More on the Montrose Ebersol/Montrose crash
Whoever they are , they say there is a chain of events that lead up to an accident. Having said that, YES the Challenger needed to be deiced, duh! But wait there's MORE! I'm a part 91 owner flown CJ2 ATP that flys single pilot. (I'm sure there are thoughts that range from "dude cool" to "what a moron") Anyway, I departed Montrose (MTJ) shortly after Ebersols plane left. Hmmmm Credibility!
Did you know that Ebersols plane departed the shorter, narrower contaminated runway when there was a longer, wider, clean runway available? The difference in taxi time from rwy 31 (the departure runway) to rwy 35 the better runway is negligible, so that wasn't it. How about the obstacle departure procedure? Ryw 31's dp is make a 13 degree left turn and fly the 297 radial of the MTJ VOR to GJT. Easy isn't it. Now take rwy 35, the DP is: climbing left turn to 7000' (you start at 5800'), join the MTJ 297 radial and when reaching 700' make an almost 270 degree back to the MJ VOR and enter the holding pattern and then depart the hold at the MEA of the Victor airway. Who wants to do low level maneuvering in icing IMC in a non-radar, non-towered mountainous environment? Or do you want to fly straight out? (I did the rwy 35 DP).
The BIG question is: would the extra 2500 feet of rwy on ryw 35 have made a difference? Could he have stopped on the runway when he figured out it wasn't going to fly?
What do they say about fuel in the truck, sky above you and runway behind you?