Category: Flying

Friends in the D.C. area have been texting me tonight regarding a Mooney that landed in some powerlines near KGAI. From CBS:

A small plane crashed into power lines in Maryland, leaving two people dangling about 100 feet in the air, officials said. The crash knocked out power to thousands of people in the area.

A single-engine Mooney M20J crashed into wires near Montgomery County Airpark in Gaithersburg, Maryland, around 5:40 p.m. local time Sunday, according to the Federal Aviation Administration. The plane appeared to be intact as it was caught in a web of power lines about 100 feet in the air.

As of roughly 7:50 p.m., Montgomery County Fire and Rescue Service spokesperson Pete Piringer said the people aboard the plane were uninured. Earlier he said that they remained in a “very precarious situation,” as the wires were still energized. Utility company Pepco said that as of around 8:30 p.m. the lines had been deenergized.

How could this happen? Mooney pilots are usually pretty good! The plane departed from Westchester County, NY, according to ABC. So the task at Gaithersburg was an attempt to land. Where are these powerlines? Let’s check The Google:

The only tall high-voltage lines that I can see are about a mile from the runway, top left of the above image, rather near Giant Food. That’s quite a distance from the runway to be so low to the ground.

Let’s check the weather. 5:40 pm is 17:40 EST then add 5 hours and we get 2240Z. Here’s are the METARS:

KGAI 272156Z AUTO VRB04KT 1 1/4SM BR OVC002 11/11 A2945 RMK AO2 SLP987 T01060106
KGAI 272128Z AUTO 18003KT 1 1/4SM BR OVC002 11/11 A2945 RMK AO2
KGAI 272121Z AUTO 14006KT 3/4SM BR OVC002 10/10 A2945 RMK AO2
KGAI 272110Z AUTO 14007KT 1 1/4SM BR OVC002 11/10 A2946 RMK AO2
KGAI 272056Z AUTO 15004KT 2SM BR OVC002 11/10 A2947 RMK AO2 PRESFR SLP995 60003 T01060100 56050

Why isn’t there a METAR closer to 2240Z? It seems that the 2256Z observation would have come after the massive power failure. Here’s an observation from nearby Dulles Airport:

KIAD 272252Z 21011KT 1 1/2SM BR OVC003 11/11 A2945 RMK AO2 SFC VIS 9 SLP971 T01110106

Could part of the problem be that the altimeter in the Mooney wasn’t set correctly and, therefore, the instruments were showing the plane to be higher than it was? This is an irrelevant factor for an approach with a glide path, which KGAI has. They would have gotten fresh altimeter settings during the entire flight from Air Traffic Control. The departure airport, KHPN, had an altimeter setting of 29.64″ about one hour before accident. So if they’d taken off from HPN and never touched the altimeter they would have been (29.64-29.45)*1000 = 190′ lower than indicated. This kind of mistake resulted in an accident at KBDL to American Airlines 1572 (The NTSB report says that they were on a VOR 15 non-precision (no glideslope) approach.)

The weather was not improving dramatically after 2156Z (4:56 pm). Is it reasonable to land with only 1.25 miles of visibility and 200′ overcast? If you’re a two-pilot crew going into Dulles Airport with its idiot-proof runways and powerful approach lighting system that will cut through the clouds and mist… yes. In fact, the minimums for the ILS 1R at KIAD are 200′ ceiling and 1800′ of visibility.

What about at KGAI? Assuming that this airplane was trying to land, they’d be using the RNAV 14. With the latest and greatest WAAS-capable avionics, the weather minimums are 269′ and 1 mile of visibility. Touchdown zone elevation is 520:

So this would have been an attempt to do the an approach that the weather report suggested could not be accomplished legally. This is actually legal for Part 91 (private) flying, but is not permitted for airlines (Part 121).

On the third hand, had the pilot flown the approach correctly, it should have resulted in a safe landing on the runway even with weather below minimums. Based on my experience, the virtual glide path created by the WAAS GPS box is valid all the way to the ground. (And this was part of our airline training at a Delta subsidiary for ILS approaches; the glide slope (projected via radio waves from the ground) could be used as a reference even after breaking out from the clouds and being within 50′ or 100′ from the runway.) In fact, an autopilot could take the plane down all the way to the runway (would be a rough landing without a flare, but nothing that would be hazardous to the people inside the plane).

So the crash remains something of a mystery at this point. I would want to know if the Mooney (potentially ancient) had a modern WAAS-capable GPS for the RNAV 14 approach. If not, the weather minimum is 400′ ceiling and 1.5 miles of visibility and the challenge for the pilot is substantially greater.

This would be perfect for a Godzilla movie. Godzilla loves powerlines and he is often well-disposed to humanity so he could simply pull the airplane out of the powerlines and set it down on the runway.

Update: I found some relevant Air Traffic Control audio at LiveATC.net. Controllers often speak on multiple frequencies and I found half of a conversation on 128.7 in the archive block starting at 2200Z on 11/27 (so the media reports of a crash at 5:40 pm are probably incorrect; it would have been around 5:28 pm). LiveATC.net captured Potomac Approach, but not the Mooney or other aircraft (so it is likely that the exchanges were happening on a different frequency associated with Potomac Approach; a merged recording of 126.75, 125.52, and 133.85 contains some fuzzy responses from the planes/pilots). The Mooney’s tail number seems to end with “1RF” (One Romeo Foxtrot). At 9 minutes in, the controller suggests (gently) that the 1RF has not followed a previous instruction correctly. At 14:45, the controller says “if you’re able to land at Gaithersburg you can report cancellation…” (i.e., it was foreseen that the weather could be below minimums). At 15:55, a Pilatus PC-12 (“Kronos”) is also going to GAI. At 16:45, the controller mentions, probably to the Pilatus, that a Cheyenne went missed from GAI and was diverting to FDK. At 17:45, the controller acknowledges a communication from 1RF. At 18:30, the controller tells 1RF about traffic and tells 1RF to join the approach. At 20:15, 1RF is cleared for the approach (allowed to descend from previously assigned altitude). At 23:15, 1RF is told to switch to the advisory frequency at the untowered KGAI airport (“CTAF”; used for pilot-to-pilot communication). Just before 27:00 the controller uses the full call sign: N201RF, which is the registration for a 1977 Mooney. Unfortunately, this is to issue a low altitude alert. If indeed the Mooney had switched to the CTAF, the message would not have been heard. Just before 30:00, the controller says “it looks like they made it” regarding the Mooney, but tells the Pilatus that he is waiting to get a cancellation from the Mooney (can’t have two airplanes doing instrument approaches at the same untowered airport at the same time).

My best guess is that the conversation was on 126.75, but the receiver that feeds LiveATC.net is not well-positioned to hear low-altitude planes near KGAI.

Second Update: presidentpicker in the comments below gives us an overlay of the Flightaware ADS-B 3D track and the approach. The tracklog ends at 5:27:20 pm and sadly infers an arrival:

Pilot readers: Before we escaped the Land of Lockdown for the Florida Free State, KGAI was my most common destination airport for trips into D.C. My personal rule was that if the weather wasn’t great I would land at Dulles instead. “Not great” meant winds of more than about 20 knots unless straight down the runway, ceiling below 400′, or visibility of less than 3 miles. I would also go into Dulles if I were arriving after the KGAI FBO closed and I wanted a rental car. The fees at Jet Aviation Dulles or Signature for a single-engine piston aircraft were actually quite reasonable. It’s great to be a skilled pilot, but it is even better to set up a situation in which skills are not required. And there’s nothing wrong with doing an approach to minimums, especially if you’ve set up a two-pilot crew in your little Cirrus, but it doesn’t make sense when one of the world’s largest airports is only 5-10 minutes farther from your ground destination.

The Dulles photo above was taken just before landing at KGAI last week:

We departed Torrance, California in the Robinson R44 Raven II shown above and landed at Gaithersburg on November 21, 2022. There were a few stops in between…

Related:

• Virginia Democrats take over Dulles Airport

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One of the long-held dreams of people in general aviation is that a car company would come in and fix all of our woes (high costs, low volumes, intensive maintenance requirements, dumb-as-bricks systems). If Honda, for example, could make an airplane that is as comfortable and reliable as a Honda Odyssey minivan, mass-produced at a reasonable price, life would be awesome.

Well, Honda actually did go into the airplane business! And it took them way longer to push the plane out the door than it would have taken Cessna or Embraer. And an operator of the first-generation plane at NBAA 2022 gave the airplane low marks. (I wrote a review of the plane in 2016.) The airplane is fueled from a single point in the tail, which requires a ladder, and can take nearly 30 minutes for a line guy (this desirable job working in the cold or heat is almost always done by those who identify as “men”) to fill. During this time there will be periodic overflows that will cover the line guy in Jet A. When finished, the plane was never able to hold the advertised maximum capacity. “We were always 100 lbs. light.” The lav is externally service, but in a non-standard way that results in some bad outcomes. “Ten percent of the Gen 1 airplanes went off the runway,” noted the operator. “They’ve maybe fixed that in the newer ones by limiting nosewheel travel depending on speed.”

The plane itself did not end up having way better specs or a lower price than the very light jet/light jet competition. Honda announced a variety of Gen 3 features at NBAA. There is an extra fuel tank under the tail, which increases the ability to accept fuel, extends range slightly. A light next to the fuel filler comes on when the massive overflow spray is imminent:

The cockpit is more or less unchanged. It is a clean Garmin G3000, with no overhead panel and a general lack of clutter:

What will be new in the cockpit are autothrottles and a big button for the amazing Garmin Autoland system.

Performance:

How many Bidies for this wonderful device? About $7 million, which sadly means that all of Honda’s manufacturing and engineering expertise aren’t doing anything to bring the price of new aircraft down (it’s cheaper than the Embraer Phenom 300, but not if you adjust for size, seats, range, etc. (and the per-hour operating cost may be similar); it is more expensive than the Embraer Phenom 100 and Cessna M2 jets and provides some additional performance and cabin size).

Related:

• “Jet It Pivots Away From HondaJet to Phenom 300” (Flying, 11/23/2022): Jet It’s CEO accused the OEM of poor service and said the company had absorbed more than $20 million in off-fleet expenses since 2020.

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The NBAA BACE convention, a.k.a., “NBAA”, was a fun experience even though I’m not in the market for the $20-75 million airplanes that are the core of the show.

Hurricane Ian hit Orlando on September 28, 2022. We are informed by the media that Orlando was destroyed by the resulting floods. See for example “Far from coasts, flooding from Hurricane Ian devastates inland communities” (Washington Post), “Far From the Coast, Ian Leaves Flooding and Damage Across Florida” (New York Times), and “Hurricane Ian floods hotels around Orlando theme parks as Disney World, Universal close for 2 days” (New York Daily News). Amazingly, county and state officials were able to rebuild 7 million square feet of convention center and open to the public just three weeks after the hurricane:

NBAA includes some safety talks. At a talk about a Challenger 605 accident at Truckee, I learned that only 1% of unstable approaches result in a go-around (it should be closer to 100%). The talk was also notable for the blame-the-pilot culture, with the panel of experts predictably calling for more training. Nobody asked why Air Traffic Control refused to give the pilots a straight-in approach, thus setting the crew up for failure in a vastly more challenging circling approach. Nobody asked why the $20 million machine couldn’t be smarter, e.g., by giving pilots guidance during the circle, noting the unorthodox configuration of full flaps before lining up on final, shouting out ”stall” instead of playing a confusing tone, and shouting out ”go around” like in an Embraer Phenom 300. The Challenger prohibits the use of spoilers below 300′ AGL and it was the continued use of spoilers in the fast/high approach that resulted in the stall, according to the NTSB. Given that the machine has a terrain database and a radar altimeter, why didn’t it say “you have left the boards out“? Everyone killed by the B737 Max’s runaway-trim-by-design would likely still be alive if the machine had simply spoken “I am trimming forward” when its MCAS system was operating.

Turboprops are about as low as NBAA goes. The Cessna Denali, a competitor to the Pilatus PC-12, has been afflicted with an additional year of delay because the General Electric turboprop, developed by Walter in the Czech Republic, isn’t going to be ready. The GE folks say that certification is delayed because the FAA is freaked out by all of the 3D-printed parts in the engine. The Cessna folks say that certification is delayed because the GE and Walter folks responded to SARS-CoV-2 by stopping work for 1-2 years. “They haven’t done anywhere near as many of the certification hours as they were supposed to,” said a Cessna employee. The engine looks good at least!

In other low-end news, I learned that after-market gear overhaul is now available for the Embraer Phenom 100 ($85k) and Phenom 300 ($125k). This is a 10-year item, even if the plane isn’t flown at all, and these prices are less than half of what Embraer charges, thus reducing the total cost of ownership. There were a lot of changes from HondaJet, which I’ll cover in a separate post.

What about at the high end? Billionaires can’t buy Bernie, but they can get a 787-based Boeing Business Jet delivered in 2025 if ordered today for $250 million. Lufthansa needs 2 years of prep time and then 18 months of installation time for a $120 million executive interior. The proud new owner will ride in the back beginning in 2027.

Is it wasteful of the Earth’s limited resources when a rich family travels via personal Boeing 787? Absolutely not! If the plane is filled with sustainable aviation fuel (SAF), the impact is less than when you take your 2007 Camry to Publix. Example:

Speaking of sustainability, I attended a talk on climate risk presented by a Massachusetts Democrat who is an executive at a big aviation lender. In a regulated industry, one of the big risks is regulatory/tax. What if righteous rage/envy results in Gulfstreams and larger being banned?

We don’t have to think about how many trees humanity could have planted for the $370 million acquisition cost of the BBJ 787. We can fix this by changing the fuel:

We still might not be able to fly conveniently because it is a proven scientific fact that hurricanes are becoming more frequent and severe (contrary to “Changes in Atlantic major hurricane frequency since the late-19th century” (Nature.com 2021); denying Science is sometimes okay). Separately, due to anthropogenic climate change it was a frosty-for-Orlando 60 degrees and cloudy on Day 2 of NBAA and everyone at the static display was seeking shelter.

I missed the first half of the climate change talk because I was at the Diversity, Equity & Inclusion talk scheduled at the same time:

My live notes from the talk:

• “It’s absolutely not about quota.” And then … “Look at the complexion of your employee base to evaluate where your are.”
• There are “dear friends” involved (can we agree to send everyone who uses this term to Venezuela in exchange for all of the folks that they’re sending to enrich our economy). “Lean In” is referenced tangentially. Creating emotionally safe spaces in the office is critical to safety.
• Black pilots cannot be safe because they are constantly exposed to microaggressions [e.g., from customers and line guys and therefore out of the operator’s control] and that takes up a lot of energy [that they might otherwise be using to run checklists and focus on their job].
• They’re sharing their diversity journeys. Executives are “very committed” and people are “walking this path together.”
• Slide for Andrew Cuomo: “framing intimate interactions—permission & grace”.

For the those who celebrate gender ID diversity, any pronoun choice made during registration made it through to the printed badge. I’m sorry that I didn’t pick Xe/Xem:

If you’re a nerd, you’ll like all of the cutaway jet engines on display from manufacturers and overhaul vendors.

The biggest booths by far were from companies involved in selling fuel. They had the best parties with food and booze flowing freely starting at 4 pm. And live bands:

When I pointed out to an FBO owner that Million Air had taken over Marathon Key and raised the 100LL price to $9/gallon, he said “The consolidation is ongoing and probably irreversible. On top of that a lot of smaller airports are closing which traditionally served GA avgas users.” Did the government’s various coronapanic programs have something to do with this? “Indirectly yes, they lead to the largest money creation in history. That in turn caused all that money having to be spend and it was spent buying up assets like FBOs at highly inflated prices. Now the new consolidated FBO’s could and have to raise prices substantially to at least pretend to justify the huge investment. Not only fuel margins, also hangar margins, etc. are way up.”

In addition to the trade show at the rebuilt-from-the-flooding-in-record-time convention center, there was also a static display of aircraft at KORL, a 25-minute drive away. Gulfstream is the friendliest by far of the luxury jet vendors. I managed to bust into a G600:

Given that it is a clean sheet of paper design, I’m not sure why the cockpit needs so many controls.

Dassault and Bombardier give a big middle finger to any peasant who wants to see the interiors of the rich. Everything is “by appointment only”. Bombardier does remind the peasantry that it is actually the height of ecoawareness to ride solo in the back of a 100,000 lb. jet aircraft. They’re all about ESG. Greta Thunberg would be proud… if they would let her into the booth.

Let’s call this photo “Race to the Maintenance Shop” (Maserati in front of a 22-year-old Bombardier):

Vaerus Jet Sales brought the most beautiful plane to the static display (DC-3):

I managed to dominate a Facebook pilot group by posting “Certified airplanes cost too much so I have decided that it is time to buy an experimental aircraft.” over the following photo of a Gulfstream G800 and one showing a huge “EXPERIMENTAL” placard next to the front door.

The keynote by Neil DeGrasse Tyson covered the entire universe, but he did not explain how he survived cancelation after being accused by four different females. He did point out that most people are stupid because, unlike him, they don’t think scientifically (ergo, Dr. Fauci is the world’s smartest person because he personifies Science). He told the audience to “be ashamed to die until you’ve scored some victory for humanity” (he has already declared personal victory as a result of educating a lot of people). Dale Earnhardt Jr. was quite humble by comparison. Is it fun to win the Daytona 500? Yes, but it is also agony to lose. He said that he missed racing, but not the emotional rollercoaster of feeling great for a week after a win and then feeling terrible for a week after a loss. He didn’t talk about surviving a Cessna Latitude crash and fire at 0A9 (5000′ runway with a 902′ displaced threshold; good illustration of my general rule to avoid airports that don’t start with a K, i.e., those that meet ICAO standards, and also a good illustration of the statistic cited above: “Neither the pilot nor copilot called for a go-around before landing despite awareness that the approach was unstabilized.”).

Loyal readers know how much I would love to post pictures of the righteous in the crowded convention center wearing masks, but sadly the Followers of Science were thin on the ground. This is an industry where safety is always the #1 priority and the convention was packed with desk job and work-from-home heroes (actual pilots, who might be presumed to be less risk-averse, are a minority). If they’re so passionate about safety, why wouldn’t they adopt the cost-free strategy of wearing at least a cloth mask in accordance with CDC guidance?

I did find a software company whose operations are split between Sweden and California. Employees from both divisions were there. The Swedes thought that the Californians were crazy for locking down, not going into work, ordering everyone to wear masks, and closing their schools. The Californians said that the Swedes were the crazy ones, running around mask-free and sending kids to school. (Sweden, of course, ended up with a substantially lower COVID-tagged death rate and the age-adjusted death rates would be even more in Sweden’s favor (Sweden has a median age of 41 while California’s is about 37)).

What about the recession? “We’re a little less busy than we were in March 2022, which was our best month ever,” said one charter operator. “But part of that is that we don’t have capacity. Our owners are flying their planes like crazy. And there is a two-year wait to get pilots into some of the type-rating programs.”

Next year: October 17-19 in Las Vegas.

Related:

• NBAA 2017 show report
• NBAA 2015 wrap-up report

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Airliners and Hurricane Ian at 6 pm on Wednesday, September 28. Note Spirit (NKS517) at about 32,700′ (^32700) above the ground flying straight over the hurricane itself:

How ugly did it get on the ground? Here’s the worst-looking METAR that I found from the big airport in Fort Myers:

KRSW 281935Z AUTO 18060G87KT 3/4SM +RA BR 25/24 A2888 RMK AO2 PK WND 18087/1929

Wind from the south (180) at 60 knots, gusting 87 knots. Visibility was three-quarters of a statute mile in heavy rain and mist.

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Who wants to meet at the big business aviation conference (NBAA) in Orlando that runs October 18-22? This is the place to order your Boeing Business Jet. Photo from 2017:

I had some trouble registering this year due to the incomplete list of available pronouns:

I’m excited because Tammie Jo Shults is speaking. Also, for rednecks, Dale Earnhardt Jr. and, finally, for anyone who wants to know where to go after we destroy Earth with CO2… Neil deGrasse Tyson (keynotes).

Related:

• NBAA 2017 show report

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From September 12, 2022:

KPHX 120353Z 17048G75KT 4SM TS BLDU SQ FEW028 SCT090 BKN110CB BKN160 31/19 A2987 RMK AO2 PK WND 18075/0353 WSHFT 0338 LTG DSNT SE AND SW CONS LTGCGIC SE-SW TS SE-SW MOV N BLDU FEW028 T03060194

Translation: At the Phoenix, Arizona, early in the morning in London (3:53 am GMT) on the 12th day of the month (i.e., evening on the 11th local time), wind was from the south (170 degrees) at 48 knots gusting to 75 knots. Visibility was 4 statute miles in a thunderstorm with blowing dust. There was a squall (SQ). Clouds will be the least of your problems, with just a few 2,800′ above the airport, some scattered clouds 9,000′ above the airport, and a broken layer of thunderstorm clouds 11,000′ up with one more broken layer 16,000′ above the airport. Temperature is a toasty 31C with a dewpoint of 19C. Altimeter setting is close to standard at 29.87 inches of mercury.

The Remarks (RMK) are tougher to parse. There was a wind shift at 3:38Z and now there is lightning distant SE and SW. CONS LTGCGIC SE-SW means “Continuous cloud-to-ground & in-cloud lightning to the southeast through south” (source). Finally, the thunderstorm is SE and SW, but moving north.

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