Every report of a plane crash hits home to me. This one in particular, because I lost a good friend and a mentor. My flight instructor, Earl Allen perished yesterday in a Piper Arrow just prior to crossing Rabbit Ears pass returning to Boulder from Steamboat Springs with a student on a mountain flying course. We have no details at this moment other than the fact that there were no survivors. Earl was an exceptional pilot, and very conservative. He will be deeply missed. My sincerest condolences go out to his widow in particular, as well as other family and friends.

Waiting for the NTSB report for N3509M, here's the news report. I wouldn't normally post names of deceased, but it has already been reported on his facebook page.

RIP, good friend. Tailwinds.

http://www.9news.com/story/news/2014/08/09/routt-county-steamboat-plane-rabbit-ears-passing-missing/13849953/

http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_26308443/plane-believed-down-routt-county-search-is-launched

Condolences Soy. Very sorry to hear it.

Very sad and a big loss to the local community.

I would like to learn from this accident and I am curious what the NTSB report will conclude.

MM

May the Lord help us all, Greg, especially your instructor's family, students, and friends.

Very sad, for sure... I've been through that pass multiple times - Very tricky if you aren't carrying a lot of altitude on the front end of your run.

Sorry for all involved!

Jim

Condolences. This is not speculation but an observation from flying a couple of different Arrows. The turbo'd version did OK in the mountains, in fact my one and only trip into Leadville was in one. It was the T-tailed version which has to have enough airspeed for that tail to fly. Not one of Pipers better ideas in my opinion. The other was a 200hp strait -tail with no turbo and the air switch for the landing gear had not been deactivated as many of them have. Lets just say that struggling along in high DA's and mountain turbulence is not the ideal time for the gear to deploy automatically when the ASI is bouncing around all over the place. Yes, there is an over-ride switch but it takes a few seconds to process what you need to do.

Again, no speculation on my part whatsoever, only a reminder of days and experiences gone by which should be shared.

Sorry Greg

So sorry. Sometimes losing a close friend is as hard as losing a relative--we get to choose our friends. Condolences to you and the families, and prayers for comfort for all.

Cary

Dang, hard to hear. I heard of this crash earlier but hadn't heard any details until now. I just did a flight review and checkout in our 150 with Earl a couple months ago. He was a really great instructor and always struck me as pretty cautious and highly experienced.
I wish I would've taken more time to chat with him the last time I was hanging out over there a couple weeks ago.

Serious bummer.

Fraser

Soy, not much we can say, condolences to you, his family and all of the flying community involved in this tragic accident and to the other pilot as well. God Bless.
Ron

That's the shits, man. Stuff like this can gut you because it's a blow to so much of who you are and what you cherish. Usually learning what exactly happened is a resolution that puts our own self-examination to rest, but it doesn't change the tragic and sad nature of the event. I've been there. I hope you make peace with it.

Aviation can be a cruel mistress.......we lose friends and mentors. I think back on those who are no longer with us, but who I had the privilege to fly with or to hangar fly with, and I realize how blessed I am to have had these mentors and friends.

Life is short, man--live every minute and cherish those times you were blessed with good fellowship, and especially good flying advice.

Flying isn't for everyone, and there are a couple of reasons for that....losing friends and mentors is one of those.

My condolences, but hold his memory in your heart next time and every time you fly.

MTV

Terrible loss. I was in Steamboat a week ago Monday on my return flight from Osh. Weather was questionable so decided to fly west and then south to Cortez and Albuquerque instead of going over Rabbit Ears. Not sure that I would be comfortable flying Rabbit Ears in the future.

Rabbit Ears is a pretty straightforward pass, relatively speaking. Rollins is far more daunting.

I can't help but speculate what happened. But the weather at the time of accident was nothing unusual or particularly dangerous. There were storm 20-30 miles to the southeast - but I don't think the winds aloft at altitude were particularly high. If they lost the engine at the wrong place though - the arrow stalls at almost 60mph and glides like a brick. Its not the plane I want to have an engine out, off-airport landing in the mountains. Give me a cub at 30mph and good control authority and a mild stall break. I'm going in ass low as slow as possible - I hope.

There are quite a few meadows up there once you cross the pass. But west of the pass, the Harrison Creek drainage is no place to go down. Even if they were following the road - and there were no cars - I don't know if you could put an arrow down on that little 2-lane road.

Preliminary available as of a couple days ago. Looks like just about severe clear and calm. Kind of interesting there was no fire considering wings were separated on impact.

http://www.ntsb.gov/aviationquery/brief ... 0209&key=1

Even though it was not expressly written I gather at least a couple of critical pieces of information from the preliminary report.

#1 the aircraft was on a heading of 240 when it impacted trees at 9100ft (400ft below the terrain at the pass) - they'd turned around and were heading back west - toward lower terrain and the airport. That's a critical detail.

#2 - I assume that if there was something extremely obvious it would have been reported. So my first question was fuel. I think if the tanks or one of the tanks were empty - it would have been immediately reported.

I had hoped they would quickly be able to tell if the engine was running or not. That would have been pretty easy to tell from the wreckage.

It was not severe clear that day. Winds were calm and clear at the SBS airport - but there were thunderstorms to the southeast of their position over Rollins pass. I was mountain biking at the time near Nederland and watching the storms build. It did seem much clearer to the north. Earl favored Milner pass for crossing the divide through RMNP - but he routinely would take Cameron pass too if there was weather or wind.

It will likely be a year before more information is released - the aircraft was recovered and still being examined. I am at least reassured that it was nothing stupid and obvious.

I know that losing friends is part of the deal in aviation. Please keep these incidents like this in your mind every time you fly - and do your level best to stick around for your family and friends.