KS family die in plane crash

[Runner]

The professionals can give a better answer, but as an amateur pilot, I would say that the "stall" we see in the video is not a "normal", straight ahead stall. It appears to me that hey are making the aircraft enter a spin by applying rudder during the stall, then recovering immediately.

 

[V1Rotate]

The PC-12 has normal stall characteristics, however, it has a very powerful engine, 1200 hp. When doing a power on stall, that big engine produces a huge amount of torque, all that torque wants to make the airplane roll over as the wing stalls. The rudder is not large enough to compensate for this so Pilatus installed a stick pusher system to prevent the airplane from stalling. The stick pusher should never be needed because there is no reason to stall the airplane, (except for flight training)

To repeat what others have said, the PC-12 is a very safe and reliable airplane.

 

[Diamondpilot]

Diamond,

I was hoping you'd chime in. You mention pilot error and I was wondering what type of error you believe may have occurred?

Do you suppose he flew into clouds and became disoriented, got into a thunderstorm and lost control, or what? Guess we may never know, but I can only imagine it would be easy to get into trouble quickly in a high performance plane like that.

If they were trying to get the plane to spin in that stall test, I would say that was a pretty darned quick recovery, not even a full turn.

I think he just flew into weather that was beyond his abilities.

Chris

 

[Diamondpilot]

Alan Kulwicki died aboard the Hooters corporate jet flown by a "professional" corporate pilot. Hmmm...

This was poor decision making on his part. They had a airplane with inoperative de icing equipment and continued on into the flight.

You hire a professional pilot to make good sound decisions. You can may train anyone to fly the airplane.

Chris

 

[brin]

I think he just flew into weather that was beyond his abilities.

Chris

Chris, I am an old pilot...have not flown in years...but I agree with you..and I have often wondered why pilots like this poor soul or JFK jr. did not just do a 180 the minute they encountered bad weather...? It would have saved their lives...I'm pretty sure they got disoriented as well and did not trust their instruments....

 

[Artisan]

Does that aircraft have any kind of black box something?
Any pitot tube readings recorded or other data that might
shed some light on things?

I wonder if NTSB quized those whom saw drama on the ground about
thunderheads, towering cumulous etc, if they witnessed anything.

 

[ray66v]

No data recorders normally on board.

Sometimes pilots have GPS units that can archive some flight information, if that function is enabled.

At 26,000 feet, pilot skill is generally limited to decision making, since the autopilot would normally be doing the flying.

 

[V1Rotate]

No data recorders normally on board.

Sometimes pilots have GPS units that can archive some flight information, if that function is enabled.

At 26,000 feet, pilot skill is generally limited to decision making, since the autopilot would normally be doing the flying.

You are right about the airplane being on autopilot, however, the PC-12 autopilot is designed to disengage automatically when the airplane encounters turbulance that is moderate or greater. So if the pilot encountered a thunderstorm and the turbulance that goes with it, he would find himself suddenly having to hand fly in possibly severe turbulance while in the clouds. Perhaps that was too much for him to handle.

 

[ray66v]

You are right about the airplane being on autopilot, however, the PC-12 autopilot is designed to disengage automatically when the airplane encounters turbulance that is moderate or greater. So if the pilot encountered a thunderstorm and the turbulance that goes with it, he would find himself suddenly having to hand fly in possibly severe turbulance while in the clouds. Perhaps that was too much for him to handle.

Right. And there still seems to be a lack of information about this pilots experience level.

Then again, skill level was not enough to save Scott Crossfield. :lightningbolt::shocked::lightningbolt:

 

[TCJatko]

Chris, I am an old pilot...have not flown in years...but I agree with you..and I have often wondered why pilots like this poor soul or JFK jr. did not just do a 180 the minute they encountered bad weather...? It would have saved their lives...I'm pretty sure they got disoriented as well and did not trust their instruments....

It's very easy to become disoriented while flying with no visual references. Your inner ear is telling you things that may or may not be true. Unfortunately, many folks don't trust their instruments, leading to catastrophic results.