YouTube - de Havilland Beaver Plane Crash at Lake Hood (HD)

Talk. Discuss. Feel free to share your 'holy crap's with everyone.

 

That looked like it came right out of a movie 0.o

 

http://www.adn.com/news/alaska/story/822923.html A link to Anchorage Daily News article concerning the above accident.

 

ahhh yes...gust of wind...funny how that kind of thing happens when you try to have your friend in position to video a "watch this" take off

As soon as the NTSB/FAA sees this video the pilot is done.

Considering this...
1- the pilot did not use the longest part of the lake (screen left),
2- he aimed at the camera for takeoff,
3- and the relatively limp wind sock seen near the end of the video (screen right) will debunk the "gust of wind" statement in the article

 

Seeing a Beaver die makes me cry

 

Holy crap!

Lotsa right aileron. x-wind? (becomes obvious at :30)

Also note the last ditch "unstick" maneuver just before the liftoff.
Watch the nose dip and water break. Most visible if you watch the floats.

CE

 

I doubt it was a friend tapeing, that's a common spot to watch the planes takeoff from. And you can't see where you're going in a Beaver so aiming is out. I agree he should have started out about 20 degrees right.

Saw on another board he just got checked out the day before, not sure if that's true.

 

Seems to me you can hear the wind at points on the video. A windsock is not necesarilly a good indicator for very localized gusts. On floats one often has only the water to read and airplane behavior to read to make quick decisions. Not many windsocks away from "civilization". Interesting info above regarding the possibility the pilot had been recently checked out in the Beaver, don't know veracity of that, but the Beaver, like anything, can be kinda squirrely in crosswinds. Looks to me like the float bows are pretty high during the take-off, almost like plowing instead of fully on step. With the nose high, less of the floats' length tracking through the water, and high power (p-factor), the Beaver will definately want to turn left on you. A good thing to check on Beavers on floats is that you are getting full air rudder travel, ie that the air rudder travel is not limited by the water rudders' rigging. Cables stretch over time and lose tension too, especially when rigged to water rudders and their associated tensions.

Glad the pilot and passengers are okay. The Beaver can, and probably will be re-built.

Stay safe.

 

I'm glad everyone is ok too. The artilce states that the pilot says everything is normal until the gust of wind. If I took off with only 50-100 feet of runway in front of me, I would not say it was normal. I am not float liscensed, but that cannot be a normal takeoff, gust or wind or not. It looks like he was either heavier than he thought he was, the lake was smaller than he remembered it was last time he took off, or the beaver was not swimming as fast as it could.