though. If anything, it increases it.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top