mark manda
Well Known Member
Date: Sat, 19 Nov 2005 13:49:07 -0700
From: "Merems" <[email protected]>
Subject: A very bad day at the airport
Fellow builders,
I want to share with you a very bad day at the airport.
I was attending a pancake breakfast with our local EAA chapter at La
Cholla Airpark just north of Tucson AZ. A dozen or so aircraft arrived
and another two dozen or so visitors arrived for a wonderful morning of
food and airplanes. One of the aircraft that arrived was a turbine
Legend (composite, high performance aircraft). It announced it's arrival
with a high speed flyby and landed. However when it went to takeoff,
something went wrong, very wrong. It appeared to lift off the runway
way too early (about 1/3 what you would have expected) pitch up and roll
sharply to the port side. At about 75-100' it was still nose high and
rolling sharply to its port side. Then the nose pitched down. The
aircraft was now heading towards the ground but my view became obscured by
a house and tree line (yes we do have trees in Arizona). A second
later was impact followed by smoke. Both soles on board died. No houses
or people on the ground were hurt.
Since it was a EAA breakfast fly-in there were pilots all around
speculating on what had happened. What went wrong. Some are speculating it
was a high performance takeoff the pilot lost control due to the torque
effect and the 700+ horse power engine. I don't know if we will ever
know. 15 years earlier an RV-4 pilot decided to do a roll on takeoff
at this same airport and killed himself and his passenger.
I hope I never have a day like this again.
Paul
From: "Merems" <[email protected]>
Subject: A very bad day at the airport
Fellow builders,
I want to share with you a very bad day at the airport.
I was attending a pancake breakfast with our local EAA chapter at La
Cholla Airpark just north of Tucson AZ. A dozen or so aircraft arrived
and another two dozen or so visitors arrived for a wonderful morning of
food and airplanes. One of the aircraft that arrived was a turbine
Legend (composite, high performance aircraft). It announced it's arrival
with a high speed flyby and landed. However when it went to takeoff,
something went wrong, very wrong. It appeared to lift off the runway
way too early (about 1/3 what you would have expected) pitch up and roll
sharply to the port side. At about 75-100' it was still nose high and
rolling sharply to its port side. Then the nose pitched down. The
aircraft was now heading towards the ground but my view became obscured by
a house and tree line (yes we do have trees in Arizona). A second
later was impact followed by smoke. Both soles on board died. No houses
or people on the ground were hurt.
Since it was a EAA breakfast fly-in there were pilots all around
speculating on what had happened. What went wrong. Some are speculating it
was a high performance takeoff the pilot lost control due to the torque
effect and the 700+ horse power engine. I don't know if we will ever
know. 15 years earlier an RV-4 pilot decided to do a roll on takeoff
at this same airport and killed himself and his passenger.
I hope I never have a day like this again.
Paul