414 in the water off of San Diego

Having a foot in the six-pack somatogravic-aware days of IFR flying versus the Garmin 5 million fly-it-like-flight-sim days of today and the requisite accidents ARE tiring.

I’m not saying it was a factor but it appears we continue to fly assumably flyable aircraft into the ground.

I’ve got friends dead from: Doors popping open, VMC into IMC, failure to maintain airspeed, CFIT and other avoidable situations.

Not saying any of this is causal to the accident, however the video of diving out of the clouds, and then immediately climbing feels… odd.
 
Having a foot in the six-pack somatogravic-aware days of IFR flying versus the Garmin 5 million fly-it-like-flight-sim days of today and the requisite accidents ARE tiring.

Word. I actually do hate (not just saying it) to sound like some angry old grognard on APC going through his third divorce and taking it out on "these damned kids" (or, probably more correctly in the aggregate, "these damned rich guys"), but there sure do seem to be an awful lot of totally operable airplanes flying into the ground after flying into a cloud. Which, ok, ever has it been so, but when everybody and his brother was flying around with a single vacuum pump made in the 70s and overhauled thirteen times, it was a little bit more understandable...
 
Maybe did he lack experience in actual IMC? Just heard a blurb about Arizona … and SoCal. Not that familiar with him but I’d be curious about that. Wouldn’t a Cessna twin have an autopilot ? Wonder if it was functional.
 
Word. I actually do hate (not just saying it) to sound like some angry old grognard on APC going through his third divorce and taking it out on "these damned kids" (or, probably more correctly in the aggregate, "these damned rich guys"), but there sure do seem to be an awful lot of totally operable airplanes flying into the ground after flying into a cloud. Which, ok, ever has it been so, but when everybody and his brother was flying around with a single vacuum pump made in the 70s and overhauled thirteen times, it was a little bit more understandable...

VFR into IMC, circling approaches, botched RNAV approaches, it just “feels” like it’s happening more often.

Maybe it’s the confluence of technology centric pilots and older tech aircraft? I don’t know. I do know that occasionally when I ask people about certain training failures, sometimes it’s “Well, you know, I didn’t double punch the GPS button and the airplane didn’t capture the inbound course so the examiner failed me” while I pretend to know what they’re saying! Ha! :)
 
This kid has had his commercial ticket for 3 years. Was a CFI. It seems unlikely he couldn’t hold wings level for 800 ft through a marine layer. It just doesn’t make any sense.
 
VFR into IMC, circling approaches, botched RNAV approaches, it just “feels” like it’s happening more often.

Maybe it’s the confluence of technology centric pilots and older tech aircraft? I don’t know. I do know that occasionally when I ask people about certain training failures, sometimes it’s “Well, you know, I didn’t double punch the GPS button and the airplane didn’t capture the inbound course so the examiner failed me” while I pretend to know what they’re saying! Ha! :)
And yet Jerry survived years of shenanigans.
 
This kid has had his commercial ticket for 3 years. Was a CFI. It seems unlikely he couldn’t hold wings level for 800 ft through a marine layer. It just doesn’t make any sense.

Maybe? I was a commercially-rated multi engine pilot w/instrument and didnt get my first true IMC until I started my CFI-I.
 
And yet Jerry survived years of shenanigans.
Present tense, survives, no? I feel like that's something I would have read about here.

VFR into IMC, circling approaches, botched RNAV approaches, it just “feels” like it’s happening more often.

Maybe it’s the confluence of technology centric pilots and older tech aircraft? I don’t know. I do know that occasionally when I ask people about certain training failures, sometimes it’s “Well, you know, I didn’t double punch the GPS button and the airplane didn’t capture the inbound course so the examiner failed me” while I pretend to know what they’re saying! Ha! :)
"Gauges scary uwu" is an entire thing in a certain IQ program, btw. Come to think of it, it was also a whole thing in a certain turboprop program.
 
Present tense, survives, no? I feel like that's something I would have read about here.


"Gauges scary uwu" is an entire thing in a certain IQ program, btw. Come to think of it, it was also a whole thing in a certain turboprop program.
I used the past tense just because I haven’t seen any recent posts about Jerry cheating death. I really have no idea.
 
Maybe? I was a commercially-rated multi engine pilot w/instrument and didnt get my first true IMC until I started my CFI-I.
Sure. I also never shot an approach to minimums until I was at the airlines. But even if that were true about his actual time, you would think he would have self assessed when he survived the first dive by 200 ft that maybe he ought not head back into the same conditions that got him into trouble in the first place.
 
I'm guessing that being AZ based and mainly flying around the Southwest, that he got very little experience flying in actual.

My first 1500 hours were spent flying the southwest mainly. Even when I got a jet job, it was sunny and clear everywhere all the time. I can count on one hand the number of times I had to shoot an approach to anything near mins in those ~1000 hours based at CRQ.

When I got the current job flying six-pack Senecas in New England weather, I learned right away how atrophied my basic instrument flying had become.

Hood time ≠ actual.
Fancy three axis autopilot ≠ hand flying
PFD ≠ six pack
 
Maybe did he lack experience in actual IMC? Just heard a blurb about Arizona … and SoCal. Not that familiar with him but I’d be curious about that. Wouldn’t a Cessna twin have an autopilot ? Wonder if it was functional.

 
The dude also casually taxi’s across the apron and a road right through the taxi lights on the way to signature and was having trouble talking to ground the whole time. He popped out of the clouds damn near into down town SD. His adrenaline was probably through the roof after landing.

The 414 is a LOT of airplane. I flew the 340 quite a bit as a baby pilot but never solo, always with the chief for this very reason.

And again just like the citation 500 crash up the street the other week, every single twin Cessna has one off avionics nowadays. All of which have various buttons and switches to make the RNAV/VNAV/VNAV+/LPV work and there is no formal training for that.

I wouldn’t be surprised if this guy got a random job offer to contract fly this flight the week before, did one check out (you can see the IFR flight track to go get current the day before) and off he went into IFR into a busy airport after flying something like a twin star for a few hours prior.

This airplanes really require 25+ hours of IOE, or a simulator check, which sadly all have been decommissioned at places like Flight Safety.
 
The 414 is a LOT of airplane. I flew the 340 quite a bit as a baby pilot but never solo, always with the chief for this very reason.
Cabin-class pressurized piston twins flown single pilot are busy as hell. They are not ipso facto unsafe, but there's a lot going on for one set of eyes and hands. I loved flying a 414 and 421, but you're working when you do and do it alone.

Edited to add -
This airplanes really require 25+ hours of IOE, or a simulator check, which sadly all have been decommissioned at places like Flight Safety.
I wondered about this. I remember seeing 414 and 421 recurrents at sim centers in the mid-2000s...I would imagine this is no longer a thing. Then there's the bit about the avionics you mentioned too.
 
Seeing @derg post and the others re the lack of common equipment on the older machines gives me thots/questions.

The Tomahawk was Pipers response to a survey of CFI's that called for a training plane that was not so benign as to make it difficult to teach more challenging things (stalls/spins). WW2 trainers were often more challenging (T-6) than the frontline fighters in many ways. From what I've heard an old 6-pack steam gauge is more difficult IFR wise than a glass panel techno thing. Does it make sense to teach in an old steam gauge thing then transition to glass after mastery (IFR ticket) of steam gauges? I've heard people say if you can fly IFR with analog stuff it's an easy transition. Is your SA better and better understanding drilled with the older way?

As for the bespoke nature of the equipment among the fleet - this is where Redbird and their VR stuff could be utilized maybe. Using VR couldn't an exact replica of a specific panel/equipment be simulated providing. a bespoke training experience for bespoke airplane equipment? This could alleviate FSI not having training programs for these.

Just thoughts, questions and such.
 
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