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Two P-51s collide at Oshkosh...

The DPE asked me...

My CFI warned me to keep my patterns close to the airfield when I took my PPL checkride otherwise the DPE he was sending me to would give me a lecture during the checkride.

Sure enough as the long checkride day wore on I let one of my circuits get a little wide of the field. The (highly experienced) DPE then give me the lecture I had been warned about, concluding with "I have had 13 engine outs in my life. How many have you had?"

The point being that I'd rather learn from people like Art and Ross and take them seriously before I have the accident that may be waiting for me. Fearful of flying? No. Just want to clearly recognize the risks up front and then do everything I can to be prepared.

Thanks guys for sharing your experiences.

--JCB
 
Nomex Maximus said:
"I have had 13 engine outs in my life. How many have you had?"
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I appreciate the advice, but this guy is making some questionable choices about which aircraft to fly in. Careful maintenance, thorough preflights, magchecks, etc. are there to prevent this kind of thing. I've driven my cars many hundreds of thousand of miles and never had an engine out. I'm not saying it can't happen in my airplane, cuz it definitely can, but thirteen times?! Part of the reason I'm building my own (motor included) is because I've seen some pretty dodgy upkeep on rental planes (IMHO).
 
szicree said:
I appreciate the advice, but this guy is making some questionable choices about which aircraft to fly in. Careful maintenance, thorough preflights, magchecks, etc. are there to prevent this kind of thing. I've driven my cars many hundreds of thousand of miles and never had an engine out. I'm not saying it can't happen in my airplane, cuz it definitely can, but thirteen times?! Part of the reason I'm building my own (motor included) is because I've seen some pretty dodgy upkeep on rental planes (IMHO).
Click to expand...

I was also warned not to argue with the DPE.

I have no idea how he managed to have that many engine outs in his time. Perhaps some of it was twins where one engine went out. I don't know and I am going to assume that a DPE checkride pilot knows what he's tallking about.
 
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Keep up the good work!

Mr Nomex,

I've had 6 engine failures/immenent failures with precautionary shutdowns. Two were in turbojets. This stuff quits if you fly enough hours. Not as safe as driving......Read the John King article!

Keep doing what you're doing and don't listen to your critics. You are on the right track. Tell yourself on every takeoff it is going to quit, and when it does you'll be ready. If it doesn't, sit back and enjoy the flight!
 
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I know one instructor who has done 11 forced landings- old guy with mega hours. Several other friends with 10-20K hours who have had multiple engine failures including PT6s, 331s and 731s. Two of these said they never had piston engined failures but a number of jet failures. On the other hand one of these had 3 piston engine failures within 2 years- all radials.

My dad has about 18K hours in military stuff mostly T6, B18, B25, P51, Vampire, T33, F86, DC3, Argus, PA31P, E90 etc. Had two engine failures- both radials.

Fly long enough and you will probably have something bad go wrong eventually up front. With twin engined planes, you simply double your chances to experience and engine failure.
 
Yukon said:
Mr Nomex,

I've had 6 engine failures/immenent failures with precautionary shutdowns. Two were in turbojets. This stuff quits if you fly enough hours. Not as safe as driving......Read the Peter King article!

Keep doing what you're doing and don't listen to your critics. You are on the right track. Tell yourself on every takeoff it is going to quit, and when it does you'll be ready. If it doesn't, sit back and enjoy the flight!
Click to expand...

I hope that my comment was not interpreted as a criticism of Mr Nomex or anyone else, and I am certainly not saying that flying is as safe as driving. However, engines quit for lots of reasons and many (most really) are foreseeable/preventable. A couple of recent examples from this site are a runaway advance on an experimental ignition system and ingestion of poorly attached air filter gasket.

I agree that each takeoff is best treated as a likely engine out, but I think we do ourselves a disservice when we take the view that "if you fly long enough, you'll have an engine out". Do we also believe "if you fly long enough, you'll have a midair"? Of course not. Engine outs can't be eliminated, but they can be reduced by treating inspections and runups as the last chance to catch a potentially fatal flaw.
 
Reply to Steven Lindberg

Your saying that "Tom P should put a stop to it" referring to formation landings sends shivers down my spine. Every time ANY thing happens in this country the new general consensus is that we must STOP everyone from doing it for his own good.
Let me decide what's good for me.
Formation flying when done properly is a known risk, but so is almost everything else we do in life.
We don't need people always saying something dangerous must be stopped.
Flying has risks, but then again, so does living.
Let others live the way they want to live. We already have enough BIG BROTHER is this country.
 
Bob Collins said:
We had an RV spin in last year too ...
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Bob, what are the details on this? I was aware of the Europa that went in at the approach end of 27 last year, killing the husband and wife from the northwest U.S. (Oregon or Washington). And, I was aware of a couple warbird incidents, including the taxi accident and the P-51 going down near Fond du Lac. However, I wasn't aware of an RV incident.
 
RV8iator said:
Your saying that "Tom P should put a stop to it" referring to formation landings sends shivers down my spine. Every time ANY thing happens in this country the new general consensus is that we must STOP everyone from doing it for his own good.
Let me decide what's good for me.
Formation flying when done properly is a known risk, but so is almost everything else we do in life.
We don't need people always saying something dangerous must be stopped.
Flying has risks, but then again, so does living.
Let others live the way they want to live. We already have enough BIG BROTHER is this country.
Click to expand...

A big problem with radical individualism is that it doesn't give proper consideration to the duty we owe other people. Oshkosh Airventure is a very public event with politicians, bureaucrats, and the general public in attendance. If the voting public decides it has seen enough slaughter and mayhem the politicians and bureaucrats will act (or likely overreact) to restrict us, to the detriment of all aviators. One of the features of our democracy is a tension that exists between unfettered freedom and the desire to control and regulate risk. We can not have either in extreme. The set-point is negotiated through politics. I think the EAA board of directors would be well advised to ban formation take-offs and landings at Oshkosh, or any other operation shown to be dangerous. They should take this action to protect the interests of EAA and, by extension, all pilots. On the other hand, I think it is perfectly reasonable for trained pilots to fly in formation, including take-off and landings...but not at public airshows. That is where I favor placing the balance between freedom and duty to others. It may turn out that this accident was not a formation landing gone bad but simply a failure to see and avoid.
 
Agree to disagree

I'll just say that I agree entirely with the last sentence of your post.

It may turn out that this accident was not a formation landing gone bad but simply a failure to see and avoid.
Click to expand...

From the NTSB prelim.

The prelim -- which follows, unedited but for formatting, below -- notes the aircraft were not attempting a formation landing, as many had speculated. Rather, it appears Beck may not have seen the P-51D's location on the runway, resulting in the landing collision.
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I guess we better ban landing at any airshow, or for that matter landing in general seems to be dangerous.
A big problem with radical individualism is that it doesn't give proper consideration to the duty we owe other people.
Click to expand...


As far as radical individualism, I don't see any of this relating. Slaughter and mayhem, ? you've got me on that one. over 40,000 killed on the public roads last year and look at the public outcry.
You just cannot protect everybody all the time.

I think the EAA board of directors would be well advised to ban formation take-offs and landings at Oshkosh, or any other operation shown to be dangerous..
Click to expand...

I guess airshow flying should be entirely LSA's making flybys down the runway at 3000 feet and that would probably protect the innocent public from this radical individualism
 
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crazy talk

Looked like Gerry Beck was landing at least 10 kts faster than the other Mustangs all week. The A model mustang is also more difficult to see out the front as the cowling is higher. The structure in the canopy also makes it more difficult to see. Plain and simple this was an accident by an experienced P-51 pilot. No point in reading into it any more than that. He screwed up and paid the ultimate price for his mistakes.

Regards,
Bob Japundza
RV-6 flying F1 under const.
Indy
 
He never knew the other guy was in front of him until it was too late. Don't get thinking this is just an warbird problem or an airshow problem...the same thing happens at Peapatch Airport with plenty of certified and experimental birds. Check under your nose!
 
Just an observation on this. An airplane crashes, oh well, lets just move on. Not to be disrespectful, I feel deeply for the families. But we put auto accidents into the common place that we don't even think of it when there is one. A head on collision, very bad, but they happen all the time. How about the bridge collapse, what do we do there, quit driving on bridges. NOPE. Lets just learn from the P51's and go on. Make sure we know what's in front of us. Fly level wing and hit the rudder to the right, that generally opens up the view in front, I do it all the time.
 
Radical aviation

Jerry: Thanks for your reply. Your guiding philosophy ("Let me decide what is good for me.") is one commonly heard and is properly called radical individualism. I am simply pointing out that all of our actions impact others to a greater or lesser extent and because of that we have some measure of responsibility to others.

All of our flying privileges come from our government, which exercises its powers by consent of the governed, which includes but is not limited to everybody watching at OSH. If you doubt that last sentence, think back to the immediate aftermath of 9-11. All flying was prohibited. Our government has that power. As far as slaughter and mayhem goes, I was thinking of the tragedy at Ramstein air base in Germany when I wrote that, but even lesser tragedies such as have occured at Oshkosh over the years can cause fear and revulsion in the general public and lead to further restrictions on our hobby.

A Ramstein type event at OSH might cripple EAA and fundamentally change OSH forever. A financially and politically crippled EAA would be bad for all pilots. My argument is that we all have a stake in aviation safety, especially at high profile events like major airshows, and some restrictions must be accepted. As I wrote before, the actual set-point is properly reached via politics.

I cannot agree with your conclusions (ban landings, airshows consisting of LSA flyovers at 3,000 feet) and I must assume you are exaggerating. We should not jump from one extreme to the other.

I agree with you that 43,000 traffic deaths a year, year in and year out, is a scandal. Yet, people continue to drink and drive, speed, and otherwise drive recklessly, apparently in the belief that they are immune from disaster. This has been termed magical thinking. Aviators must always guard against it and be firmly grounded in reality.
 
Don't jump to conclusions

Remember, so far, I think everyone is working on speculation as to what happened to cause the crash. A friend of mine who works with the war bird guys at Osh said that there was a radio transmission from the 2nd P51 saying he had to get on the ground now! He wasn't landing in formation. It's possible that a medical condition caused the whole incident. Hopefully an autopsy will be performed and we will all know. It's possible that pilot was dead before he crashed. Who knows! Stuff happens, it's an accident!
Regardless of the reason, I'll await the final report from the FAA before I make a bunch of comments one way or the other.
At any rate, it won't stop me from flying and I'll still go to Osh again. I will be extra careful. Everytime I hear about these things, I try to be a little safer.
Anyone who doesn't feel comfortable flying there should drive to Osh, anyway.
 
If that is true, that the second guy said he had to get down now, why??? wasn't the first guy told to do a go around???
 
The passion for flight that clouds judgement...

I have mentioned before that I believe that we who have this thing called a "passion for flight" may sometimes let it cloud our judgement when we try to decide what is an acceptable risk and what is not. Most other people do not have this passion for flight that we do and their reactions to airplane crashes is likely not going to be the same as ours.

We are all aware of how the media tends to paint stories about "homebuilt" or "amateur built" aircraft crashing. The emphasis is placed on the word "amateur" and the strong inference is made that the amateur builder is somehow a foolish person who doesn't follow the normal rules (whatever the average person thinks those rules should be) and took foolish risks in exposing himself and the general public to his amateur built airplane.

We invariably react against this inference and try to educate the media or the public about how our aircraft have to go through stringent airworthiness inspections and flight test regimes before they are allowed to fly freely in the national airspace. But yet the inference keeps getting made.

The point I am trying to make here is that it probably just doesn't work to try and look at these tragedies through aviator eyes, but rather we need to look at them through the eyes of the general public. The skies above our country belong to all Americans - not just the pilots and I suspect that the average American has a pretty strong expectation that no one is going to be allowed to fly unless they are well qualified to fly and further that no unsafe aircraft is going to be allowed to fly and further that no "unreasonable" activities are going to be allowed to occur in the airspace above their heads. It accomplishes little to argue to the average person that the late pilot was an expert pilot or that the amateur built aircraft was well inspected once the crash has occurred. In their minds if he was an expert or if the aircraft was airworthy and safe to fly then the crash would not have occurred and the pilot wouldn't be dead.

I mean no disrespect to anyone who has crashed. I am simply trying to examine how the average person views airplane accidents and contrast it to how we may tend to view airplane accidents.

Is a private person flying a vintage F-86 jet out of a local airport really something that the average American thinks is a reasonable activity for the FAA to allow? Pretty hard to defend, it would seem, when the jet overshoots a runway on takeoff and kills a large number of uninvolved people. Sure, we aviators think that the F-86 is a really cool airplane and we might want to have one ourselves if we could afford it, but does the average other person in the community think we should be allowed to do this? Over their house? Over their children's schoolyard? Anywhere other than an empty desert test range?

It just seems to me that the more esoteric the airplane or the activity the more difficult it will be to justify to the community as something that should be allowed at all, especially when tragedy strikes. "Why was he doing that in the first place?" a non-pilot watching the newscast will ask. It is one thing for that person to be told that an ordinary "reasonable" type of aircraft crashed while carrying passengers or cargo or perhaps even performing a rescue mission. It is quite another when the crash involves some exotic aircraft or some "wild flying" in the non-pilot's eyes. The average person I suspect looks at that and wonders why such activity is being allowed by the FAA in the first place.

In the Corey Lidle accident the first thing that the "aviation experts" had to start explaining to the "average viewer" was why in the world were private pilots in little airplanes allowed to fly anywhere near New York high rises or for that matter anywhere near New York city. You and I know all about the details of airspaces and VFR routes and minimum altitude rules, but these were all formed pretty much by "aviation experts" with little real input from "the average person". When an accident like that happens the "average person" is not impressed by "aviation experts" saying that what the pilot was doing was legal. If it was legal and appropriate, then why was there a crash that endangered so many lives?

I have no opinion of what went wrong in the crash of these P-51s and I would make no suggestions about what should or should not result in the way of new rules. I just think that if we pilots want to have a better understanding of the social effects of crashes on the public then we need to not let our passion for flight cloud our judgements about flight.

--John
 
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I have no opinion of what went wrong in the crash of these P-51s and I would make no suggestions about what should or should not result in the way of new rules. I just think that if we pilots want to have a better understanding of the social effects of crashes on the public then we need to not let our passion for flight cloud our judgements about flight.
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It seems to me that just the opposite is true. It should be our passion for flight that drives us to educate the public and inform them of the truth. If we continue to roll over everytime some journalist puts out bad information then General Aviation doesn't have a long future.
It seems to me that is just how we are trying to handle the user fee battle. We have to get out and fight for what we believe in.
 
P51's

And excepting those media types that are our friends and fly as well, what would an average person or media type take away from this string and it's "tone"?

That we disregard the risks? Clearly most don't but to assume that outsiders (non Rv'rs non pilots) don't read things like our little forum for reference material, that would be naive indeed.

A very smart Lawyer friend of mine once told me many years ago, "never put anything on email or the internet that you wouldn't want on the front page of the local paper". Would we want this string there? I wouldn't.

We must use common sense but if we set the tone as this string has and it is referenced by a non aviation average person it would appear that we do not deserve to own an F86 or P51 if we won the lottery of life and could. Or, maybe we should have more rules. God help us.

If we assume that is reasonable for the average person then why not that they should take away all our rights to fly? Can't happen? Does Meigs Field ring any bells?

How about giving the average person a little credit and let's keep ourselves and our discussions professional and avoid the taking of our own passion to task each time one pilot falls upon bad things.

If this logic held wouldn't we ban cars long before planes? Higher accident rate, death rate, etc. Oh that's right, we average folk are too stupid to figure out that if we fly we are at risk and those on the ground always look up and say - "Oh no a plane it might fall on me", come on..........

Nomex, I think the point so many people have tried to make to you myself obviously included is that we do care. We care about how we are percieved, we care about our friends lost, and we do care about people that reinforce the perception that we don't.

We should all fly safe all the time but they are called accidents for a reason.
 
Jim Pappas -

I was mainly responding to Stephen Lindberg's comments regarding radical individualism that I for one found interesting.

I have encountered your line of reasoning before many times on this forum. I shouldn't write about it because somehow non-pilot people will read this forum and get ideas that they don't already have and ban all aviation. So don't ever talk about it.

I don't buy it and never have. I think about the only people who read this forum are RV builders. I cannot imagine how some new reporter is going to come here and find some "ammunition" that they didn't already have so I see nothing unprofessional about my posting. What would the average person reading that posting take away from it? Probably that we as pilots do care about safety and the public good. And that is not a bad thing for them to take away.

I never said that we disregard risks. That was not the point of my posting. My point was that we don't seem to see things the way (probably) most other people do. Who gets to decide what are acceptable aviation risks? Pilots alone? If anything, your posting only makes me think that is my observation is probably correct.

No one is going to ban aviation. Certainly not because of one person's opinion posted on a website frequented mostly only by builders of a particular airplane type. No one is going to put this posting on the front page of a paper, and if they did, well then I probably have a bright new lucrative career ahead of me as a newspaper columnist. No, I don't think that's going to happen.

Again, I made no recommendation about changing rules or banning this or that or anything. The usual (highly bogus) response that we should not concern ourselves with aviation safety because there are higher risk activities than aviation (driving, etc) that we haven't addressed first is just getting old. No one is suggesting we ban aviation anymore than we are going to ban driving. come on ...

-- John
 
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P51

Nomex,

I tried, twice, and missed. I will sit out the rest of this string because I rarely post unless I think I can add to the discussion but it's clear to me that you don't see how close we are in point but how far we are.

If that's all I'm accomplishing I'll just sit out and you can read the other 69 posts from a lot of other pilots and the THOUSANDS of views from more that don't want to throw in because they like me have been here more than just a month or two and have seen this many, many times.

Go ahead, it's your right, I spent three yrs in the military in part to defend peoples right to have differing opinions.

I'm also a builder, an Insurance guy and an ex politician who made laws so of course I know nothing of what I speak.

I don't have to agree and neither do you. But respect for the opinion and perception of others was my point. I respect your right to have the opinion just not the message or the presentation.

I guess you missed that too.

Be well and fly safe.
 
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