Cirrus Watch

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denverpilot said:
Not really. The pattern is repetitive and consistent.

Doesn't even require a Cirrus to become someone who gets pulled out of our mountains in a body bag every year.

The weather doesn't care what you're flying. Nor do the rocks. Night VFR in marginal VMC and high winds and thunderstorm remnants in the mountains is suicidal.

So I dug around and see that the "large debris field" is on Baxter Peak... and the crash was around 10PM local.

Baxter is nearly directly north of the town of Glenwood Springs and is a slightly higher hump in the ridgeline there. Very rugged terrain on that ridgeline.

Baxter is also on a GPS direct path between FNL and CNY.

One might think they'd follow V-8 which is slightly north of that line by about a mile and, of course, can give a specific amount of terrain clearance if you're at 13,400 on the airway, minimum.

The peak is shown as 11,188 on the sectional and I bet the megenta line is right where they hit, and I bet that's how the search folks found it that quickly, launching out of GWS. Track search.

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Maybe they did wait long enough that the thunderstorms that delayed the GWS high school football game Friday night had ended. Maybe not. I don't have any historical radar data available.

But Rifle shows an overcast varying from 7500 - 10000 pretty much all night, once the winds calmed at the surface, which would put the broken layer at 15,000.

It appears the pilot was freshly certificated as a Private pilot with no instrument rating in March 2017. And whether confirmation of the previous theory about personality types, or not, was a successful owner of an HVAC company in Ft Collins.

There's at least three no-go items for that flight in my mind now that I have a time of day and the weather. Nope. This sort of accident statistic and shattered lives is almost always the result of breaking those.

Don't know if he had attended the Colorado Pilot's Association Mountain Flying course in the late summer, but if not, I sure wish he had.

Ran out of altitude, distance to the clouds, visibility, and options for an "out"... breaking the number one rule of mountain flying... always know what your "out" is. If you don't know your "out" in that airplane you could climb... but non-instrument rated, he had nowhere to climb to.

The mountains demand respect. When they're not respected they often exact their toll in fatalities.

RIP and condolences to the family.
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Situation sounds strangely familiar to a simulation I did for FAA CAMLS several years ago. I responded to an ad in Flying and was flown out to OKC twice as a part of an experiment.

Simulated flight was Amarillo to ABQ in one of the bigger Piper piston singles (can't remember which one). At the time I was VFR and asked to fly a VFR route. Along the way the overcast layer began to sink, and sink ... and sink. As I approached the mountains outside of ABQ, it was clear I wasn't going to be able to get in through the victor airway I had chosen.

The purpose of the experiment was to see what you'd do based on material they had you review in the previous visit (I was in the placebo group and didn't get the material). I chickened out and opted to land short of the mountains and call it a night. Apparently there was a pass in the mountains that would have provided clearance to get through south of ABQ, but I didn't notice it in the hurry to come up with a solution.

Funny (or not) note - one person who participated in the experiment ended up slamming into the mountain VFR while having his head buried in charts. That guy was apparently a gold seal CFII.
 
I may get crap for this but I still think Cirrus tends to attract the wrong types of pilots by advertising that chute as an option. Yeah, it's a nice airplane but do you think if the chute wasn't a featured option, they would sell as many airplanes? I dont.
 
USMCmech said:
That myth arrises because Cirrus didn't do conventional spin testing for the FAA. The FAA bought off on the idea that CAPS deployment was an effective spin recovery solution.

Despite that, the Cirrus did go through full spin testing for Euopean certification.
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I flight instructed in Cirrus's for a while. The come out of a fully developed spin pretty nice.
 
SeanD said:
I may get crap for this but I still think Cirrus tends to attract the wrong types of pilots by advertising that chute as an option. Yeah, it's a nice airplane but do you think if the chute wasn't a featured option, they would sell as many airplanes? I dont.
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Yawn. I've heard this tale for the last 30 years. Before the Cirrus it was the Malibu, before the Malibu it was the 210, before the 210 it was the Bonanza.

A pilot is going to do what a pilot is going to do....no matter the chariot.
 
Richman said:
Yawn. I've heard this tale for the last 30 years. Before the Cirrus it was the Malibu, before the Malibu it was the 210, before the 210 it was the Bonanza.

A pilot is going to do what a pilot is going to do....no matter the chariot.
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The difference is that CD pushed the tech in the plane opposed to the gray matter between the pilot's ears. No, that's not second-hand info either.
 
SeanD said:
I may get crap for this but I still think Cirrus tends to attract the wrong types of pilots by advertising that chute as an option. Yeah, it's a nice airplane but do you think if the chute wasn't a featured option, they would sell as many airplanes? I dont.
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I know a guy (CP at an FBO here) who owns two and trains pilots in Cirri almost exclusively. I quote: "The CAPS system is what gets the wives and girlfriends - especially ones with kids - to buy off on the whole buy a Cirrus and learn to fly it dicussion."

That is, of course, one man's anecdotal opinion, but I can see the practicality.

Like @Richman said - pilots have been finding ways to die in airplanes for far longer than BRS packages have been available. At least the thing has saved a lot of lives.
 
SeanD said:
I may get crap for this but I still think Cirrus tends to attract the wrong types of pilots by advertising that chute as an option. Yeah, it's a nice airplane but do you think if the chute wasn't a featured option, they would sell as many airplanes? I dont.
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I don't mind the sorts of folks they attract at all. Usually well off, have the time money and drive to train correctly *IF* someone gets to them and explains that all the gadgets in the world won't replace airmanship.

I just wish someone had gotten to this seven month Private Pilot and gotten the word into their head that mountains aren't to be trifled with, and then spent some time with them up in the rocks developing a respect for them -- even if you're just going to travel over them. I also wish someone had gotten to him and explained the facts of life of a single at night with a lowering overcast and showed them both day and night IMC in a controlled way.

There's little "wrong" with pilots who can afford to buy nice equipment and use it to the fullest for personal transportation, but they need to know the real risks. Many of them are quite risk-averse in their jobs/owning businesses when shown a solid risk of absolute failure and will train hard to avoid it.
 
denverpilot said:
I don't mind the sorts of folks they attract at all. Usually well off, have the time money and drive to train correctly *IF* someone gets to them and explains that all the gadgets in the world won't replace airmanship.

I just wish someone had gotten to this seven month Private Pilot and gotten the word into their head that mountains aren't to be trifled with, and then spent some time with them up in the rocks developing a respect for them -- even if you're just going to travel over them. I also wish someone had gotten to him and explained the facts of life of a single at night with a lowering overcast and showed them both day and night IMC in a controlled way.

There's little "wrong" with pilots who can afford to buy nice equipment and use it to the fullest for personal transportation, but they need to know the real risks. Many of them are quite risk-averse in their jobs/owning businesses when shown a solid risk of absolute failure and will train hard to avoid it.
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I'd say it's not as issue of risk, but being aware of their limitations. Also, possessing the humbleness to admit "I can't do it."
 
Nark said:
I'm confused.
How does the terrain overflown impact your flight, during night flying ?

I'm pretty sure a corn field will kill you just the same a valley wall will, during an engine failure, at night.
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Not entirely sure you're actually looking for an answer. But here goes...

It's not the terrain overflown that impacts your flight. It's the terrain not overflown...

Largely is boils down to density and topography of that terrain.

Corn is generally found in nice flat terrain and has a density that stops airplanes much like EMAS. A corn field is likely one of your best options for an off field emergency landing. Not that anecdotal evidence is all that sound, but I know of several folks who have made successful night emergency landings in fields.
Granite is usually found in vertically displaced terrain and has a density much like, well, granite. I know of nobody who's made a successful night emergency landing in mountains.

Make sense?

Of course, as or more important, and as others have pointed out, granite vs corn is just one among many issues when overflying mountains.
 
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SeanD said:
I may get crap for this but I still think Cirrus tends to attract the wrong types of pilots by advertising that chute as an option. Yeah, it's a nice airplane but do you think if the chute wasn't a featured option, they would sell as many airplanes? I dont.
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It's not an option. It's required because without it the airplane is unairworthy.
 
killbilly said:
I know a guy (CP at an FBO here) who owns two and trains pilots in Cirri almost exclusively. I quote: "The CAPS system is what gets the wives and girlfriends - especially ones with kids - to buy off on the whole buy a Cirrus and learn to fly it dicussion."

That is, of course, one man's anecdotal opinion, but I can see the practicality.

Like @Richman said - pilots have been finding ways to die in airplanes for far longer than BRS packages have been available. At least the thing has saved a lot of lives.
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There are lots of lousy pilots out there, and that's not Cirrus' fault. But with Cirrus, it's a bit of a catch 22. Without the assumption they can rely on the chute, a lot of Cirrus pilots wouldn't harbor the kind of complacency that encourages them rely on the chute.

The required CAPS system has been marketed brilliantly by Cirrus as a "we care sooooo much that we're doing this for your family" safety device. Whatever. Marketers are going to lie. It's what they do.

The real problem with CAPS is it normalizes a kind of complacency and some really questionable procedures for precisely the kinds of pilots worst suited for that complacency and those procedures. In CSIP training, they ask instructors, "You've just taken off and climbed to 500AGL when you lose your engine. What are you going to do?" The expected - and required - answer is, "Pull the Chute." OK, fine, if you have the presence of mind to do so timely. But what happens when you learn to fly in a Cirrus and then sit down at the controls of almost any other airplane? Huge negative transfer at the very least. A well trained pilot who has internalized proper basic and emergency flow patterns and procedures could likely swap back and forth between a Cirrus and another airplane with no more trouble than swapping between a jet and twin piston. But your typical Cirrus pilot/owner is not a professional aviator and probably hasn't even preflighted, 'cause, you know, "I'll get all that info on my XM". If they stay in the Cirrus, they might be ok. But even then, the other problem creeps in... the even greater, insidious complacency engendered by the mere presence of that chute. "I can go, 'cause if I get into trouble, I'll just pull my chute." Sure, if you pull below max Vpd of 140kts and everything works correctly. But many a Cirrus pilot is not going to even recognize the problem early enough to fix it. The classic is the Cirrus pilot who iced up over the Sierra, lost climb ability, stalled, entered a dive, and broke through 200kts before he even recognized the problem. When he pulled the chute, it predictably departed the aircraft. The chute was designed and implemented for stall/spin recovery. Developing a sense - or worse, an assumption - that one can rely on it for any other scenario is a fools errand.
 
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I get it, mountains are evil.
My point was simply, flying over mountains, at night, has zero impact on he aircraft (mechanically). I say this of course, wearing my high altitude helicopter training school's shirt. (I fully understand environmental impacts in the mountains, vs corn field, that's not what I'm getting at)

@Roger Roger, how many thousands of hours have you/we flown over inhospitable terrain in SE AK, with out an engine failure? When partial and full engine failures did happen, did they occur over suitable terrain?
Again, mountains and night VFR don't compound mechanical failures.

Will I fly my piston engine, single in the mountains at night? Absolutely maybe.

PS. who the hell would ever deface a Breitling with a cirrus?
 
denverpilot said:
Not always. There's been a number of night engine outs to roads and such. Depending on time of year and weather, there's a measurable difference in temperature, too... and closeness to other humans and rescue, which makes the chances if you survive the off-airport landing of dying of exposure much lower.

Most of us who do day mountain flying carey some way to make both shelter and fire. The average amount of time for a rescuer to get to you is roughly a full 24 hours in the backcountry. Not so much if you plant it in or near your hypothetical corn field. Which usually has a road, at least one farmer, and at least a volunteer fire department close enough to it to factor significantly in your hypothetical.

It's all risk management, and one risk of flying over someplace uninhabited is that it's horses, four wheelers, or technical rescue climbers to even get to you in much of the Rockies, with a night time temperature below the point of simply being "uncomfortable" for a night.

Mick Wilson, formerly of the Denver FSDO, used to do a safety seminar called, "How to crash an airplane and survive", that discussed much of this. He had examples of survivors in the mountains who aimed for the aspen trees rather than the pine forest, as a real world response to your hypothetical if you add daylight or a very good sense of SA.

In your farm/cornfield hypothetical, there's somewhere/something relatively flat to land on, nearby most corn fields. Not so much over a national forest.

Even in this real world flight, let's say our intrepid seven month rated Private pilot recognizes he's in trouble and pulls the infamous Cirrus chute, and everyone including the dog, is intact. It's about 35F at night at those altitudes now, and over the next couple of months that will fall below freezing and stay there all winter. Better have some way to keep four humans and a dog warm for 12-36 hours on board, or you just expire of hypothermia after surviving the crash.

Worst rescue time I've ever seen for a "corn field" rescue was 6 hours. Unfortunately the occupants died because they didn't buy retrofit shoulder harnesses for their aircraft. The crash was utterly survivable and the aircraft was completely intact. Their faces hit the instrument panel and they died of blunt force trauma and brain injuries.
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I think the point Nark is getting set is unless you are willing to expend the personal cash and fly with some kind of NVGs what are you really gaining in a rural area with rocky terrain vs fields with irrigation ditches and god knows what grade, you can't really tell. I don't care how night adapted you are even with ambient light your best case is a guess. You are blind. Out of the people on this forum a large portion have never operated with systems like FLIR or NVG so it's honestly very easy to see the opinion of not understanding just how little night adapted vision can see. 100% illum night unaided still isn't good enough to land to an unlit field you aren't familiar with, much less a random chunk of real estate you picked while making a disturbingly quiet decent in the dark. Heck even NVGs and FLIR on some nights are garbage as far as what detail they can break out in the dark.

As to road recovery, one of my best friends executed an emergency landing to a road early morning in a populated area. Got the aircraft down fine and his fiancée managed to get out. Before he could the aircraft inadvertently burst in to flames and he has burns over 80% of his body now so yeah where he landed was far easier access for rescue and recovery, but it won't change a thing for him. Honestly unless you land on a state highway/interstate/etc near a major metro area your chances at immediate aid in an emergency are pretty slim. That's not exclusive to aviation either. A car accident at 11pm in whole swaths of the country where you are immediately visible on the road are going to go largely unnoticed by any passers by. My dad ran rescue out in rural farm country. People would die if they weren't able to seek rescue, meaning having the means after an accident to move towards somewhere with lights and people and attract attention to their situation. Very rarely did somebody if they weren't involved but unharmed from an accident be able to get aid moving their way, Planes same as cars crashing in the dark fall under that category of if a tree falls in the woods unfortunately.

Either way as dangerous as a night flight over mountain terrain in a single engine sounds stupid, I doubt it's any less dangerous and I'd put money on safer from say driving through the cascades or front range in a FWD explorer in the dark.
 
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When your butt eats your underwear.

I recently cut an oil filter that had been in use just 10.3 hours and found a bunch of metal in it.

A quick play back of where my SE aircraft had been the last 10.3 hours occurred. No night over mountains.

After looking at that filter, writing a $37k check to Continental was easier than one would expect.

Arrows.jpg
 
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Lawman said:
I think the point Nark is getting set is unless you are willing to expend the personal cash and fly with some kind of NVGs what are you really gaining in a rural area with rocky terrain vs fields with irrigation ditches and god knows what grade, you can't really tell. I don't care how night adapted you are even with ambient light your best case is a guess. You are blind. Out of the people on this forum a large portion have never operated with systems like FLIR or NVG so it's honestly very easy to see the opinion of not understanding just how little night adapted vision can see. 100% illum night unaided still isn't good enough to land to an unlit field you aren't familiar with, much less a random chunk of real estate you picked while making a disturbingly quiet decent in the dark. Heck even NVGs and FLIR on some nights are garbage as far as what detail they can break out in the dark.

As to road recovery, one of my best friends executed an emergency landing to a road early morning in a populated area. Got the aircraft down fine and his fiancée managed to get out. Before he could the aircraft inadvertently burst in to flames and he has burns over 80% of his body now so yeah where he landed was far easier access for rescue and recovery, but it won't change a thing for him. Honestly unless you land on a state highway/interstate/etc near a major metro area your chances at immediate aid in an emergency are pretty slim. That's not exclusive to aviation either. A car accident at 11pm in whole swaths of the country where you are immediately visible on the road are going to go largely unnoticed by any passers by. My dad ran rescue out in rural farm country. People would die if they weren't able to seek rescue, meaning having the means after an accident to move towards somewhere with lights and people and attract attention to their situation. Very rarely did somebody if they weren't involved but unharmed from an accident be able to get aid moving their way, Planes same as cars crashing in the dark fall under that category of if a tree falls in the woods unfortunately.

Either way as dangerous as a night flight over mountain terrain in a single engine sounds stupid, I doubt it's any less dangerous and I'd put money on safer from say driving through the cascades or front range in a FWD explorer in the dark.
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I remember the first f/w flight I made after completing nights. I got a 152 and headed for Apalachicola. Once south of DHN. It got dark, D-A-R-K. I had forgotten just how dark it could be unaided with almost zero illum. I could see Panama City in the distance and thought that was a better option.
 
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