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Posted

After takeoff on runway 21 at Santa Monica normal procedure is to turn left 10 degrees and fly over the golf course for noise abatement .

 

 

 

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Posted
Richard,Actually I practice simulated ones fairly regular, also stalls and lots of other things I used to do in my training & for what it is worth mate I don't just plod along fat dumb & happy when I fly, I actually fly quite disciplined.

 

I don't quite know what to make of your comment above?

 

I think my flying skills are above average, one thing I do have is I don't tend to panic much in life, I look at when there is a problem that arises in my life not to ponder on it but to deal with it.

 

And yes I hope myself I don't have an engine failure soon either but the overall outcome of it all if I do will be from my own decision making won't it as will it be yours, then you can give it your all on the outcome whether good or bad.

 

Alf

Alf,

I don't know where to start with this but this is the way I see it, the uncontrolled crash which has most likely totaled the plane and left the pilot badly injured has been described as a good landing, the pilot was trying to get back to the airport when the the best thing would have been to do a out landing on the fairway. I have thought some of the comments on this thread are so absurd people are just baiting or they are clueless about these things. I think the fact he is still alive is more luck than good management. Because you have said what a great job the pilot did I thought you did not understand what appears to have happened which was the reason for my comment above. If I am wrong about all this then so be it, I am just working with the information that is available. I am glad you practice engine failures.

 

Richard.

 

 

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Posted
Alf,I don't know where to start with this but this is the way I see it, the uncontrolled crash which has most likely totaled the plane and left the pilot badly injured has been described as a good landing, the pilot was trying to get back to the airport when the the best thing would have been to do a out landing on the fairway. I have thought some of the comments on this thread are so absurd people are just baiting or they are clueless about these things. I think the fact he is still alive is more luck than good management. Because you have said what a great job the pilot did I thought you did not understand what appears to have happened which was the reason for my comment above. If I am wrong about all this then so be it, I am just working with the information that is available. I am glad you practice engine failures.

 

Richard.

Fair call Richard

 

That's the beauty of us all being human and having different opinions

 

No offence taken

 

 

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Posted

It's easy to be an armchair pilot, but nobody mentioned the beautiful beach straight ahead of him where a downwind turn-back to runway was unnecessary.

 

Phone video footage suggests he kept a nose high attitude, trying to stretch his glide to the runway rather than be decisive about maintaining airspeed to flare nicely somewhere (either the beach, or the golf course he just flew over on climb out).

 

A LAME I know has suggested a likely engine seizure due to an oil petcock (for anti hydraulic-lock) accidentally being left closed on the pre-flight check. Only a theory, but apparently is a likely cause on that engine.

 

 

Posted

Truth is we are all just surmising. Those that are Han Solo or Indiana Jones fans see a hero making a good fist of it. Those that see the end result of a destroyed aircraft and substantial injury think maybe he got it a bit wrong. Could be he made the best of a very bad situation or he cocked it up and is lucky to be alive. If it was me, I would be disappointed to have landed so heavily as to wipe out the undercarriage and break the back of the aircraft, but glad to be alive!

 

 

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Posted

Glad to be alive is the operative word. Let's face it he has enough money to buy a dozen new aircraft (or pay for that one to be totally rebuilt). The one and only thing that matters is that no one died.

 

 

Posted
If it was me, I would be disappointed to have landed so heavily as to wipe out the undercarriage and break the back of the aircraft, but glad to be alive!

Believe me, when you have successfully landed in the sticks after a full engine failure - you don't really care how hard you thumped it down! happy days,

 

 

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Posted
What you do is scull your first stubbie and then you shove your cigarette buts into that empty stubby.

And then place the stubby in the little hole with the flag?

 

 

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Posted
Believe me, when you have successfully landed in the sticks after a full engine failure - you don't really care how hard you thumped it down! happy days,

Thats exactly right ,

 

Speaking from experiance , although , im sitting in my armchair !

 

My thoughts as i crawled out of the recked Avocet , ( distant memory ) , was , any landind you walk away from ,!

 

Yea , blood dripping and all that ,!

 

Mike

 

 

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Posted
Thats exactly right ,Speaking from experiance , although , im sitting in my armchair !

My thoughts as i crawled out of the recked Avocet , ( distant memory ) , was , any landind you walk away from ,!

 

Yea , blood dripping and all that ,!

 

Mike

Mike,

 

My point exactly in all of my previous posts about this , he may have not done it 100% but he did enough to survive with a combination of some skill & some luck, yeah he hit hard in the end but that may have had something to do with the tree he supposedly hit prior to reaching the ground.

 

Point is we were not in his situation so how we all would have handled it would be different, some of us might be dead, some of us might have walked away with no damage to oneself or the plane, some of us might have a broken ankle & pelvis like HF but he survived in reasonable shape for a 72 year old and that is all that matters.

 

Alf

 

 

  • Agree 3
Posted
Believe me, when you have successfully landed in the sticks after a full engine failure - you don't really care how hard you thumped it down! happy days,

Such bad advice, confusion between crashing and landing, sure if you thump it down hard enough you won't care because you will be dead.

 

 

Posted

Might relate to the smoothness of the arrival. Better to get it on the ground and pull it up than try for a greasy touch down, and float excessively and hit something. Most of those Ryans are not noted for their strong undercarriages. It was easy to deform them on fairly normal arrivals. Nev

 

 

  • 2 years later...
Posted

Shortly after takeoff from Santa Monica Municipal Airport in Southern California, the pilot advised the air traffic control tower controller that the Ryan’s engine had lost power, and he requested an immediate return to the airport.

 

He initiated a left turn toward the airport, however during the approach, he realized that the airplane was unable to reach the runway.

 

Subsequently, the airplane struck the top of a tree and then hit the ground in an open area of a golf course

 

A post-accident examination of the engine revealed that the carburetor’s main metering jet was unscrewed from its seat and rotated 90°. The unseated jet would have allowed an increased fuel flow through the main metering orifice, producing an extremely rich fuel-to-air ratio, which would have resulted in the loss of engine power. It is likely that, over time, the jet gradually loosened from its seat, which allowed it to eventually rotate 90°.

 

A review of the airplane’s maintenance records indicated that the carburetor was rebuilt during the airplane’s restoration about 17 years before the accident.

 

The carburetor maintenance instruction manual contained no pertinent instructions for the installation of the jet assemblies.

 

Further, no maintenance entries in the engine logbook regarding carburetor maintenance were found.

 

Had the carburetor maintenance instruction manual identified a means to ensure the security of the main metering jet, it is unlikely that the jet would have become unseated.

 

There was no record of maintenance personnel inspecting the carburetor jets during the previous 17 years nor was there a requirement to do so.

 

The front and rear seats of the airplane were equipped with non-factory-installed shoulder harnesses. The pilot’s shoulder harness was installed by mounting the end of the restraint to the lower portion of the seatback assembly, which was made of thin aluminum. No reinforcement material or doublers were installed at or around the attachment bolt hole in the seatback.

 

The lack of reinforcement allowed the attachment bolt, washers, and stop nut to be pulled upward and through the seatback structure during the crash, which resulted in the pilot’s loss of shoulder harness restraint.

 

It is likely that the improperly installed shoulder harness contributed to the severity of the pilot’s injuries.

 

As a result of this investigation, the NTSB is working with the pilot community to inform them of the lessons learned from this accident: The security of the carburetor’s main metering jet and the security of the shoulder harness are both critical aspects of aviation safety.

 

Probable cause: A total loss of engine power during initial climb when the carburetor main metering jet became unseated, which led to an extremely rich fuel-to-air ratio. Contributing to the accident was the lack of adequate carburetor maintenance instructions. Contributing to the severity of the pilot’s injuries was the improperly installed shoulder harness.

 

NTSB Identification: WPR15FA121

 

This March 2015 accident report is provided by the National Transportation Safety Board. Published as an educational tool, it is intended to help pilots learn from the misfortunes of others.

 

 

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Posted

BexrBetter

 

I had installed a five point harness in my HummelBird, but "wing-loading" requires it's removal as weight saving.

 

My two-stroke garden edger has by coincidence had it's choke butterfly screw unwind itself, thus carbie strip & locktite the screw.

 

spacesailor

 

 

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Posted

Space, I like your idea of the 5 point harness and reckon if it puts you ever so slightly over some magic weight number then you should ignore that. After all, its your plane and your neck and you have more direct interest in looking after them both than any regulators do.

 

 

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Posted

I Did think the same:

 

The powers-to-be have decreed that their rules are to be obeyed to the letter, so all HummelBirds have been removed from the 95-10 register,included those with their grandfather clause.

 

There were sixteen builder's at one stage and four flying, now I think there's one on the nineteen register!.

 

What a shame on the AUF of old, that new crowd don't want the small aicraft,

 

I can go VH experimental but at what cost, If CASA gives all "noncommercial aircraft to RAA, I'd be back at square one again.

 

spacesailor

 

 

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