TNFlyGirl Final NTSB report issued

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Brad Z

Brad Z

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The other thread got locked, so I thought I’d drop this here:


TLDR- they don’t really know why she lost control of the aircraft, but based on everyone’s assessments of her flying skills, she was in over her head and behind the aircraft and likely mistrimmed the aircraft on autopilot. Also, they weren’t able to recover any video footage of the flight. Lastly, she was on multiple meds to treat anxiety which were on both the FAA DNI and DNF list.
 
You have to wonder how a CFI signed her off for a checkride or how a DPE passed her.

The whole thing was just sad.
 
"Flight instructors who had flown with the pilot before the accident indicated that she routinely demonstrated poor manual aircraft handling and struggled with cockpit automation, including
autopilot and trim use..."

Police officers have the ability to report to a state DMV if they feel someone is driving so poorly they should be reevaluated. Does such a process exist for CFIs to report pilots?


"On May 14, 2022, she passed her private pilot (single-engine land) practical test, at which time she
had accumulated 193.2 hours total flight time. Of those hours, 182.6 were dual instruction received..."

Wow!


"None of the pilot’s logbook endorsements were contained within the undamaged segment of logbook that was reviewed..."

I bet there are a lot of CFIs who were happy to hear that!
 
That old Century Autopilot was probably not worth trying to fix. Her screwing around with it likely contributed to the loss of her and her father's lives. Very sad.

The money I spent in trying to make a vintage Century become reliable over the course of 4+ years would have almost paid for the brand new S-Tec that replaced it. A double whammy to the wallet.

The general opinion of multiple shops (including Century's) that failed to provide for any lasting fix was "crappy troublesome connectors". When the fishing expedition progressed to the stage of rewiring, I decided it was finally time to admit defeat and replace the entire system. That was 26 years ago... never looked back. The S-Tec has been, until just recently, completely trouble-free.
 
Rick A said:
That old Century Autopilot was probably not worth trying to fix. Her screwing around with it likely contributed to the loss of her and her father's lives. Very sad.

The money I spent in trying to make a vintage Century become reliable over the course of 4+ years would have almost paid for the brand new S-Tec that replaced it. A double whammy to the wallet.

The general opinion of multiple shops (including Century's) that failed to provide for any lasting fix was "crappy troublesome connectors". When the fishing expedition progressed to the stage of rewiring, I decided it was finally time to admit defeat and replace the entire system. That was 26 years ago... never looked back. The S-Tec has been, until just recently, completely trouble-free.
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By the sound of it from the instructor, there was nothing wrong with the autopilot.
 
Has to be odd to not know you are a bad pilot until you are helplessly spinning toward the ground.
I think I am an ok pilot but she probably did too. Perhaps naively so not realizing this isn't a game just because she hadn't crashed so far.
Her poor father.
 
Racerx said:
By the sound of it from the instructor, there was nothing wrong with the autopilot.
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I remember hearing somewhere following the crash that she had been, or was actually headed out to an autopilot fix it shop destination when the crash occurred.
 
I was looking through the docket… https://data.ntsb.gov/Docket?ProjectID=193491

Apparently NTSB investigators reached out to her sister to obtain copies of the videos taken down from YouTube but the family was unwilling/unable to do so. You’d think NTSB would be able to subpoena YouTube, but I doubt it would really make a difference in the outcome of the investigation. The accounts from her instructors seemed to do what the videos would have otherwise conveyed.

Also, after she and her father passed in the December 2023 accident, her mother passed away in April 2024. What a sad time for that family.
 
FPK1 said:
Police officers have the ability to report to a state DMV if they feel someone is driving so poorly they should be reevaluated. Does such a process exist for CFIs to report pilots?
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Anyone can report an unsafe pilot. That’s the purpose of the FAA Hotline. Generally speaking, such a report would likely trigger a 49 U.S.C. Section 44709 Reexamination (or as commonly referred to as a “709 ride”) with an aviation safety inspector.
 
Rick A said:
I remember hearing somewhere following the crash that she had been, or was actually headed out to an autopilot fix it shop destination when the crash occurred.
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I think that was mentioned in one of her videos (or a comment she left on one of the videos) prior to the flight. My recollection was she was planning on replacing it with a new Garmin setup, but I’m not 100% on that.
 
Brad Z said:
Anyone can report an unsafe pilot. That’s the purpose of the FAA Hotline. Generally speaking, such a report would likely trigger a 49 U.S.C. Section 44709 Reexamination (or as commonly referred to as a “709 ride”) with an aviation safety inspector.
Click to expand...

a 709 ride based on hearsay?
 
Rick A said:
I remember hearing somewhere following the crash that she had been, or was actually headed out to an autopilot fix it shop destination when the crash occurred.
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I watched a few clips of her fumbling with the autopilot. I don't think she knew how to work it and just blamed the autopilot. The autopilot did not have trim. So she had to manually trim based on the annunciator. Her instructor said she would get confused. Being barred out on Xanax would make things confusing. She very well might have been going to a shop to fix it. But that doesn't mean it was broke.

If you didn't think the autopilot was working and we're taking it somewhere to fix it. Why on earth would you not handfly it.

The flight school owner said this was too much plane for her skills and she agreed.
 
Racerx said:
I watched a few clips of her fumbling with the autopilot. I don't think she knew how to work it and just blamed the autopilot. The autopilot did not have trim. So she had to manually trim based on the annunciator. Her instructor said she would get confused. Being barred out on Xanax would make things confusing. She very well might have been going to a shop to fix it. But that doesn't mean it was broke.

If you didn't think the autopilot was working and we're taking it somewhere to fix it. Why on earth would you not handfly it.

The flight school owner said this was too much plane for her skills and she agreed.
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No disagreement here. If the autopilot was acting crazy (and not her lack of understanding of how to operate it), and she couldn't hit the disconnect and/or pull the breaker by then, somehow she failed the Darwin test. Amazing it didn't happen sooner...
 
Rick A said:
I remember hearing somewhere following the crash that she had been, or was actually headed out to an autopilot fix it shop destination when the crash occurred.
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I believe her goal was to replace it with a completely new one and install some glass as well...but one wonders, if she believed her autopilot was defective, why would she continue trying to use it?

I made the video of her fumbling a 50 mile flight, flying the wrong direction, and getting lost over familiar terrain. The situational awareness was zilch. I have some other footage of her making poor decisions such as: handing over control to her non-pilot father at approximately 200 feet after takeoff in order to fool around with the cameras in the back, the day after her PPL checkride.
 
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I also recall she was scheduled for an avionics overhaul. I haven’t read the report yet, but can’t imagine after several years of investigation the NTSB didn’t figure that out and include it.

Edit: The flight school manager talked to her the day of departure and the report states, “They were going to take the Debonaire to an avionics shop south of Little Rock for a new avionics upgrade.”

All the instructors that worked with her should now have a clear picture of their responsibility to inform someone if they have reached their limitation as a pilot. According to that flight school manager, he did that.
 
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I watched a couple of her videos before the crash; it was clearly a train wreck waiting to happen.

AV8R_87 said:
Don't you need at least 10 hours of solo time before the checkride? She barely got over the line.
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I thought it was 20 hours solo? Did the requirements change at some point?
 
SixPapaCharlie said:
Has to be odd to not know you are a bad pilot until you are helplessly spinning toward the ground.
I think I am an ok pilot but she probably did too. Perhaps naively so not realizing this isn't a game just because she hadn't crashed so far.
Her poor father.
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Spinning toward the ground it probably still didn’t occur to her that she was a bad pilot.
 
Dana said:
I watched a couple of her videos before the crash; it was clearly a train wreck waiting to happen.

I thought it was 20 hours solo? Did the requirements change at some point?
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I, too, recall 20 hours of dual and 20 hours of solo as the checkride requirement.

Gemini confirms: “Yes, your memory is correct. Prior to August 1997, the FAA required a minimum of 20 hours of solo flight time for a Private Pilot certificate under Part 61.”

The regulations were overhauled in 1997 to provide more flexibility in how a student reaches the 40-hour total minimum.”
 
Hasn’t it beenn
SixPapaCharlie said:
Has to be odd to not know you are a bad pilot until you are helplessly spinning toward the ground.
I think I am an ok pilot but she probably did too. Perhaps naively so not realizing this isn't a game just because she hadn't crashed so far.
Her poor father.
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discussed here that 90% of drivers believe themselves to be above average? Same thing I think.
 
I was flying a plane once with the autopilot on and the prop governor suddenly failed. I pulled the throttle back quickly as the RPMs surged. As I was looking down, trying to figure out what happened, the nose pitched way up. I disconnected the autopilot and regained control. I had never thought about this type of scenario before that day. The altitude-hold was doing it's job even though I pulled power. I could see something like this overwhelming a pilot quickly.
 
dmspilot said:
I believe her goal was to replace it with a completely new one and install some glass as well...but one wonders, if she believed her autopilot was defective, why would she continue trying to use it?
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Maybe because she was hoping that the current autopilot was ultimately going to be fixable (or learnable). It doesn't appear this last flight was intended to drop off the plane, so maybe the intent of letting the pitch excursions was to provide a good description of the autopilot's deviations to the destination shop. Not disconnecting and then hand-flying may have been intentional. And she ignored (or forgot about) airspeed management while screwing around. Then stalled and spun.

Dropping off a plane for panel work at another airport takes having all the necessary parts and equipment already there, an appointment, and a friend with a plane to willing to pick you up and fly you home. Or airline tickets. And maybe luggage for a stay. None of that was ever mentioned in the NTSB report, or by anybody else.

IMO this flight may have been taken to provide an evaluation of the current condition of autopilot's status, and recommendations as to what her options were. Only then could the shop create an estimate.

The last Garmin boxes I had installed took over 4 months to be delivered to the shop, and the appointment date was a little later yet.
 
decalogue said:
I wonder how many of those hours were actually dual.

It’s not uncommon for somewhat attractive women, who are aspiring pilots, to get right seat time, and for the pilot to sign dual so they can log it.
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Student pilots can’t log any time except solo and with an instructor.
 
JScarry said:
Student pilots can’t log any time except solo and with an instructor.
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Yup

And a good chunk of the owners at my field are also CFIs, albeit not very active ones.

Many of the cute airport girls for some reason enjoy the company of pilots on $100 burger missions much more if they are CFIs and can log it, no idea why ;)
 
schmookeeg said:
Shocking. I could print out the local airport's hangar waiting list, which is about 7 years long, and thin that herd with a few phonecalls.
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I'm not sure why you are assuming that an anonymous tip would be 100% of the evidence against the pilot. Or that your multiple anonymous tips about multiple pilots would not raise suspicion against you.

Basically, you seem to be assuming that you (the reporter) have complete control over the situation and not simply triggering an investigation, which may produce nothing. It's really not that different than real life criminal prosecution where the police act on an anonymous tip..
 
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The listing of Rx drugs she was on...wowzers. :yikes: Incredibly sad for the family, but she should've maybe focused more on her health. There's no way all of those didn't have some effect on mental or physical reaction times.
 
mark.staggs said:
The listing of Rx drugs she was on...wowzers. :yikes: Incredibly sad for the family, but she should've maybe focused more on her health. There's no way all of those didn't have some effect on mental or physical reaction times.
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Maybe we can stop pretending that documenting one's life online for the approval of strangers is something that well-adjusted people feel the need to do.
 
bbchien said:
And this is why the medical branch is so EXACTING in the evaluation of pilots with such medical histories...
Pull the breaker fly the plane. sigh (wears CFI hat).
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malreynolds-firefly.gif


Bob Hoover – Pilot Medical Solutions – LeftSeat.com

www.leftseat.com www.leftseat.com

www.seattletimes.com

Seattle pilot fought back after Delta ‘weaponized’ mental health rules

When Delta grounded her after securing a bogus bipolar diagnosis, Seattle-based pilot Karlene Petitt fought back. She resisted. And she won.
www.seattletimes.com www.seattletimes.com


 
Mark.Staggs said:
The listing of Rx drugs she was on...wowzers. :yikes:
Click to expand...

Well there can be abuse, for sure....but we have about 40 of these "meds" situations, in the past 20 years.
FWIW I am a believer in the maxim: the answer is not more $$s.

And Now - where's that "popcorn" icon.....
 
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decalogue said:
malreynolds-firefly.gif


Bob Hoover – Pilot Medical Solutions – LeftSeat.com

www.leftseat.com www.leftseat.com

www.seattletimes.com

Seattle pilot fought back after Delta ‘weaponized’ mental health rules

When Delta grounded her after securing a bogus bipolar diagnosis, Seattle-based pilot Karlene Petitt fought back. She resisted. And she won.
www.seattletimes.com www.seattletimes.com


Click to expand...
"Exacting" and "accurate" are not synonyms, and I presume that Bruce used the word he intended. The FAA for certain has a bias towards lowering risk and is not interested in granting you any "benefit of the doubt."
 
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