Plane in reservoir SW of Berthod CO

An hour in the water in Colorado in the winter? If that's true they're lucky to be alive.
 
Unfortunately, they are not alive.
 
I saw a similar headline earlier today and thought, "that area to the east is almost all relatively-open farmland. How did they manage to hit the only major body of water in the area?"
 
From the damage to the LE, it looks like they came in steep and fast. If at night, maybe they got disoriented. The only reason I would intentionally land in the water would be due to an in-flight fire that I could not get put out by shutting the fuel off or if fire entered the cabin. My condolences.
 
The initial reports were pretty early but after sunrise, it seemed.

Original shots from the news helo had a number of us thinking it was an airplane that tried to land on ice and the ice around here would be really thin this year...

But photos from other angles made it clear that this was some sort of high speed water impact. Leading edge is smashed, flaps are all shoved backward and wrinkled, the airframe is intact but the wings look like they hit really hard.

FD reported they were underwater for 50 minutes. To have a time like that, they must have some witnesses, but not much info has come out.

Doesn't make a whole lot of sense yet. RIP.
 
N2461N. Registered to McAir Aviation out of Broomfield. 2005 C172S G1000.
 
From witnesses and the damage it sounds like a text book stall/spin
 
I had a flight review with Pat. He was a very good instructor. Sad news indeed.
 
6500 ft/min? That's one heck of a spin. Sounds more like a recovery into a dive without enough time and altitude left.
 
That's a scary accident. Experienced instructor, no problem airplane, couldn't recover from a spin. Yikes!

I did my spin training in a Citabria. It always recovered immediately after you pushed the nose down and stepped on the rudder.
 
Just like the good ol' days. Students and instructors dying while spin training. This is why the FAA doesn't make you do them anymore.
 
Dav8or said:
Just like the good ol' days. Students and instructors dying while spin training. This is why the FAA doesn't make you do them anymore.
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Actually, they do. The student was working on a CFI cert. Spin "awareness" endorsement, required.
 
I'm curious why the spin training in what looks like a 172 or 182. I would have thought the citabria or decathalon, one that's used specifically for spin and aerobatic training. Learn there first, then move to the common training airplane.

Or maybe they did.
 
murphey said:
I'm curious why the spin training in what looks like a 172 or 182. I would have thought the citabria or decathalon, one that's used specifically for spin and aerobatic training. Learn there first, then move to the common training airplane.

Or maybe they did.
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If I remember correctly, the CG needs to be within certain limits to spin a 172. I think you can only have people in the front seats. I don't think a 182 is certified for spins.
 
Everskyward said:
If I remember correctly, the CG needs to be within certain limits to spin a 172. I think you can only have people in the front seats. I don't think a 182 is certified for spins.
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Correct, no spins in C182, C172, front seat occupants only is applicable due to CG, done in utility category only but it can perform spins. I recall having to fully stall it, kick a rudder, and apply a burst of power to get it to enter a spin.
 
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murphey said:
I'm curious why the spin training in what looks like a 172 or 182. I would have thought the citabria or decathalon, one that's used specifically for spin and aerobatic training. Learn there first, then move to the common training airplane.

Or maybe they did.
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McAir only has 172s, a complex, and a twin. All their 172s are fairly new. As far as I know they are the only school in the Denver area with flight exam authority as part of their 141 program. It would be easy to correct me on that point though. One of my primary instructors went through their program from zero to CFI.
 
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murphey said:
I'm curious why the spin training in what looks like a 172 or 182. I would have thought the citabria or decathalon, one that's used specifically for spin and aerobatic training. Learn there first, then move to the common training airplane.

Or maybe they did.
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It is probably more common to do CFI certification spins in training airplanes than in an aerobatic aircraft.

It's becoming a little more prevalent to use Citabrias, etc, but not because of the training value. There are fewer CFIs who are comfortable with spins so spin training is becoming more specialized in CFIs with Citabria access. Also, I've spoken with flight school operators who, on the one hand, don't want to tumble the gyros in newer aircraft and, on the other, are concerned about the stresses of recovery on 30, 40, and 50 year old airframes,
 
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denverpilot said:
Actually, they do. The student was working on a CFI cert. Spin "awareness" endorsement, required.
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Wow. A CFI teaching another CFI how to teach other people how to recover from spins end up dead in a spin. Sad. RIP.
 
Everskyward said:
If I remember correctly, the CG needs to be within certain limits to spin a 172. I think you can only have people in the front seats. I don't think a 182 is certified for spins.
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Utility category, and it's not available on the newer ones AFAIK.

Spun the snot out of a number of the older ones, though. It's a pretty benign maneuver. Waaaaaay slower rotation than a Citabria, and a Citabria isn't exactly fast at it. And in the 172s I did it in, you almost had to hold pro-spin inputs to get them to stay in it. Releasing backpressure was often enough to break it and you'd be in a screaming dive real quick, but not 6500 ft/min.

The fact that they were that specific in the report makes me wonder if that aircraft had a G1000 or similar with logging capability, or they wouldn't usually be so ultra-specific about that number to the press.

And if G1000... no Utility category...? Unless I'm wrong on that. Anyone have the AFM for a restart 172 handy?
 
The NTSB report states that both occupants were within tolerances (considering occupant weight & fuel burn) to spin the A/C in the utility category. It also stated that the flight school did not install SD cards in their G1000s so the FAA sent their cell phones to D.C. for analysis.

I received spin training in my 172. After doing one the CFI remarked that it was more of a spiral so the next time he added a burst of power while holding full inputs. I was along for the ride at that point but recall it recovered easily.
 
denverpilot said:
The fact that they were that specific in the report makes me wonder if that aircraft had a G1000 or similar with logging capability, or they wouldn't usually be so ultra-specific about that number to the press.

And if G1000... no Utility category...? Unless I'm wrong on that. Anyone have the AFM for a restart 172 handy?
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It said they had G1000, but no SD card installed so no downloaded data.



Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
 
abqtj said:
It said they had G1000, but no SD card installed so no downloaded data.



Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
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Perhaps the 6500 number is simply calculated from the damage to the leading edge of the wing? Odd.
 
As reported in the article the NTSB used radar data to get the descent rates. On the first spin the had over 4,000 fpm. The higher rate was seen on the second spin. There is some uncertainty in radar data because of scan rate. I do not know what the possible error is.
 
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