TiredSoul

He wrote one of the first G1000 training manuals around 2005-2006.
Is he actually encouraging the use of GPS and moving map for a traffic pattern at 8:14?
SMH

Thats not a perceptual problem that’s a decision making problem.

Stan446

Aholes posting on people dying.

Stan446

Wow, guy is dead,.

JohnBurke

The guy being dead is the reason he's being discussed. If he didn't do something that made him front page news, nobody would know who he was.

We all fly the same airspace. While it's inappropriate to speculate, it's not inappropriate to discuss elements of the event, because the airmanship issues impact us all.

Being dead is not a ticket to sainthood, nor does it elevate one to beyond reproach, or exempt one from the topic of discussion. Rest assured, make a smoking hole in the ground, and you'll be the prime topic around the aviation dinner table. Gain enough notoriety for your actions, and you'll be a prima facie case at every groundschool, recurrent, and training event for the next 40 years. Lots of deaths at Tenerife, yet it remains an obvious choice for CRM, ADM, and numerous other topics. Do you think a training class for the Lear 35 passes without discussion of the Payne Stewart mishap? Of course not, and yes, they all died.

A good share of the regulations, rules, and policies by which we are all required to abide exist based on a loss of life and event that caused the rule change or initial development; the policies, procedures and regulations which guide and govern us are written in blood, and there is great benefit at times in discussing how they came to be.

A pilot flew an RNAV approach which prohibited circling to runway 27R, at night. The pilot elected to do it anyway, circumventing the prohibition by cancelling his IFR clearance under conditions in which he should not. This decision, and his actions in attempting to make that circle, far below circling minimums for either runway (where circling wasn't allowed to that runway at night) ultimately cost him his life, as well as that of his crew. He broadcast his terror on the air, captured and rebroadcast now on public video, and video was captured of his descent and death. We have also the death of the crew to consider as the result of this decision tree, and it may be a minor miracle that no one on the ground was killed by these actions.

The bodies, or what little remains of them, are scarcely cold at present, with an investigation left to go, and little but the words of talking heads vying for youtube exposure (and revenue) to stir the waters: speculation is unwarranted, and unprofessional. Discussion of what is known, and the nature of the airport, approaches, procedures, runway lengths, atmospheric conditions, etc, is not unwarranted, and is as open to discussion as any other airport, procedure, or weather yesterday, today, or tomorrow.

Very clearly there was nothing stable about this approach to land. The procedure in use is a matter of public domain. It's not a secret. The minimums for that approach are 1000-1100' above field elevation, with a clear prohibition on circling to runway 35 or 27R, even though circling minimums are published. Straight-in, the lowest minimums were 1000' above field elevation. The pilot asked for brighter lighting on the runway, with the response that lights were full brightness. Did the pilot see the lights, or just a glow? Did experience at that field prompt him to step beyond the legal limitations, use some "tribal knowledge," and let himself down to 27R, despite the prohibition? The rules won't let me, but I'll do it anyway, but changing the rules? Is there a point at which a pilot in instrument conditions may legally cancel his instrument clearance and proceed visually, while unable to maintain cloud clearance and other VFR requirements? An investigation will touch on all of that, but presently we are left with a smoking hole, high approach minimums, circling restrictions, an airplane that attempted to cancel and circle anyway, and dead crew that the pilot's decision making also caused. https://aeronav.faa.gov/d-tpp/2113/05402R17.PDF

Runway 27 has an approach, but it has a seven degree glidepath to the runway, which is clearly more appropriate for getting to the field, then entering the traffic pattern from the overhead, and even that approach, the LOC-D, offers only circling minimums (despite alignment with the runway) and also prohibits circling to 27R at night. Regardless of whether the crew had flown the RNAV 17 (as they did) or the LOC-D, either would have required circling to get to 27R, and both prohibited it. https://aeronav.faa.gov/d-tpp/2113/05402LD.PDF

I am a proponent of not speculating. That said, there are elements of this very public mishap which are beneficial to discuss, will impact those using that airfield or procedures with high minimums in low weather, and perhaps should be considered, without requirement to wait out a mourning period, or the two years that it will take to read the final report. This isn't a case in which a pilot reported a mechanical issue. The timbre of his voice on the radio did not sound tense, nor concerned. The impression one might have is that this action, flying the RNAV 17, then circling to 27R, wasn't a first-time event for the pilot. The specifics are not known, and will be investigated. The generalities are well known and haven't changed because a death occurred.

If you think that a death exempts one from discussion, or that all talk and examination of the deceased actions are verboten and off-limits, or that somehow being deceased exonerates a pilot from examination, you. must be very new to aviation. You may not be familiar with the pilots prayer, Dear God, don't let me screw up. I can tell you that one of my great motivating factors in how I plan is not only how my actions will be dissected in an investigation and in court, and in consideration of the safe outcome of the flight, but also from the simple fact that I don't want to be 'that guy' at the center of discussion and the center of a smoking hole in the ground. There before the grace go we all, but grace does not exempt us from examination. Neither does death.

USMCFLYR

Absolutely use the tools in your aircraft to set up, judge, determine and correct abeam distance if available and know how to use them.

TransWorld

I agree with John Burke. Wish we had a like button. Appropriate discussion. Appropriate learnings. Sad that people died.

TiredSoul

Advocating to use a GPS/Moving Map to fly a visual pattern lower then where you are allowed to be is a complete contradiction.

USMCFLYR

if you are responding to my post, I never said in order to tly a pattern lower than you should.
Using the tools in the airplane is no different than using external cues for proper abeam distance.
How and when you use them is up to the PIC. Make good decisions.

Excargodog

There was also a request to turn up the runway lights which were already at max. If you can’t see the runway lights well from that close you have to wonder about a slant range visibility problem, that or you are skirting the bases of the clouds. Not somewhere you want to be at 400 AGL at night in a jet aircraft. Or any aircraft really.

JohnBurke

This naturally raises the question of how the airplane arrived at 400' above field elevation without seeing the lights, as the minimums for the approach were 1,000' above.

This does not mean, of course, that the pilot didn't have visual contact, proceeded below mins, and then lost the runway while circling, but were that the case, he shouldn't have attempted to circle 600' below minimums (to a runway where circling is prohibited at night), and if clouds obscured the runway at that altitude, then clearly there was not sufficient ceiling or visibility to cancel and proceed under VFR.

I won't speculate on what the pilot saw, nor his reasoning, but the outcome is clear.