Shortly after that Marine FA-18 crashed into a University City neighborhood in December, another FA-18 made an unintentional low approach over Allied Gardens, mistaking Montgomery airfield for MCAS Miramar. The approach rattled both nerves and windows in the area, and is detailed in this San Diego U/T article.
As usual, there is a lot of uniformed speculation in the comments to an article like this. Few people question the technique or qualifications of a surgeon, for example, but rather his outcomes. Kid landed safely handling compound emergencies.
Just took a little detour getting there.
Few landsmen appreciate how closely packed everything is from the air. A trip that might take you half an hour in a car is a matter of moments in an airplane, and distant landmarks are within clear field of view from even a couple of thousand feet above the ground. Elevation compresses distances almost unimaginably.
After nightfall, an urban setting to the aviator is a mostly undifferentiated cluster of cultural lighting. Airfields resist cultural intrusion, so each strip is a puddle of comparative darkness, and runways 24 and 27 are not so very far apart when you’re in a continuous turn.
Weather along the coastline tends to degrade much more rapidly than inland, and North Island was already nearly covered by clouds at 900 feet. Once you’re in a low fuel state emergency, the last thing you’d want to do is make an unsuccessful approach and have to divert further inland.
Finally, the emergency route that Winder 411 took – an east coast jet, by the callsign – led him off the standard arrival corridors, even if he had been familiar with them. Making a mistake like this in non-trivial, but it’s easier than it looks.
Not, you know, to say that I’ve ever done so. Although there, but for the grace of God and so on.
Although I have marshaled on the wrong side of the boat before.
No, for your real buffoonery you’ll have to go and see this DeHavilland Beaver showing off for the camera man, with – as Tailspin Tom points out – all that lake there to his right.
I’ll place $10 on “Hey y’all, watch this!” as the last thing on the flight recorder prior to impact, with $5 on “Hold my beer” to cover.
– Max
I hope the pilot was also the owner!
Stupid…..
So I’m sitting here expecting some sort of buffoonery and it’s not like I’ve ever piloted any aircraft before but the first and only thing out of mouth after the cameraman falls is… WTF??!!
Sheesh…
One of the most embarrassing moments I ever had in the air was in plt tng in T-37s. pre-solo. I’d just come back from a GREAT ride and was determined to make a smooth as glass pitch-out and landing w.o. a bobble or unnecessary power adjustments–nothing. And I did–a nice, tight (remember that word) continuous descending turn to final and rolled out wings level rock-steady w.o. a burble, perfect descent-rate with the perfect sight-picture of a centerline groove. Just as my brain was registering all those shiny objects parked on the runway my IP coughed, motioning to his right, “Erm, I think the runway is over THERE.” Silence, as my eyes & brain were now registering the concept and/or word RAMP. Then: “Tower, this is Ugly 2 (My call-sign–how even more appropriate at that moment) on the go.”
For some reason I wasn’t pinked for that ride. Maybe it was because of all that had gone before. Or maybe it was that I was the Sq. Co’s only student (most IP’s had 4 students out in the ready room/bull-pit, I sat alone conspicuously in front of the Sq Co’s desk as we debriefed in his glass enclosed office, all eyes on me) and he didn’t want to make himself look bad by admitting he had an idiot of a student jock that he was unable to “coach-up” sufficiently. At any rate, I somehow survived–lesson taken to heart–a more learned (look before you leap–keep your head out) even if more red-faced future birdman.
What a tool. I agree with Steve – I hope he wrecked his own plane.
Kris/
That is best filed under: “Seemed like a good idea at the time.” Cross referenced to MaxDamage: “Bets”
Lex:
I’ve got that funny little “SE/S” on my license, and while I have no Beaver time (yet) let me offer a couple of uneducated guesses:
He doesn’t appear (or rather sound) to have applied full power on take-off. There comes a point in takeoff from water that you actually lower the nose to get the floats “on the step” to reduce wetted area and thus hydrodynamic drag. That assumes you’re going fast enough. That didn’t happen here, either, perhaps because of the power issue. The strong right drift can sometimes be intentional, when taking off from a fairly tight area or unintentional, as in he was trying to trouble shoot WTF was happening and said “screw it” to the whole directional thing. He tried lifting one pontoon at the last second, also an approved technique. By then he was so deep behind the power curve I don’t think all the thrust in the state was going to get him out of that whole drag/lift high alpha/low V thing. Better to have cut power and let the shoreline incline stop you. He got airborne long enough to get to the scene of the mishap.
VR,
Comjam
VX,
That’s alright. Imagine the debriefing in Jax after a P-3, spending the day in the “crash & dash” pattern at Jacksonville International Airport, managed to bring it in with a beautiful, smooth approach, and slide it down the runway after forgetting to put the gear down. In front of numerous cameras and film crews.
I remember the FE talking about how everything was going so swimmingly smooth, and then it seemed the aircraft was settling down below it’s normal distance above the runway, then this loud pinging sound from outside as the prop tips hit.
I have the SE/S ratng and watched the airplane doing a high speed water taxi without ever getting up on the step. What ever he was doing, the pilots actions (lack of really) were making me nervous from the moment he increased power. My first thought was maybe he’s got a stuck throttle or maybe he forgot his water rudders and left them down (rudders up before takeoff).
In any case, the high speed water taxi was too slow. Continuing to the point he did at the speed and angle of attack was a sure recipe for disaster long before it was impossible to fix. My point is that the PIC made a poor judgement call on a couple of must haves – not enough airspeed, failed to get on the step, no clear area in front to takeoff and failure to shut down soon enough.
I’ll bet there is more to this story than poor judgement.
The slo-mo was interesting. Some interesting dynamics of “folding (almost) wing” structures made a debut.
Shooting off on a tangent again, but when I saw this on Mythbusters last Wednesday I thought “Maybe that’s why Lex wasn’t chastised for busting Mach at Eglin.”
I’ve watched several videos of VIPs taking a hop with the Blues, and all of them got to taste the bananas and/or went “to sleep” with one exception: Dale Earnhardt Jr. He was laughing, hooting, carrying on, it was like he was on the best roller coaster ride of his life. You could tell the parts where the jet was pulling serious G, from the little G-meter in the corner of the picture, and from the attitude of the aircraft (sharp pull ups, tight turns). And who says NASCAR drivers aren’t atheletes…
And yeah, that Beaver driver needs to turn his ticket in, that was a really bad take off roll.
I’m not a seaplane guy, but doesn’t it seem like he held too much AOA on the runup to takeoff? It looked to me like he should have used a little forward yoke and “planed out” on the floats but instead just held ‘em back and plowed through the water. Again, I’m no seaplane guy, so if I’m wrong someone please explain how that works.
Never landed at the wrong field, but I did take a COD into the break on the wrong boat during 3-carrier ops in W-72. Was “charlie on arrival” and realized it was the wrong boat as passed over the island and saw “69″ on the bow instad of “71.” Departed the pattern with my tail between my legs. Bet at least one guy was hollering at me on Ike’s tower freq, but I wouldn’t know because I had TR’s dialed up.
Herbal, I can’t believe they would breathe a word, if they thought they could have trapped you.
And decorated your plane.
Just to put pespective on this, I fly out of ANC and have watched from this same spot several takeoffs, IMO, the pilot was not showing off. The vantage point is right beside the water runway. Everyone flies down that channel along the fence. Possible that a gust (as the pilot claims) with poor control input did cause a early liftoff and he chose to continue rather than stuff the floats back into the water since he was already on the step. I’d say pilot error, but not showing off etc.
Salty:
It never looked like he was really on the step. Like I say, I have no Beaver time myself, but we have several that operate out of where I fly my float plane and he always looked too far back until the very last when he lifted the right float. Totally agree, should have cut power, taxied back and tried it again. I ain’t afraid to abort in the bay I normally fly out from. (lots of boats, wind surfers, kayakers and assorted waterborne idiots.)
thats not a pilot hot-shotting for the cameraman, thats an airplane experiencing a wind shift while performing H20 departure…..they handle a little different with boat skids than tires. give the guy a break, he, his wife and their dog managed to walk away.
http://www.adn.com/news/alaska/story/822923.html