5 RV Accidents in the last Month (April/May 2019)

[gmcjetpilot]

Originally Posted by N941WR

George, for comparison, any idea how many Cessna's crashed in the same period?

Yes that information is available in the NTSB report. My interest was not comparing experimental vs. certified plane. There is an annual report on general aviation safety, and it does break down experimental and certified plane accidents. It's from AOPA and called the Nall Report. FAA has accident and safety analysis as well.
https://www.aopa.org/training-and-sa...-t-nall-report

https://www.faa.gov/news/fact_sheets...m?newsId=21274

https://www.ntsb.gov/investigations/...Stats2016.aspx

Post was more of what Paul said, it's an uptick, time to take inventory of safety. I think currency and maintenance are two things to think of before saddling up again, if you and your flying machine have been hibernating for the winter. I'm not saying that's the cause of any of these accidents.

At some point statistics are only so useful. It's your own personal abilities and decision making. However when I was a new young pilot I read flying magazines and the Lessons Learned articles of accidents or some pilot adiverting disaster. I did learn a lot from those, still do to some extent. I say to some extent because a lot of accidents or incidents are from the same reasons they always have been.

[terrykohler]

I wonder how many hours flying it will take until I "feel" confident the RV machine is a solid, reliable performer?

I had my very first condition inspection done by an A&P/AI with over 50 years experience. When he finished, he handed me my logs and said ?it?s better than a factory plane?. I have great confidence in 3TP, on the other hand, I?m constantly trying to improve my skills. If there?s ever a problem, that?s where it?s likely to come from. Mechanical problem? Fly the plane.
Terry, CFI
RV9A N323TP

[vic syracuse]

This is a great thread, if nothing else than to have us all constantly pay attention and not get complacent with our airplanes. We’ve seen a huge down tick in Experimental aviation accidents over the last 10 years, and we are getting real close to the certified GA fleet accident rate. Of course, even one fatal accident is one too many, but they do happen and the best thing to do is to study them and try to learn from them.

We do believe that a lot of the gains have been due to the technology that we have been able to place in our cockpits, such as moving maps, since CFIT (controlled flight into terrain) has been drastically reduced. Loss of control is another area that has improved, we think due to the focus on training. Another contributing area has been the Additional Pilot Program, as many of the accidents happened during the first 8 hours of flight.

Regarding the question of when do we begin to trust our airplane, I tell everyone that around 100 hours of flight time, with proper testing, is a timeframe when one can start to feel comfortable that something catastrophic due to assembly should diminish. However, past that, it is all about the maintenance and paying attention to SB’s and other operators’ experience. We have a very young fleet in the scheme of things. My concern is that we will start to see an uptick in maintenance-related accidents if we don’t pay attention, especially with the growing population of Second and third owners who are somewhat used to just taking their airplanes once a year to the mechanic for the annual. My experience has been that our kit-built airplanes need a little more TLC throughout the year to understand the particular wear items and maintenance areas.

Having another set of eyes look over your airplane every once in a while, as I know some of you practice here, is a really super idea. ��

Vic

[Capt]

Originally Posted by gmcjetpilot

In the last month April to May there have been five RV accidents.

5/18 Ohio RV-6 (1 fatal) - takeoff possible loss of power on takeoff (witness stated engine slowed then surged)
4/29 Washington RV-6 (2 fatal) - in flight impacted water 1000' south-southeast of runway 31 (no witnesses)
4/26 Oklahoma RV-6 (non-fatal) - landing nose over on grass (tail wheel)
4/18 Oregon RV-8 (2 fatal) - in flight "loss of control"
4/12 South Dakota RV-12 (non-fatal) - takeoff on snow covered runway veered off runway, nose gear folded.

In a month period 5 reported accidents, 3 fatal. Please be careful.
2 In flight
2 Takeoff
1 Landing

Thanks for bringing this to our attention, it is concerning.

[sailvi767]

One area I know we could improve is interaction with convective weather. In a RV there really is no acceptable technique for penetrating a line of storms. I see people often advocating the use if NEXRAD and ducking under to spot rainshafts as a acceptable method. Unless the cells are widely spaced and you can find a least a 10 mile gap it?s not a good practice. Hail can be tossed a long distance downwind from a storm and winds can change nearly instantly as cells develope and collapse. The Delta L1011 crash in DFW is a excellent example where a Learjet proceeding them on the approach reported a smooth ride and no issues. Moments later the L1011 was smashed into the ground despite having plenty of energy available to climb. Best way to get through a line of storms is sitting in a hangar watching it pass over.
George

[N941WR]

Thanks GMCJ.

What I was wondering is if RV pilots tend to take more risks than spam can pilots due to the confidence the RV's instill in us. In other words, decision making.

It's difficult to tell from your brief write-up of each of the RV accidents.

[airguy]

Originally Posted by scard

It took me about 450hrs before I started to accept that we built a proper machine that wasn't going to kill us in the next 30sec. That was a long time ago, and oh the places we've been since...

I'm at exactly that point now, with 425 hours on mine in just over 3 years.

[rackley16]

The accident rate always concerns me. The difference with me is this. My life long exposure to mechanical things, repair and maintenance, fabrication skills that I use on a daily basis give me confidence that I can build a totally safe machine. I have 0 worries that the machine will fail based on what I have done to it, or better yet what I haven't done to it. I simply am not complacent about my abilities and use sound practices to ensure nothing is forgotten or overlooked.

It is also one of the reasons I chose Van's as their track record for mechanical failures and design flaws are very good. It is a sound design. I feel that if it is built, maintained, and flown properly then my confidence in its safety is very high.

My real concern is with mans ability to fly. In my mind it truly is not natural for us, and seemingly simple mistakes have very unforgiving consequences. I am still a student pilot and it still freaks me out a bit that someone can just crash an airplane when they are a professional pilot that flies almost everyday. I read about high time pilots that wind up in a fatal crash involving their RV (any plane really) that they fly for recreation. Can most of this be explained by complacency? Really?

The ones that bother me the most are the no witness, kind of undetermined, "loss of control" or flight into terrain with no good explanation as to why did it happen. The more experience the pilot has the more sketchy I feel about this whole idea of flying my own plane someday. It seems odd to me that someone with all those hours just lost control........and how the heck am I ever going to be able to feel safe when I have so few hours and so limited skills? How am I going to develop these skills to the degree that this won't happen to me without being in this perilous position at all times?

[JonJay]

It?s good to be reminded that flying is more than a casual hobby. The Daybreak accident was three miles from our Airpark. Nobody knows what happened. Two experienced pilots known in the community. We are waiting on the NTSB reports and hope to learn something from it.
It is also good to be reminded that the bulk of us will fly for our lifetimes with no accidents or incidents. We just had two neighbors awarded the Wright Brothers Master Pilot Award for flying over 50 years accident free. A third qualified but chose not to receive the award (not the award type I guess), and another received the award several years ago.
Our ?hobby? is safe, but not risk free as we all know and it doesn?t hurt to be reminded.

[Ironflight]

Originally Posted by sailvi767

One area I know we could improve is interaction with convective weather. In a RV there really is no acceptable technique for penetrating a line of storms. I see people often advocating the use if NEXRAD and ducking under to spot rainshafts as a acceptable method. Unless the cells are widely spaced and you can find a least a 10 mile gap it?s not a good practice. Hail can be tossed a long distance downwind from a storm and winds can change nearly instantly as cells develope and collapse. The Delta L1011 crash in DFW is a excellent example where a Learjet proceeding them on the approach reported a smooth ride and no issues. Moments later the L1011 was smashed into the ground despite having plenty of energy available to climb. Best way to get through a line of storms is sitting in a hangar watching it pass over.
George

All true - and yet, the number of accidents in the experimental world these days that involve convective activity is statistically very tiny. We?ve done a great job of educating pilots that thunderstorms are to be avoided, and the availability of in cockpit weather has helped that trend.

Definitely stayed a healthy distance from convective activity - but look at what is actually causing accidents these days (mostly loss of control in the airport environment) to keep reducing accidents!