Low ceilings aren't inherently dangerous. The plane doesn't know it's in a cloud. Not sure why the pilot shot the approach and didn't divert prior to arrival, but in any case, shooting the approach shouldn't have killed him. It should've resulted in a missed. In fact, knowing the ceilings just prior to shooting it, he should've been fully expecting to see nothing and to treat it as practice before diverting. I would've expected this outcome more from someone who was not expecting to have to go missed.
Your diversion analysis is excellent. There are so many opportunities to keep an eye on the WX while enroute and change the plan prior to reaching the original destination. I'd argue it was fine for him to take off from Morristown, however it was pointless continuing to BHB once the WX was confirmed while enroute, other than for practice.
Thanks for our kind words. My primary motivation for producing the Aviation News Talk podcast is to hopefully save a few lives. I've been to way too many funerals and have lost too many pilot friends to crashes, almost all of which were totally avoidable.
Thanks very much for this excellent analysis; this has been a topic of much speculation here in Maine bc it was such a rare event at BHB. I was working in the Bar Harbor /Trenton area that day and there were many visibility issues that morning; the fog was exceptionally dense at times, even by our standards. We drove by the airport two hours after accident and it was very sad to see all of the rescue vehicles and news crews. Cape Air regularly runs flights in and out of BHB; I would be curious to know if even they were flying that morning. Thanks again.
If you could provide some minimal video with your presentation it certainly would be a step To bring many more viewers to your channel . I hope you can do this and start with photos of The subject matter . Make it as interesting as possible . Thanks Captain .
Bob, Thanks for input. A typical episode takes me 20 hours to produce, though this one was less as it didn't include the ten or so news stories I usually include. The primary audience is the audio podcast audience, and that audio posts automatically to UA-cam. I'd love to add video to the UA-cam posts, but I'm also a full time flight instructor, and I just don't have the time to do a full video version as well.
Hi Max, another great in-depth analysis. I’m a SR22T driver, and have a question on one statement you made. You said, “under speed protection will not work with the auto-pilot off.” My understanding is under speed is part of ESP, and ESP is always active, (unless you press and hold the AP disconnect button, or deliberately turn off ESP in the Perspective menus. That said, I wonder if ESP turns on/off below 200 agl?
I agree, ESP is always on. But when we do stall practice in a Cirrus, I don't think underspeed protection activates. Though come to think of it, I often turn ESP off for stall practice, since it tends to make the recovery for the pilot! I'll need to research it.
Great reviews/training! More time than not I just land Bangor and drive to Bar Harbor...At least if the ceilings are low the margins are better. On this day I would go to lunch and postpone.
Agreed. For a flight like this, there's little margin for error. But even the best pilots make mistakes, which is why it may have made more sense to cancel the flight or divert to an airport with better weather.
Great content! Having spent some decades in 121, I couldn’t come up with a good reason for 135 crews always gravitating to an RNAV approach other than “it’s the way we were trained”. Your explanation of that logic switched the bulb on. THANKS
Glad to help. One of the big gotchas in using an ILS in G1000-equipped aircraft is that if pilots manually switch the CDI from GPS to a Nav radio for the ILS while the autopilot is in Nav mode, it will kick into ROL mode, which many pilots miss. That wasn't an issue on this flight into Bar Harbor, but it's an example of one of several things that make an ILS approach a little more error-prone than an RNAV approach.
I did mention landing gear seven times, but it all of the mentions were with reference to the Bonanza incident that I referred to. Are you guys listening at 2X and missing words???
I'm not sure that's the right conclusion. A conclusion I was hoping listeners might draw from this is that they should review weather carefully, and train, train, train!
I'm very happy with my decision to ignore the existence of autopilots and simply handfly. The level off of death is all too common. It is much harder to make that mistake when hand flying. The only exception is simulator work with the Challenger 650 which has autothrottle.
The minimum safe altitude for pulling CAPs in that model would be around 600' AGL. This aircraft was much lower than that, so it wouldn't have been an option. No the aircraft aren't deadly. Last I saw, the fatal accident rate for Cirrus was nearly identical to other GA planes and the overall accident rate (which includes non-fatal accidents) was about half that of other aircraft. So arguably, they are safer that other planes.
Does change fuel requirements of course. I fly Part 91 but don’t go if forecasted below mins, and don’t start approaches that are below minimums. No worth the risk.
Oddly, under Part 91, not only can you depart when the destination is below minimums, you can also fly the approach when it's below minimums to "take a peek" and see if you can see the runway. Not a particularly great idea, as it's easy to bungle the missed at minimums.
@caiolinnertel8777 not true. Fuel requirement is the same whether the destination is below mins or slightly above. What matters is if an alternate is required, not whether the dest is below mins.
Low ceilings aren't inherently dangerous. The plane doesn't know it's in a cloud. Not sure why the pilot shot the approach and didn't divert prior to arrival, but in any case, shooting the approach shouldn't have killed him. It should've resulted in a missed. In fact, knowing the ceilings just prior to shooting it, he should've been fully expecting to see nothing and to treat it as practice before diverting. I would've expected this outcome more from someone who was not expecting to have to go missed.
Experience in Cirrus aircraft is one thing. Experience with all of the circumstances presented is another.
How true. And recent experience helps a lot.
Your diversion analysis is excellent. There are so many opportunities to keep an eye on the WX while enroute and change the plan prior to reaching the original destination. I'd argue it was fine for him to take off from Morristown, however it was pointless continuing to BHB once the WX was confirmed while enroute, other than for practice.
Thanks for your thoughtful and careful instruction and coverage of the news.
Thanks for our kind words. My primary motivation for producing the Aviation News Talk podcast is to hopefully save a few lives. I've been to way too many funerals and have lost too many pilot friends to crashes, almost all of which were totally avoidable.
Max, Thank you. Excellent and thorough review.. Fly Safely - Train Often .. DR
Thanks very much for this excellent analysis; this has been a topic of much speculation here in Maine bc it was such a rare event at BHB. I was working in the Bar Harbor /Trenton area that day and there were many visibility issues that morning; the fog was exceptionally dense at times, even by our standards. We drove by the airport two hours after accident and it was very sad to see all of the rescue vehicles and news crews. Cape Air regularly runs flights in and out of BHB; I would be curious to know if even they were flying that morning. Thanks again.
Wow, very informative
Glad you found it helpful.
I found it interesting where you mentioned that if an approach plate notes says "AP coupled approaches are NA" that means no AP at all.
Agreed, it is one of those things you have to think about it. After all, the signal problem could be with the localizer.
If you could provide some minimal video with your presentation it certainly would be a step
To bring many more viewers to your channel . I hope you can do this and start with photos of
The subject matter . Make it as interesting as possible . Thanks Captain .
Sounds like you would see that on his patreon
Bob, Thanks for input. A typical episode takes me 20 hours to produce, though this one was less as it didn't include the ten or so news stories I usually include. The primary audience is the audio podcast audience, and that audio posts automatically to UA-cam. I'd love to add video to the UA-cam posts, but I'm also a full time flight instructor, and I just don't have the time to do a full video version as well.
No, I don't have a video version of this podcast anywhere.
Hi Max, another great in-depth analysis. I’m a SR22T driver, and have a question on one statement you made. You said, “under speed protection will not work with the auto-pilot off.” My understanding is under speed is part of ESP, and ESP is always active, (unless you press and hold the AP disconnect button, or deliberately turn off ESP in the Perspective menus. That said, I wonder if ESP turns on/off below 200 agl?
I agree, ESP is always on. But when we do stall practice in a Cirrus, I don't think underspeed protection activates. Though come to think of it, I often turn ESP off for stall practice, since it tends to make the recovery for the pilot! I'll need to research it.
Great reviews/training! More time than not I just land Bangor and drive to Bar Harbor...At least if the ceilings are low the margins are better. On this day I would go to lunch and postpone.
Good plan. As I recall, the ceilings at Bangor were slightly higher, but at most, by just a couple of hundred feet.
To fly a flight ✈️ envelope in such weather conditions heightened situational awareness is essential. Complacency contributed to this deadly outcome.
Agreed. For a flight like this, there's little margin for error. But even the best pilots make mistakes, which is why it may have made more sense to cancel the flight or divert to an airport with better weather.
Great content! Having spent some decades in 121, I couldn’t come up with a good reason for 135 crews always gravitating to an RNAV approach other than “it’s the way we were trained”.
Your explanation of that logic switched the bulb on. THANKS
Glad to help. One of the big gotchas in using an ILS in G1000-equipped aircraft is that if pilots manually switch the CDI from GPS to a Nav radio for the ILS while the autopilot is in Nav mode, it will kick into ROL mode, which many pilots miss. That wasn't an issue on this flight into Bar Harbor, but it's an example of one of several things that make an ILS approach a little more error-prone than an RNAV approach.
SR22’s are FIXED GEAR they are NOT retractable….
There is long discussion on the Bonanza accident in Florida before he gets to the Sr22 at BHB.
@@billtisdale6122 Oh .. well that makes sense. Max is a smart man, so I was surprised …
I did mention landing gear seven times, but it all of the mentions were with reference to the Bonanza incident that I referred to. Are you guys listening at 2X and missing words???
I'm not ever leaving my A-P-A-R-T-M-E-N-T!
I'm not sure that's the right conclusion. A conclusion I was hoping listeners might draw from this is that they should review weather carefully, and train, train, train!
I'm very happy with my decision to ignore the existence of autopilots and simply handfly. The level off of death is all too common. It is much harder to make that mistake when hand flying. The only exception is simulator work with the Challenger 650 which has autothrottle.
Technology is a double edged sword….
Amen. It makes things easier for us, but can also reduce our hand flying proficiency. Pilots need to be good with the autopilot and hand flying.
The parachute? Sirius are deadly.
The minimum safe altitude for pulling CAPs in that model would be around 600' AGL. This aircraft was much lower than that, so it wouldn't have been an option. No the aircraft aren't deadly. Last I saw, the fatal accident rate for Cirrus was nearly identical to other GA planes and the overall accident rate (which includes non-fatal accidents) was about half that of other aircraft. So arguably, they are safer that other planes.
I thought it was against regulations to depart for a destination below mins?
Not CFR Part 91
Does change fuel requirements of course. I fly Part 91 but don’t go if forecasted below mins, and don’t start approaches that are below minimums. No worth the risk.
Oddly, under Part 91, not only can you depart when the destination is below minimums, you can also fly the approach when it's below minimums to "take a peek" and see if you can see the runway. Not a particularly great idea, as it's easy to bungle the missed at minimums.
@caiolinnertel8777 not true. Fuel requirement is the same whether the destination is below mins or slightly above. What matters is if an alternate is required, not whether the dest is below mins.