This one has been hashed out over the last year with analysis videos being made for Youtube, etc, but I thought it would be appropriate to cover it here as well. Landing hot and long at Johnson Creek is a tale as old as time, and an unfortunate rerun that may repeat forever unless there's better awareness made of it.

Long story, short: Loaded 206 lands late in the day August 29, 2024 with too much speed, attempts go-around, crashes.The description of the crash scene in the prelim is pretty hair-raising. There is video of the aircraft and pilot performing nearly the same flawed approach and go-around weeks prior, but this time his luck didn't repeat.

Link to NTSB preliminary report: https://data.ntsb.gov/carol-repgen/api/Aviation/ReportMain/GenerateNewestReport/195022/pdf

Location: Yellow Pine, ID
Accident Number: WPR24FA288
Date & Time: August 29, 2024, 15:40 Local
Registration: N712AM
Aircraft: TEXTRON AVIATION INC T206H
Injuries: 2 Fatal
Flight Conducted Under: Part 91: General aviation - Personal

On August 29, 2024, about 1540 mountain daylight time, a Cessna T206H, N712AM, was destroyed when it was involved in an accident near Yellow Pine, Idaho. The pilot and passenger were fatally injured. The airplane was operated as a Title 14 Code of Federal Regulations Part 91 personal flight.

The flight originated from the airplane’s home base of Phoenix Deer Valley Airport (DVT) about 0815, with a planned destination of Johnson Creek Airport (3U2), Yellow Pine, Idaho.

Preliminary ADS-B data indicated that the airplane made intermediate stops at St George Regional Airport (SGU), St George, Utah and Jerome County Airport (JER), Jerome, Idaho.

The airplane departed JER about 1430, and began a climb to the northwest, reaching an altitude of about 12,000 ft, 27 minutes later. At 1507, the airplane made a right turn to the north, while maintain the same altitude. The airplane began to descend at 1526, and the last ADS-B target at 1532 showed it reached an altitude of 9,875 ft, about 11 miles south of 3U2.

3U2 airport was located within a forest canyon, at an elevation of 4,960 ft. It was comprised of a 3,400 ft x 150 ft turf runway. The runway was oriented north-south within a canyon surrounded by steeply rising terrain to the east and west. Due to the surrounding terrain and runway slope, runway 17 was typically used for landing, even during tailwind conditions.

One of the airport caretakers was sitting in an office located about midfield on the east side of the runway. She was looking out of the window facing west and observed an airplane flying right to left just over the runway surface at what she considered to be a high speed. She was surprised because from that location she does not usually see airplanes still in the air.

Another witness, located outside in a similar location, reported that he initially observed the airplane make a downwind approach at an unusually high altitude. He watched as the airplane landed almost midfield. It appeared to be traveling fast with full flaps and touched down in a flat pitch attitude with almost no flare. The airplane then bounced two times while remaining in the same flat pitch attitude as it traveled down the runway. After the second bounce, with about ¼ of the runway length remaining, the nose aggressively dropped, and the airplane landed hard. It did not appear to slow down, and with the runway end approaching he heard the engine speed increase, and it became apparent the pilot was attempting a takeoff.

The airplane then began to climb but with an aggressive nose up attitude such that he could see the full overhead profile of the airplane. From his vantage point it appeared that the pilot was trying to avoid terrain at the end of the runway. The airplane then rolled left and descended behind the trees as the roll continued, and a few seconds later a fireball ensued.

The main wreckage came to rest on a rock-strewn slope 1,750 ft south, and 60 ft above the departure end of runway 17 (see figure 1). The area was surrounded by conifer trees reaching heights of up to about 100 ft.

Figure 1 – View of landing approach to runway 17. Wreckage location indicated by arrow. Photo courtesy of Idaho Division of Aeronautics.

The first identified point of impact was at the top of an 85 ft tall tree which contained a section of the outboard right wing and aileron. Two trees located about 20 and 30 ft south had their tops severed while the surrounding taller trees were undamaged.

The right wingtip fuel tank was found on the slope about 140 ft beyond the initial impact. A ground disruption that contained fragments of clear plastic and sheet metal, along with a serrated propeller tip and a landing light assembly, were located about 40 ft downslope and southwest of the tip tank. From there, fragments of sheet metal and cabin contents fanned outwards to the main wreckage, another 30 ft downhill.

Most of the airplane was consumed by fire, with charred remnants of the lower fuselage, empennage, and primary structure of both wings remaining. Both flaps along with all primary flight control surfaces were accounted for at the accident site. The flap motor jackscrew extension corresponded to a flap position of between 5° and 10°. The airplane has been recovered to a remote storage facility for further examination.

Sigh!!

My take is absolutely conjecture, I don't know the pilot or any context beyond what I've seen on YouTube. That said, I have a couple of general comments.

1. The Dunning-Kruger effect is alive and well in aviation.
2. Our standards of training are too low in the US. We need to do better, but I honestly don't know how to fix it. Having flight instruction just be a time-building exercise for most instructors is definitely a contributing factor. Standards for both instructors and students should be higher.
3. Deep pockets + re-assurance provided by high performance aircraft compound the effect of #1.

CParker wrote:My take is absolutely conjecture, I don't know the pilot or any context beyond what I've seen on YouTube. That said, I have a couple of general comments.

1. The Dunning-Kruger effect is alive and well in aviation.
2. Our standards of training are too low in the US. We need to do better, but I honestly don't know how to fix it. Having flight instruction just be a time-building exercise for most instructors is definitely a contributing factor. Standards for both instructors and students should be higher.
3. Deep pockets + re-assurance provided by high performance aircraft compound the effect of #1.

100%

Additionally, long runways lull pilots into ignoring all of the other backcountry/mountain flying risk factors that are very high in environments like JC.

I am sad these people died, especially the unwitting pax. I am happy for the transparency we get for accidents and investigations. I also appreciate insights from this community, from which I have learned an incredible amount over the decades—insight I am sure has saved my bacon multiple times without having to learn the hard way.

But the key is you have to be open to learning and reflecting on what else you might not know. My biggest fear is getting bitten by that which i don’t know I don’t know.

The dude had to have thought “I barely scraped by with that go-around last time, i won’t do that again.” But then he did. Willful ignorance? It takes work to get better at this stuff.

Something kinda on topic in case you find yourself in a similar hot & floating situation, due to whatever circumstance: I learned this from Greg Swingle about 15 years ago in his Rans S-7. Hold the forward slip in after leveling out and don’t relax it until you bleed that speed off and sink. If you have all this excess energy and you’re just floating, cock ‘er sideways and present that broad fuselage to your relative wind. Not just on short final but on the deck. Many pilots who forward slip straighten out early and pick up some extra knots in the last few seconds. Hold it in.

I would say fly slower and control airspeed better but it can be a challenge in the rough air of the hot & windy afternoon.

You have to treat Johnson Creek as a one-way, no go-around when landing that direction in those conditions. That means getting much lower much sooner.

What else?

What else?

Sometimes it's best to accept some bent metal rather than adding more, but not enough energy into the flying system.

Running off the end of a strip is a LOT better than crashing and burning on a hillside.

I was faced with the decision to take the ride off of the strip many years ago, rather than attempting a go-around due to a loss of one brake in my old 170. It wasn't easy, but to this day, I am sure that bent metal was the best choice.

I recall another BCP member, Mountainmatt, did that when too hot on Mile High. Intentional ground loop or on its back from hard braking, i can’t remember. He walked out.

Zzz wrote:I recall another BCP member, Mountainmatt, did that when too hot on Mile High. Intentional ground loop or on its back from hard braking, i can’t remember. He walked out.

I remember that. Back in the good ole days

In a Stinson. A good decision was made, if going into Mile hi can be considered a good decision.

(Fibbing... I LOVE going into Mile Hi)

IMO - studying accidents such as this is some of the most important recurrent training we can engage in. I never miss a Blancolirio or Pilot Debrief video.

Having their content logged into your short term memory can be a real life saver in a stressful situation.

I know there were some comments on my other thread about a checklist being too in depth, or things being too obvious, but sometimes it's the things we assume are committed to memory that can be the easiest to miss while under pressure. That said, everyone's brains are wired differently and we have to build systems that work for us as individual pilots.

For instance, remembering to set the prop on final.

To quote;

"I know there were some comments on my other thread about a checklist being too in depth, or things being too obvious, but sometimes it's the things we assume are committed to memory that can be the easiest to miss while under pressure. That said, everyone's brains are wired differently and we have to build systems that work for us as individual pilots."

In transport category, multi-crew airplane there are both "checklist" items and immediate "memory items". As a general rule the checklist items are associated with a configuration status and the memory items are the do right now, safety of flight items. They are used in conjunction with each other in most instances.

Additionally a "flow" is often completed as a pre-cursor to a "normal" checklist to then catch any omitted items.

Very good points - but I do contend there's a big difference between well trained transport pilots and weekend warriors in the back country. Those memory items are much better committed when performed daily vs weekly or even less by a part 91 aviator. Again, I'm simply pointing out that there are individual differences that need to be considered.

CParker wrote:Very good points - but I do contend there's a big difference between well trained transport pilots and weekend warriors in the back country. Those memory items are much better committed when performed daily vs weekly or even less by a part 91 aviator. Again, I'm simply pointing out that there are individual differences that need to be considered.

All agreed, it requires a disciplined approach so as to maintain safety of flight at all times, in all circumstances.

Scolopax wrote:
Sometimes it's best to accept some bent metal rather than adding more, but not enough energy into the flying system.

Running off the end of a strip is a LOT better than crashing and burning on a hillside.
.

I'm grateful to all of those who have shared their experiences on BCP over the years, particularly on this subject.

Last June, I found myself touching down too fast on a short (750') strip along a river that turned out to be a lot rougher and brushier than I expected. After one horrific bounce and float, I thought for a split second about cobbing the throttle to go around, but that thought was countered by the knowledge that it would be better to go off the end into the saplings than to stall/spin on an uncertain go around. I got on the brakes. Thanks to big tires, double pucks, and the grace of the Almighty, we skidded to a stop less than 20' before the end.

My son (the PNF) has been through this rodeo before himself, off-airport with an engine failure. He thought we were going to flip. If that had happened, it would have been at low speed, and most likely we would have just had to work out our extraction using the InReach. By some miracle, we didn't flip, and the bird was just fine. After a few hours of work with a shovel and loppers, we got of there.

There were a lot of "don't do that again" lessons in this for me. I'm just grateful for all of the wisdom I had read over the years about it being better to take your lumps off the end going slow than to try to abort too late. That was the last link in the chain, and it didn't break.

That's a big Thank You to y'all.

CAVU

Training is obviously a good thing. But, some people aren’t cut out to be pilots, and some pilots aren’t cut out to be anywhere without long asphalt runways with standard approaches.

I was at Thomas creek last fall hunting. I watched a guy wheelbarrow a C208B, with the mains coming down as reverse was engaged. I watched several 206’s come in so flat, but also fast, sounded like 75% power or more on short final only to chop to idle as they floated over the threshold at 30’. These were commercial pilots, nearing the end of a summer season, with training and a checkride at the start.

If someone doesn’t fly much, and doesn’t fly loaded as they’d be going into the back country, maybe they got training, did they actually learn or will they go right back to their crappy technique that doesn’t bite in their normal environment.

I ask my friends to tell me I’m being stupid with a weather decision, or tell me when I’m doing dumb shit. Perhaps when we see people doing questionable things we need to say something. Some egos will surely be hurt. There is no shortage of training available, getting people to see they need it is the challenge.

I am convinced that until I had a certain amount of time I was simply unable to make decisions or carry them out in a reasonable timeframe. I think that a natural response to something going sideways is to do nothing for a while to wait and see how it pans out. This is the worst thing a pilot can do in the start of a groundloop, or when they realise they are too high or too fast, instant action is required.
It was a while until I realised that "flying the plane until it stops" means actually moving controls, adding power, sideslipping, braking.....
I have always felt that tailwheel steering, once you "get it" is about making tiny rudder inputs very early, and that this becomes subconcious - you just look where you want the plane to go and your feet do the work. I think maybe lots of inputs are like this - basically muscle memory taking over. But this means lots of time in the cockpit, and fairly recently.
I certainly know that the more I fly the better it gets, but it dissapears fast. Its part of what makes flying so addictive to me, I can get better if I work at it.

I've been in and out of Johnson Creek many times in my Maule MX-7-180 and a Super Cub. The runway is huge but you need to control your airspeed. Go-arounds are difficult because of the terrain around the runway. Usually, back country training stresses identifying an abort point on the approach. If you haven't got the correct airspeed, altitude and configuration when you get there, then you abort the approach. I'm sure that this accident has been analyzed extensively but I didn't see any discussion of the abort point.

I don't see any reason why the 206 could not have slowed down to 65 kts with flaps extended and made the first third of the runway as long as they reduced airspeed to about 70-80 kts by the abort point. I use 70 mph and 24 degrees flaps in my Maule as my canyon cruising speed. Elevation is 4960 MSL so pattern altitude is around 5800 MSL. From that altitude and airspeed it's easy to slow my Maule down to 55 mph with 48 degrees flaps on final and land with plenty of runway at Johnson Creek. I spent 7 years flying a C185F which is about the same weight and power as a 206 but tailwheel. I didn't have any trouble slowing it down to 65 kts with 40 degrees flaps for landing.

It's important to do that in the morning since density altitude can be a big factor on a hot afternoon,

Sometimes the answer is stranger than you'd think. I read a comment on FB that went off about some other pilot this person considered dangerous because their instructor had taught them that a surefire way to avoid stall was to fly everything 20 kts fast. It's possibly this accident pilot had some weird habits, like increasing approach speed when the air is rowdy.

PNF?

seward wrote:PNF?

Pilot Not Flying. We alternate legs or days as pilot in command when we fly together. That day was my day.

As Epictetus, a Greek philosopher said, "It is impossible for a man to learn what he thinks he already knows",
or You don't know what you don't know.