The dumb bastard is lucky to be alive.

There was a lot of discussion during the flight regarding the stall and spin characteristics of the
cuffed wing, with the PIC advising that the combination of the cuffed wing and electronic
protections prevented the aircraft from stalling.

This ignorance will never cease to amaze me. To think that automation will ever trump good old fashioned practiced stick and rudder skills is just as good as signing your own death warrant. And then to think that a wing is "stall proof" is laughable.

Reminds me of this:

http://www.flyingmag.com/news/air-france-447-stalled-high-altitude-official-bea-report-confirms

The co-pilot in control continued to make primarily nose-up inputs and the airplane climbed to a peak altitude of 38,000 feet, triggering the stall warning multiple times in less than a minute.
As the pilot at the controls struggled to regain control of the airplane, the other co-pilot attempted to call the captain back several times, according to the report.
When the captain returned to the cockpit, 1.5 minutes after the autopilot and auto-thrust had initially disengaged, the Airbus 330 was at 35,000 ft with an angle of attack greater than 40 degrees, losing altitude at 10,000 feet per minute.
This is consistent with an aerodynamic condition known as deep stall in which the wing stalls and the tail is blanked out, leaving the airplane in an aerodynamic state that may be a difficult or impossible from which to recover. In the case of Flight 447, however, the airplane seems to have been in a steady state conventional stall, from which the pilots never attempted to recover.
Less than thirty seconds later, the co-pilot at the controls said, “I don’t have any more indications,” while the other co-pilot said, “we have no valid indications.”
The last data recordings, which showed the airplane still falling at 10,912 feet per minute, were captured less than 2.5 minutes later.

Hold my beer and watch this!

I agree with the problems of giving total control to a computer. The Cirrus accident was scary enough, but the POH concerning control function is scarier. Evidently it needs a lot of pressure airspeed against the controls, in some situations, to make them work. The need for full forward on the stick continuously rather than just to break the stall seems to indicate this. If the damn thing won't fly, they should fix it. Some of us don't like heights or parachutes.

All Part 3 and Part 23 airplanes live by "the design of the airplane is to fly." That means if a pilot comes unglued, he can just turn loose of everything and the airplane will return to flying. I can understand four stars at the Pentagon giving this safety feature up for high performance, stealth, gadget capability, and mostly to spend large rather than small amounts of money, but not business, training, and recreational manufacturers. Unless the design of the airplane is to fly, I don't want to fly it. So many airplanes are so well designed that crop dusters can somewhat safely say, when preflighting, "I'm not looking to buy it, I'm just looking to fly it.

Did I read right? Spin recovery with the throttle advanced....wrong move. Full throttle raises the nose and flattens the spin. Outside aileron helps get the world whipping by also. Major fun when your inverted and the smoke is pumping. Butcha gotta pull the power to idle to get it where you can stop the spin.

Rich

PittsDriver wrote:Did I read right? Spin recovery with the throttle advanced....wrong move. Full throttle raises the nose and flattens the spin. Outside aileron helps get the world whipping by also. Major fun when your inverted and the smoke is pumping. Butcha gotta pull the power to idle to get it where you can stop the spin.

Rich

Yes, you read right. Then, after the "passenger in the right seat" applied full rudder opposite the spin and the aircraft began to respond, the PIC numb nuts applied full rudder back INTO the spin.

The Cirrus has been tested in stalls and spin recovery. The company opted to certify it by demonstrating loss of control recovery with the CAPS system (parachute), because they felt like most pilots were more likely to survive a parachute ride than a spin recovery. It's quite apparent that their dealer/demo pilot wouldn't have survived without the parachute, even though the person he was demoing the airplane for apparently knew at least a little bit about spin recovery procedures.

Jim,

The Cirrus recovers just fine from a spin in most cases. The POH says to move the elevator control to full nose down PROBABLY because they want to make damn sure that they actually break the stall. I've worked with pilots who, when trying to break the stall, simply relax back pressure on the elevator control. That works fine in many airplanes, but not in all of them. I like the procedure that Rich Stowell teaches: "elevator control THROUGH neutral" as part of the spin recovery--recognizing that it is possible to be in an inverted spin in some aircraft, in which case nose down elevator would be precisely the wrong input. But the likelihood of a Cirrus getting into an inverted spin is pretty low.

In any case, this accident doesn't suggest to me that there is anything wrong with the Cirrus airplane. Rather, it suggests to me that Cirrus management REALLY needs to find a different demo pilot/salesman.

MTV

Thanks Mike,

I thought the CAPS system referred to some computerized autopilot system. I am glad the airplane is actually designed to fly.

Jim

I'm impressed with the flight data that was recorded. What kind of system/actuator records that? The autopilot servos?

Edit: In re-reading that section it sounds as if the flight data is purely inertial, so probably from the AHRS. It says control input was not recorded.

Increase in power right rudder into right spin what was this guy thinking? Simple spin recovery power to idle elevator neutral to forward aileron neutral rudder opposite from rotation. So simple a 25 hour student can do it solo and not need a chute.....

The initial important thing here is not the aircraft type, hamfisted pilots fly all sorts of planes and unfortunately kill themselves and their pax on a regular basis. The second, and most important thing is, despite the situation they found themselves in, they all survived.

If it was a similar aircraft, say a Cessna 400, and they found themselves in the same situation due to poor decision making, chances are it would be a smoking hole in the ground..

What if the A330 mentioned above had a Parachute System and the obviously incompetent pilots knew how to deploy it? Chances are a whole lot of innocent and trusting people would be alive today...

CAPS works, it's a proven lifesaver

onefitty wrote:The initial important thing here is not the aircraft type, hamfisted pilots fly all sorts of planes and unfortunately kill themselves and their pax on a regular basis. The second, and most important thing is, despite the situation they found themselves in, they all survived.

If it was a similar aircraft, say a Cessna 400, and they found themselves in the same situation due to poor decision making, chances are it would be a smoking hole in the ground..

What if the A330 mentioned above had a Parachute System and the obviously incompetent pilots knew how to deploy it? Chances are a whole lot of innocent and trusting people would be alive today...

CAPS works, it's a proven lifesaver

But the report makes it pretty clear the PIC did everything wrong to make the crash. used CAPS to make for his bad flying...

Does training trump parachute or parachute trump training? Cirrus seems to think the later. I see that as problematic. A pilot who does not lose control is very hard to kill in an airplane. How high does an untrained and unglued pilot have to be to deploy the parachute safely? Is there any way the parachute can fail?

The Ercoupe was designed to eliminate adverse yaw and stall/spin. Other than not being a good training airplane, it flew really well without control issues. Yes, lots of pilots spread the gear by not controlling sink rate with power. That did not kill them, however. No spin training was necessary, or possible, in the Ercoupe. Perhaps stall/spin training should be required in the Cirrus. Or rather than say it won't stall or spin, they should placard it "No Stall or Spin." It seems they are between a rock and a hard place if it has nasty stall/spin control problems to the point they think it would be dangerous to teach stalls and spins in the airplane.

cstolaircraft wrote:

onefitty wrote:The initial important thing here is not the aircraft type, hamfisted pilots fly all sorts of planes and unfortunately kill themselves and their pax on a regular basis. The second, and most important thing is, despite the situation they found themselves in, they all survived.

If it was a similar aircraft, say a Cessna 400, and they found themselves in the same situation due to poor decision making, chances are it would be a smoking hole in the ground..

What if the A330 mentioned above had a Parachute System and the obviously incompetent pilots knew how to deploy it? Chances are a whole lot of innocent and trusting people would be alive today...

CAPS works, it's a proven lifesaver

But the report makes it pretty clear the PIC did everything wrong to make the crash. used CAPS to make for his bad flying...

Absolutely, he totally messed up, no doubt at all. But the one thing he did right is pull the chute and they're alive because of it

I'll agree the chute saved the day here but I see alot of situations where they are being used to cover up pilot stupidity.

Yeah - the chute might have saved his ass - but mostly because he was such a dumb ass.
Wannabe far away from him.

cstolaircraft wrote:I'll agree the chute saved the day here but I see alot of situations where they are being used to cover up pilot stupidity.

Absolutely agree, and it does a tremendous job of it!! Not really covering up stupidity though, it's more about mitigating the consequences of the stupidity. How many Cirrus fatalities are in the news now vs CAPS saves? In comparison, how many Cessna's are crashing with loss of life? One is too many....

Unfortunately (fortunately, or I would be grounded..? ) stupid pilots are allowed to fly as well, not everyone can be the best pilot in the world. Maybe pilots are allowed to kill themselves through stupidity but it's good if there pax and family have an option...

I guess airbags, antilock brakes and side intrusion bars are only for stupid drivers?

I'm always amazed at the negative comments regarding the Cirrus due to the simple fact it has a parachute, that thing is a proven lifesaver! Newer ones also have airbags, is that a bad thing??

The Cirrus is popular for a reason, it's an incredible aircraft, and yes, for a time there the accident rate was disproportionately high, probably because they were being flown by the best pilots in the world.... That has changed dramatically due in part to COPA education and the real focus on CAPS during training. If anything goes wrong pull the chute and live. Better to be an alive, embarrassed stupid pilot, than in a wooden box beside your loved ones...

Do a google search and spend a bit of time reading about CAPS and the reason behind it, then see if your opinions change

+1 for the CAPS system. Engine failure over crap terrain, inadvertent IMC, flight control failure, whatever. No pilot wants to be relieved of duty in the heat of the moment, but a ballistic parachute is a solid safety device. I would seriously consider installing one if I didn't think the extra weight penalty for an aircraft the size of mine would in turn add its own additional risks.

onefitty wrote:

cstolaircraft wrote:I'll agree the chute saved the day here but I see alot of situations where they are being used to cover up pilot stupidity.

Absolutely agree, and it does a tremendous job of it!! Not really covering up stupidity though, it's more about mitigating the consequences of the stupidity.

I feel that we have to be careful with statements like this. Regulating planes out of the sky would also result in no deaths period. Yes in certain situations CAPS is great, but I feel that it's use due to a situation caused by major pilot error should result in some sort of punishment. We could all just where a chute and jump out when SHTF I guess...

A1Skinner wrote:I feel that we have to be careful with statements like this. Regulating planes out of the sky would also result in no deaths period. Yes in certain situations CAPS is great, but I feel that it's use due to a situation caused by major pilot error should result in some sort of punishment. We could all just where a chute and jump out when SHTF I guess...

I think that when considering procedural philosophy of emergencies, with the singular objective being to survive, you do yourself a disservice to regard any of it in black and white. I don't get the resistance to a feature like a parachute.

Are ballistic chutes good? The answer is yes. Is exercising good airmanship good? Yes. Are these two things mutually exclusive? No.

Are they [chutes] better than flying the plane? Maybe. Maybe not. In some scenarios deploying the chute may produce the best odds of survival. Parachutes can remove the lateral velocity from the equation, which, no matter how good a pilot you are or how sound your decisions were, you cannot do by flying the airplane with any airspeed save for a very strong headwind.

Does the causality and pathology of the emergency affect the means by which you save yourself? I don't think so. To say that a parachute is a bad thing because a pilot makes a bad decision resulting in an emergency is connecting two incompatible cause and effect events. I often see this mentality regarding helmets-- that being that because a pilot chooses to wear a helmet that they will subconsciously (or consciously) take more chances and be less safe leading them to a scenario where they get to use their helmet. Regardless, in the event of a crash, the helmet still protects the wearer. The value of the safety device is a independent variable.

I don't think it's right to insinuate that a pilot values good airmanship any less because they want their aircraft equipped with a ballistic parachute, any more than it is to want a backup attitude indicator. We all buy into the level of safety we can live with and afford, and we all want to roll our aircraft back into the hangar at night. Has there been a case where a Cirrus pilot deployed the CAPS and was injured or killed? I'm not 100% but I don't think so. Has there been a case where a pilot was killed trying to execute an emergency landing? Yes. It reminds me of the Mercury astronauts who were bent out of shape because they felt they were little more than chimps along for the ride, having been trained as pilots and chosen for the "right stuff."

Personally, I would sleep better having a ballistic chute in my airplane, and I would have some strong criteria for what I felt justified deployment.

Zzz wrote:I often see this mentality regarding helmets-- that being that because a pilot chooses to wear a helmet that they will subconsciously (or consciously) take more chances and be less safe leading them to a scenario where they get to use their helmet.

You seen the studies into this? Same goes for seat-belts, and driving aggressively.
When people feel safer, they take more risks, it's a proven fact.