Another crash on rabbit ears pass near Steamboat. This looks awful - but the guy will live:

http://www.steamboattoday.com/news/2015/jan/26/plane-crash-survivor-doing-amazingly-well-denver-h/

Now I wonder what got him into the situation. It's great that he survived though! I'm always happy to see survivors!

I can relate to the memory loss with a concussion. Of my last crash, the last thing I remember is trying to knock the large, zero time owner of the plane's foot off the rudder and not being able to get a wing up with full aileron and full rudder. The doctor said I would remember after a week or so. After the week or so, he said I would never remember.

I don't know what it is about that pass... Been a bunch of accidents there over the years... Kind of like Pearl pass between Crested Butte and Aspen... Planes always seem to get tangled up with the ground. I've been through Rabbit Ears a few times in my Maule and decided it didn't have the HP to be safe. I'd do it in my Bo, but would give myself a lot of margin!!!

My own theory is that those two passes create hard to judge winds/up-drafts/down-drafts because of the choke points and surrounding terrain... Add to that a relatively low powered aircraft and you're gonna have problems... Doesn't matter how many times you've done it; its that one time when you misjudge the conditions and then gravity takes over...

Glad the guy is ok!

They say he was lucky.....lucky his cell phone worked. Bet he packs more survival gear next time.
Looked like a rough ride.

Denver was from almost north at 55 or 65 kts at 12k' at the time. Steamboat was MVFR to worse just prior. I stayed in Granby, to the southeast of Steamboat, on Sunday to wait for VFR and calm winds the next day. The day before, I went from 9k to 16k in minutes in a 182 at almost idle on the way to go skiing. On the other (down) side of the wave, I pegged the VSI at 75 mph or so ground speed and normal cruise power and airspeed. It was glassy smooth, of course, but the rotors beneath the waves in these conditions can be other worldly.

Northerlies along the divide can be brutal, and this time it brought pockets of ice and snow with it in places in the mountains while the rest of the state enjoyed spring weather.

I've found downward wave activity over rabbit ears pass on more than one occasion, and the up side is by the flat tops to the west. Things can happen really fast on either end of the wave.

Someone made a safe forced landing just west of the flat tops the same day apparently. I don't think it was a coincidence.