RV-12 accident Australia 3-23-2013

[sailvi767]

I am still at a loss as to what the secret is about this accident. Aircraft have been known to pitch up for a variety of reasons many of them mechanical. If the answer is in the data I can't see it. The aircraft pitched up and stalled. That is not in dispute. The question is why. Is the final report out? Why is everyone playing I have a secret?

George

[Andy Hill]

George

The question is why. Is the final report out? Why is everyone playing I have a secret?

I think you need to read the whole thread, or even wider.

The disappointing aspect is the Australian ATSB either do not, or are not required to, investigate Amateur Build accidents. The police and coroner will hold their forms of investigation, but they are not exactly experts in aircraft accidents.

The police called in the ATSB to extract the Dynon data. They did as requested, and presented exactly that as their final report. In many ways, worse than nothing, since it is left to others to the interpret it - and no doubt interested parties could interpret as they wish.

From the Oz posters above, they have discretely alluded to how they see things happened, and also that the coroner's report may well be more forthcoming as to what happened. Certainly in a recent Yak-52 accident, the coroner did not exactly hold back in making clear their views on how things were (not) run - particularly by CASA (Oz FAA) [ Link ].

I may well have got some of the above wrong / incomplete, and more than happy to be corrected. Ultimately to me, whilst it is hinted what probably happened, I feel Oz law / govt is wrong in not requiring the ATSB to investigate such accidents. Certainly our AAIB and the NTSB do.

[NASA515]

I can read between the lines, decipher the code, and all the other things mentioned by down-under posters with better knowledge of the pilot.

Taking off and then accelerating at low altitude to 90 mph is not "normal" in an RV-12. It IS normal in an aerobatic routine, and is usually followed by a dramatic pitch-up to impress the crowd - such a pitch-up apparently occurred here. I have been eyewitness to two Experimental pilots doing this exact maneuver in small airplanes - one an RV - both crashed and were killed.

Sometimes people are "Legends" in their own mind......

If one accepts that this may have been a case of poor judgement, there are a number of parties who were adversely impacted by this event.

One is the builder, who saw his hard work snuffed out, possibly for all the wrong reasons, and then became unwittingly involved in a search for a cause that might have involved him and his building skills.

Second was Vans Aircraft, who became a party, like it or not, and had the always painful experience of suffering the first fatal accident with a new aircraft type. I have vivid memories of the first three serious accidents on airplanes I was deeply involved in - in fact - like the Kennedy assassination, can remember where I was when I learned of the event. All three - 737, 757, and 777 - were after extended times in service, and all three involved extremely poor piloting that really meant those accidents need not have occurred.

I was a Third party, in a way, to this accident, as I was in my final preps for my First Flight, which I made about one week later. Reading the initial description of the accident made the hairs stand up on the back of my neck, and gave me a long pause. It caused me to check and re-check, and even considered an indefinite stand-down until the accident cause became known. I even considered the actual flight, and having my wife there to witness it. Better, I thought, for the Sheriff to come and tell her the bad news, than to see me go into a smoking hole in person.

Unlike many others, I made my First Flight pretty quietly, with only two on-lookers and no cameras. I can tell you this for sure - as I opened the throttle and started down the runway, this accident was very much on my mind. And, I do not appreciate that apprehension if it was precipitated for all the wrong reasons.

So, those are three affected parties, besides the usual friends and family members. I know there were myriad more - including many on this list. Sometimes, airplane "accidents" turn out NOT to be "accidents" at all. Which makes them all the more painful.......

Bob Bogash
N737G

[sailvi767]

I caught the aspects about the pilot that were alluded to in the thread. What I don't fully accept is that a experienced pilot even if one known to push things a little or a lot would make the first take off which is a test flight and fly the aircraft as described. In fact I can't even conceive that any pilot would do that. There is so much involved in the first flight and things that should be checked such a action is so far outside the norm I just don't get it. I have never made a first flight in a aircraft however I have flown many maintenance test flights on aircraft some of which were down for long periods of time. You simply don't do that. Those who knew him seem to think this was not out of character for his flying however sometimes there is a lot more to a accident then meets the eye. Could for example a instrument or screen have slid out of the panel and shoved the stick backwards causing the pitch up among many other possibilities. I once had a friend who liked to pop a fireball into his mouth before night carrier landings to wake himself up at 3am. He was landing aboard the boat one night when he popped one into his mouth and promptly choked on it! He said he was literally passing out when the thought went through his mind "let the accident board figure this one out!" Somehow at that point the fireball popped free. He was still in a fog for a minute of so but kept the aircraft out of the water.

George

[Dgamble]

Originally Posted by sailvi767

There is so much involved in the first flight and things that should be checked such a action is so far outside the norm I just don't get it.

I was thinking along the same lines, but then I remembered how often I've seen people do normally inexplicable things simply because they were in front of a crowd and/or a camera, particularly when trying to live up to the title of LEGENDARY.

I'm not saying that is what happened in this instance - just sharing my thoughts as I read through this thread.

[luddite42]

I'll bet this guy thought he was "legendary".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hwCa5n63Rt4

[Waiex-guy]

...I suspect that's pretty much what it looked like, unfortunate for everybody.

I guess this is what it was supposed to look like:

http://youtu.be/TRt6UnNzR6I

Hope that put's y'all back in a better frame of mind

[Mike S]

Well, the data has been presented and interpreted, the pilot has been described/diagnosed/debated. Innuendos and hints are overflowing, and the official results are still out on the horizon.

No more to be gained from letting this thread slip slowly yet inevitably down the speculation slope, so time to lock it up.