17 Year Girl Has Successful Off Field Landing

Firebird2XC said:
This is why when I fly light aircraft VFR, I daisy-chain airports together and use them as waypoints.

This way, if I have to drift down from altitude, it's not such a crisis.

But you gotta wonder, sometimes. I've heard stories about Duchess pilots hanging the oil dipstick on the high end of the prop during preflight.. then leaving it there until engine start.

It happens to all kinds of folks. I just personally don't want to go lumping this kid in with Sully until I get all of the data, ya know?
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I watched a fellow instructor do this to a 172, and started the engine. It took the dipstick and wraped it around the spinner/prop! He still gets teased about it to this day!!!:laff:
 
ryanmickG said:
We had a student pilot do this on a solo x-country (c-172) and lost his engine about 30 minutes into the flight. He landed it successfully!

I have a hard time thinking this is what happened purely based on the article. If there was no oil dipstick then the FAA "instructor" would not of even attempted to start on the ground, it would have caused even more engine damage. I would think that oil quantity would be the first thing he would have checked before an engine restart.

IMO
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True. But you never know, know what I mean?
 
ryanmickG said:
I have a hard time thinking this is what happened purely based on the article. If there was no oil dipstick then the FAA "instructor" would not of even attempted to start on the ground, it would have caused even more engine damage. I would think that oil quantity would be the first thing he would have checked before an engine restart.
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I completely agree. This is why at first guess I would guess carburetor ice right away. Could have been anything, but when this happened to me in a 152, the engine came right on when I started the airplane on the ground no problems. Her situation sounds very familiar.
 
SFCC/UND said:
Well if you read what she said, the airplane oil pressure dropped to zero then the engine died.
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Yeah, I must have read it differently. It states "Daley watched the oil pressure go to nothing and the propeller slow down." which I interpreted the prop slowing due to engine failure. Again I was just purely speculating. The oil pressure could have very well dropped, then causing engine failure. :)

The reason I brought up the carburetor ice thing in the first place is because, it's happened to me (emergency landing), and a good buddy of mine as well. In the case of my friend, he actually landed in a field like the girl from the article. His engine failed due to carb ice, and he was able to re-start it on the ground and took off again.
 
I wonder what kind of user fees we can expect to pay in the future in order to burden the system by making a mayday call on the radio and a dead stick landing in a corn field.
 
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