Very bad news...

gismo

gismo

Touchdown! Greaser!
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iGismo
Steve, a good friend and founder of the company I recently worked for died last night when his SR-22 crashed during a landing attempt at his home base (KMIC). I'm the one that introduced Steve to GA on an Angel Flight which reignited a long dormant desire to fly. I mentored him through his flight training over the last several years culminating in his passing his instrument rating early this year. He called me last Friday while I was at Gastons asking for advice on how to "deal with weather" and indicated that he felt his IR training didn't really teach him much about that aspect of instrument flight. We talked at length about how the various sources of weather information can be used during preflight planning and while enroute. All I know at this point is that he was on an IFR flight from the Memphis area and was landing in rain around 10PM last night. This one's gonna hit hard.
 
Horrible news Lance.. Sorry to hear it.
 
He was right. Basic IFR training does not teach much about practical dealings with the weather. That comes with multiple long XCs, crossing fronts, hihger than legal personal mins that eventually work down to legal mins.

And this was a weather accident- temp=dewPt and vis 1.5 miles.

Ouch!
 
I'm very sorry to hear that Lance... my thoughts and prayers are with you.
 
bbchien said:
He was right. Basic IFR training does not teach much about practical dealings with the weather. That comes with multiple long XCs, crossing fronts, hihger than legal personal mins that eventually work down to legal mins.

And this was a weather accident- temp=dewPt and vis 1.5 miles.

Ouch!
Click to expand...

I checked the METARs at the time of the crash (just after 03:00Z) and they didn't look too bad for an instrument approach:

[FONT=Monospace,Courier]KMIC 170353Z 10004KT 6SM -RA BR FEW038 OVC085 17/16 A2989 RMK AO2 SLP120 P0009 T01670161[/FONT]
[FONT=Monospace,Courier]
KMIC 170309Z 10004KT 4SM RA BR OVC044 17/17 A2990 RMK AO2 P0003[/FONT]
[FONT=Monospace,Courier]
KMIC 170253Z AUTO 08003KT 3SM -RA BR OVC042 17/17 A2990 RMK AO2 SLP121 P0004 60019 T01720172 53004[/FONT]

The pilot was relatively inexperienced in IMC but pretty competent and quite conservative. He had made several long XCs with the plane prior to getting his IR including a couple through the southern Rockies. There's just no way I can see him sniffing for asphalt and given the METAR and the fact he crashed on the airport grounds it seems like something unusual must have occurred.
 
I'm very sorry to hear this Lance. I know you are a great mentor. My condolences.

Best,

Dave
 
But the actual weather was good ceilings, crappy vis. temp=dewpt.

Would'a made the approach lights TOUGH to see, and a CTL is right on the brink. Is there a Flight Aware track? Kinda had it, didn't have it, had it, didn't have it, loss of airspeed - high distraction environment, etc.....? Losing it at the transition (VOR or RNAV) approaches is still pretty deadly. Easy to say now that the FCM ILS 10 would have been a better choice.

Wed Jun 17 01:22:00 2009 1245201720 0 0 KT RABR 18 17 1012 Cloudy 1.5 mi 8500 ft 94 M
Wed Jun 17 01:34:00 2009 1245202440 90 5 KT -RABR 17 17 1012 Cloudy 1.75 mi 8500 ft 100 M
Wed Jun 17 01:41:00 2009 1245202860 70 4 KT -RABR 17 17 1012 Cloudy 2 mi 10000 ft 100 M
Wed Jun 17 01:51:00 2009 1245203460 0 0 KT -RABR 17 17 1012 Cloudy 1.5 mi 4900 ft 100 M
Wed Jun 17 01:53:00 2009 1245203580 0 0 KT -RABR 17.2 17.2 1011.8 Cloudy 1.5 mi 4900 ft 100 M
Wed Jun 17 02:09:00 2009 1245204540 0 0 KT -RABR 17 17 1012 Cloudy 2.5 mi 4200 ft 100 M
Wed Jun 17 02:53:00 2009 1245207180 80 3 KT -RABR 17.2 17.2 1012.1 Cloudy 3 mi 4200 ft 100 M
Wed Jun 17 03:09:00 2009 1245208140 100 4 KT RABR 17 17 1013 Cloudy 4 mi 4400 ft 100 M

Very sorry for your personal loss.
 
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Ooof, that's just terrible. I've mentored several people to their tickets, and it would be very difficult to have this happen. Sorry for your loss, Lance.

A new IFR pilot flying a piston single in low night IMC. Probably at the end of a long day, so he's tired to boot. A bad combination, indeed.
 
Well we do not yet know if it was a pilot factor that was at the core of this accident. It could have been anything right now, it could be mechanical, design, health, or pilot factors just to name a few. All we know is that Lance's friend is dead.
 
gismo said:
Steve, a good friend and founder of the company I recently worked for died last night when his SR-22 crashed during a landing attempt at his home base (KMIC). I'm the one that introduced Steve to GA on an Angel Flight which reignited a long dormant desire to fly. I mentored him through his flight training over the last several years culminating in his passing his instrument rating early this year. He called me last Friday while I was at Gastons asking for advice on how to "deal with weather" and indicated that he felt his IR training didn't really teach him much about that aspect of instrument flight. We talked at length about how the various sources of weather information can be used during preflight planning and while enroute. All I know at this point is that he was on an IFR flight from the Memphis area and was landing in rain around 10PM last night. This one's gonna hit hard.
Click to expand...

I'm sorry Lance. I've met Steve and have also flown in his Cirrus. Several people here met him at Prairie Du Chien. He was a very nice guy. :frown3: KMIC can be an interesting airport at night -- as it is so embedded into the city that the surrounding lights over-power the airport.
 
jesse said:
I'm sorry Lance. I've met Steve and have also flown in his Cirrus. He was a very nice guy. :frown3: KMIC can be an interesting airport at night -- as it is so embedded into the city that the surrounding lights over-power the airport.
Click to expand...

I've been lost trying to find KMIC at night. I agree 100%
 
Jay Honeck said:
Ooof, that's just terrible. I've mentored several people to their tickets, and it would be very difficult to have this happen. Sorry for your loss, Lance.

A new IFR pilot flying a piston single in low night IMC. Probably at the end of a long day, so he's tired to boot. A bad combination, indeed.
Click to expand...

There is a good chance that fatigue played a significant factor.

Does anyone know how to pull up Nexrad images from the previous day? Also I thought there was a way to get FlightAware to show the actual radar image from the time of the flight. Anyone know how to do that?

Here's the flight: http://flightaware.com/live/flight/N214BN
 
jesse said:
I'm sorry Lance. I've met Steve and have also flown in his Cirrus. Several people here met him at Prairie Du Chien. He was a very nice guy. :frown3: KMIC can be an interesting airport at night -- as it is so embedded into the city that the surrounding lights over-power the airport.
Click to expand...

You know, I'd forgotten that. Even Dr. Chien was there. IIRC that was pretty soon after he'd gotten his PPL.
 
bbchien said:
But the actual weather was good ceilings, crappy vis. temp=dewpt.

Would'a made the approach lights TOUGH to see, and a CTL is right on the brink. Is there a Flight Aware track? Kinda had it, didn't have it, had it, didn't have it, loss of airspeed - high distraction environment, etc.....? Losing it at the transition (VOR or RNAV) approaches is still pretty deadly. Easy to say now that the FCM ILS 10 would have been a better choice.

Wed Jun 17 01:22:00 2009 1245201720 0 0 KT RABR 18 17 1012 Cloudy 1.5 mi 8500 ft 94 M
Wed Jun 17 01:34:00 2009 1245202440 90 5 KT -RABR 17 17 1012 Cloudy 1.75 mi 8500 ft 100 M
Wed Jun 17 01:41:00 2009 1245202860 70 4 KT -RABR 17 17 1012 Cloudy 2 mi 10000 ft 100 M
Wed Jun 17 01:51:00 2009 1245203460 0 0 KT -RABR 17 17 1012 Cloudy 1.5 mi 4900 ft 100 M
Wed Jun 17 01:53:00 2009 1245203580 0 0 KT -RABR 17.2 17.2 1011.8 Cloudy 1.5 mi 4900 ft 100 M
Wed Jun 17 02:09:00 2009 1245204540 0 0 KT -RABR 17 17 1012 Cloudy 2.5 mi 4200 ft 100 M
Wed Jun 17 02:53:00 2009 1245207180 80 3 KT -RABR 17.2 17.2 1012.1 Cloudy 3 mi 4200 ft 100 M
Wed Jun 17 03:09:00 2009 1245208140 100 4 KT RABR 17 17 1013 Cloudy 4 mi 4400 ft 100 M

Very sorry for your personal loss.
Click to expand...

It looks like he was on the RNAV(GPS) 14 approach and straight in, not circling. The flightaware track looks like he was tracking well (could have been on the autopilot). There are no approach lights, but there is a VASI, REIL, and MIRL so unless the vis was really bad (way worse than the METAR) it shouldn't have been that hard to see the runway. His plane was WAAS equipped and he knew how to use that. The approach doesn't include a glideslope per se, but I think the GNS430W would have given him an advisory one. I agree that the transition from instruments to visual is the tough part on a challenging approach but in this case 4 mi vis, 2000+ cloud base it shouldn't have been a big deal assuming the wx wasn't locally a lot worse.
 
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Is any of this in the LiveATC archives?
 
Like the others, I'm saddened by the news. Our condolences to you and his family.
 
gismo said:
I agree that the transition from instruments to visual is the tough part on a challenging approach but in this case 4 mi vis, 2000+ cloud base it shouldn't have been a big deal assuming the wx wasn't locally a lot worse.
Click to expand...
Lance, I think that the ground vis around Crystal is frequently not representative of the vis from 400 agl. I've experienced this a number of times at Peoria, where it's clearly legal to land out of the ILS but hoky smokes batman, when you break out all that you notice is that the color of gray changed.....it's the old argument about flight visibility vs. ground visibility. Yes, the ground measurement trumps the pilot. But in fact, sometimes the flight vis is WORSE than the ground vis. I mean, that simply HAS GOT to happen.

The LOC 1 to Watsonville CA is that way too. It's all local phenomena.
 
Lance, I am very sorry to hear of this loss. The only good that can come is that others learn from this accident, and I already see that happening here.
 
My condolences Lance.

I've met quite a few pilots with the IMC concerns that you mentioned your friend had but I've never found their basic weather knowledge learned for the IR to be lacking. It could always be better in most pilots of course but, it was adequate and their concerns were more an issue of subconsciously not liking to have to accept the fact that the weather still dictates when and how much one can fly in it, even with the Instrument Rating.
 
. . . and the pain is felt in Maine. Thoughts are with you and Steve's circle.

HR
 
I am really sorry to see this tragic news Lance. From all I know about you, I am sure you did more than you felt necessary to help keep Steve safe. _ _ _ _ happens, and this is a very nasty example of that. Please try to not let it eat on you. We all feel your loss and I really hope that helps.

Rick
 
bbchien said:
Lance, I think that the ground vis around Crystal is frequently not representative of the vis from 400 agl. I've experienced this a number of times at Peoria, where it's clearly legal to land out of the ILS but hoky smokes batman, when you break out all that you notice is that the color of gray changed.....it's the old argument about flight visibility vs. ground visibility. Yes, the ground measurement trumps the pilot. But in fact, sometimes the flight vis is WORSE than the ground vis. I mean, that simply HAS GOT to happen.

The LOC 1 to Watsonville CA is that way too. It's all local phenomena.
Click to expand...
I've got a Lifeline Pilot flight into Crystal this Sunday. I'll say a little prayer for his soul as I come in.
 
Thanks everone. I'm still having a hard time accepting this and it probably won't sink in completely until the funeral. Meanwhile as Rick guessed, having all sorts of thoughts along the rather useless direction of "what could I have done to prevent it". On top of everything else Steve was extremely well liked at the company he founded as well in several other circles and his youngest daughter is going to be married in a few weeks. I can't imagine how she and the rest of the family are taking this.
 
I'm sorry Lance... that's about as close to home as it can hit. My condolences to you and those that knew your friend.
 
gismo said:
his youngest daughter is going to be married in a few weeks. I can't imagine how she and the rest of the family are taking this.
Click to expand...

Shakes head... That just compounds the sorrow I really feel for his daughter to be frank while I certainly still fear dying as I get older my fear for my daughter should that happen G-d forbid, is eclipsing my own fear for my self.

Lance perhaps it may help you some just to start jotting down some of the great things about your friend. There will be time to learn from the accident in a bit but this may help you somewhat.
 
kpdc.jpg


I think this might have been the first time I met Kent, Dr Bruce, etc. I remember thinking "damn kent is big", At the time, I had been arguing up a storm against Kent online.
 
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Lance, My condolences as well. I remeber you talking about him on the plane ride to Gaston.
 
Lance, I'm really sorry to hear this. As Dave said, I'm sure you were an excellent mentor to him. You can only do so much; at some point, it's all up to him....
 
jesse said:
kpdc.jpg
Click to expand...

I actually ran across the article before I saw it here, because someone linked to it from Twitter. Quite a shock - I remembered Steve's name well, which is uncharacteristic for me. Only met him that one time. Sorry for your loss, Lance. :( :( :(

I had to look back through to the pictures of that day, and sure enough, that was the plane:

attachment.php


I think this might have been the first time I met Kent, Dr Bruce, etc. I remember thinking "damn kent is big", At the time, I had been arguing up a storm against Kent online.
Click to expand...

Sorry to put this in such a somber thread, but I had to laugh out loud when I read that. Is THAT why you've been so quiet ever since? That was the first time I met you in person, and I think the 2nd for both Dr. Bruce and Lance.
 
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