Learjet 60 crash in West Palm Beach

caliginousface said:
Just trying to understand as someone that felt like she did a great job still continuing to communicate during the while sequence. By taking herself out, do you mean she immediately became a non functional crew member?
Click to expand...

I am really trying not to be judgemental or kick the crew. I wasn't in the cockpit so I will for sure never know what really went on inside there. I don't know if there was anything she could do, but it sounded more like a resignation to the situation (which maybe we all would have done) than actually working the situation with the captain. To me, listening to the audio, it gives me the impression that they didn't know what was going on until they broke out of the clouds and she said she was going to die. I might also say that her communicating to ATC took her away as a PM to the PF. None of this I think, was causal to the crash as I really think the airplane went from perfectly fine, to a fatal crash being a certainty, very very quickly.

She did do a great job of communicating what she was experiencing. Her info will help, although I don't think we needed her ATC audio to put the puzzle pieces together; we can clearly see they flew through a cell, got the airplane into an upset, at some point the horizontal stab departed, and they crashed at a high rate of speed.
 
CFI A&P said:
Not typed, but I do have some LJ60 training materials at the house. I'd bet Lear-Gates-Bombardier didn't publish performance tables for icing in -47c. If anything, there's probably a note/ caution/ warning/ limitation that prohibits operations in such conditions.
Click to expand...

There are ice encounter emergency checklists. Basically, if you get ice (as the Lear is all anti-ice, not de-ice) there are performance tables and some procedures to follow. If I remember correctly, engine anti-ice should be on at 10c and up to -40c, which is pretty standard across the board so it would have been off at that temp, and rightfully so.

They were in a real pickle as they probably tried to out climb the build up, but really needed to descend into warmer temps.
 
This kind of high speed descent, i could only imagine the structural forces they were likely hearing as they exceed maximum Mach, not sure if they would’ve heard the stab separation. The engines too, with the now extremely large
intake of high velocity air, the fans and internal components being pushed far past their design limits, compressor stalls if not possibly coming apart internally.

There’s going to be little to nothing at the impact crater, same as the couple of F-16 sites i was at in my time. Being upper transonic, if not nearing supersonic, that sheer amount of kinetic energy impacting the ground, those forces will be instantaneously dissipated through the weakest structure: the entire airplane. And you’re talking dissipated into small fragments, even the engine cores and landing gear structures. What small
aluminium pieces would survive, would likely be easily consumed by the explosion of the fuel. I would be very surprised if it can ever be determined what exactly happened when, along the known general accident timeline. Structural failure as something causal, or something resultant? May very well never be known with any certainty, only guessed. All that seemingly remains are some apparently found stab pieces, some brief ATC audio, and the aircraft records.
 
Wardogg said:
1 either or I guess. I’ve been IMC at 410 but it doesn’t happen often. At 25 miles though something should have been painting. Unless it was inop. Or not being utilized. Or worst case being utilized improperly.

2 Well, you learn something new everyday. I had no idea. My only 121 time was an ERJ-145 and it had it. Everything else I’ve been on has had it. So that’s quite eye opening.
Click to expand...

I'm always disappointed at how many pilots do not know how to fully utilize the onboard radar.
So they rely on ATC or nextrad.
(shivers)

If ATC had them descend from 410 to 370, they didn't want to take a delay on the descent or oppose ATC in any way.

Seems to be a pattern with a lack of assertiveness, asking for a more aggressive heading change, reporting the icing/turbulence conditions with this crew.

Scenario could easily be: Grumpy Capt ignoring/not including the rookie FO.
"You man the radio and sling the gear, then leave me alone"

Which means addition CRM training in the future for the rest of us.
(wheeeee....)


Side note:
Ever notice how much information that we post quickly shows up in news articles?
Are we an early source to them?
 
DropTank said:
I'm always disappointed at how many pilots do not know how to fully utilize the onboard radar.
So they rely on ATC or nextrad.
(shivers)

If ATC had them descend from 410 to 370, they didn't want to take a delay on the descent or oppose ATC in any way.

Seems to be a pattern with a lack of assertiveness, asking for a more aggressive heading change, reporting the icing/turbulence conditions with this crew.

Scenario could easily be: Grumpy Capt ignoring/not including the rookie FO.
"You man the radio and sling the gear, then leave me alone"

Which means addition CRM training in the future for the rest of us.
(wheeeee....)


Side note:
Ever notice how much information that we post quickly shows up in news articles?
Are we an early source to them?
Click to expand...

I think their incident in TEB back in May is another indicator of that. That video concerns me for a couple of reasons. If they really couldn't maintain altitude, why not declare an emergency and say it was severe? Or was it an airmanship issue, as everyone else was in moderate and nothing else? Is there a pattern of flying into bad weather and dismissing the severity?
 
MikeD said:
This kind of high speed descent, i could only imagine the structural forces they were likely hearing as they exceed maximum Mach, not sure if they would’ve heard the stab separation. The engines too, with the now extremely large
intake of high velocity air, the fans and internal components being pushed far past their design limits, compressor stalls if not possibly coming apart internally.
Click to expand...

At idle, even at .9, you have a difficult time getting the N2 anywhere near 100%, same with the N1.


MikeD said:
There’s going to be little to nothing at the impact crater, same as the couple of F-16 sites i was at in my time. Being upper transonic, if not nearing supersonic, that sheer amount of kinetic energy impacting the ground, those forces will be instantaneously dissipated through the weakest structure: the entire airplane. And you’re talking dissipated into small fragments, even the engine cores and landing gear structures. What small
aluminium pieces would survive, would likely be easily consumed by the explosion of the fuel. I would be very surprised if it can ever be determined what exactly happened when, along the known general accident timeline. Structural failure as something causal, or something resultant? May very well never be known with any certainty, only guessed. All that seemingly remains are some apparently found stab pieces, some brief ATC audio, and the aircraft records.
Click to expand...

You can see the wing imprint on the concrete.
They likely folded into the crater, which is damn impressive.

You're correct, Landing gear and engine cores will be the biggest pieces, and even they will be heavily fragmented.
Obviously, the biomass is likely non existant

It is an odd feeling to mourn the death of someone when the body is annihilated.

The crater will be a down scaled version of the Value Jet crater, deeper than it was wide, filled with various hazmats and biohazards.

As for the flight recorder, I'd be shocked if it survived.
 
Inverted said:
I think their incident in TEB back in May is another indicator of that. That video concerns me for a couple of reasons. If they really couldn't maintain altitude, why not declare an emergency and say it was severe? Or was it an airmanship issue, as everyone else was in moderate and nothing else? Is there a pattern of flying into bad weather and dismissing the severity?
Click to expand...

Normalized deviation.
Old pilot does it "his way" and rookie doesn't have the knowledge/courage to counter.
Peer pressure is also a factor. "I don't want to be the only one who says severe and have a PIREP in my honor"

So many pilots refuse or are mentally unable to declare the Big "E".

Overcoming pride needs to be taught more.
 
DropTank said:
At idle, even at .9, you have a difficult time getting the N2 anywhere near 100%, same with the N1.




You can see the wing imprint on the concrete.
They likely folded into the crater, which is damn impressive.

You're correct, Landing gear and engine cores will be the biggest pieces, and even they will be heavily fragmented.
Obviously, the biomass is likely non existant

It is an odd feeling to mourn the death of someone when the body is annihilated.

The crater will be a down scaled version of the Value Jet crater, deeper than it was wide, filled with various hazmats and biohazards.

As for the flight recorder, I'd be shocked if it survived.
Click to expand...

yup. same thing with what once was an F-16, now a wispy smoking crater i was looking into back in the day. If you didn’t know any better, you’d assume it’s just a random excavation of some kind with some junk having been burnt inside.
 
Kingairer said:
The ice thing surprises me too at that temp and duration. Allegedly, she texted her boyfriend 8+min prior to go into the final storm that they were getting ice, so they were in whatever she perceived as ice for a long time.
Click to expand...

On this, is this some new world where texting,
especially non-pertinent conversation, in the cockpit is now normal? It’s one thing if you are sitting in back, on rest or off duty or as a pax, but in the cockpit as an acting crewmember?
 
MikeD said:
On this, is this some new world where texting,
especially non-pertinent conversation, in the cockpit is now normal? It’s one thing if you are sitting in back, on rest or off duty or as a pax, but in the cockpit as an acting crewmember?
Click to expand...

This adds to my concern about her lack of participation as a crewmember.

I don't think we are going to be real happy when the NTSB and FAA put a lot of the exterior puzzle pieces together....
 
MikeD said:
On this, is this some new world where texting,
especially non-pertinent conversation, in the cockpit is now normal? It’s one thing if you are sitting in back, on rest or off duty or as a pax, but in the cockpit as an acting crewmember?
Click to expand...
Not in my world. I think when it was a new capability, some people couldn't control themselves, but I haven't seen it lately. In my mind its one of the few things, intentional non-compliance, that could get you fired from a comfortable job. I can't speak to the prevalence of it in corporate part 91 type operations. It surprises me that the text would be during a complex portion of the flight, like wx deviations and routings. It would surprise me if it was at FL410 with a clear blue sky over Kansas.
 
DropTank said:
Normalized deviation.
Old pilot does it "his way" and rookie doesn't have the knowledge/courage to counter.
Peer pressure is also a factor. "I don't want to be the only one who says severe and have a PIREP in my honor"

So many pilots refuse or are mentally unable to declare the Big "E".

Overcoming pride needs to be taught more.
Click to expand...
We don’t do enough in the bizjet training world to train and truly evaluate critical thinking, decision-making, and non-tech skills. These are skills critical to avoiding accidents and incidents. Many times pilots show up to training to “check the box” circle at a large footprint airport (unrealistic to their real ops), do the same dance and go back to flying or worse, dance on the edge of safety every day. Millions of dollars for the level D sim and approval is given for KMEM KJFK and any other large airport that no one would ever circle at? Come on. Yes, I know how approvals work, I know the difference between training and checking. But checking and testing should be relevant in real world scenarios and their geographical locations. When the inspector is concerned with the amount of 3D or 2D approaches given versus how the crew is actually performing, when it’s all about marathon endurance during a 2.5hr repetitive check… there’s a problem with that. I also question some NSP inspectors’ judgement in certifying borderline passing FTDs every year. The excuse, “I don’t want to affect the business.” Long story short in jest, Disney or Universal do a better job at immersion.

We’ve been seeing complacency every month. Runway incursions, excursions, too high, too fast, too loose with stands. On a good day crews can get through the cookie cutter training and checking curriculum with no extra days or issues. However, it’s been the norm in my personal experience to witness several extra training events, and struggling pilots trying to get through a 2 week type rating course or recurrent. My hope is that something is recommended to look at and rethink/reshape bizjet training methods that do more than just “check a box” because something is really missing here at the schoolhouses.
 
Last edited:
Inverted said:
This adds to my concern about her lack of participation as a crewmember.

I don't think we are going to be real happy when the NTSB and FAA put a lot of the exterior puzzle pieces together....
Click to expand...

Certainly would make one wonder about this, as Kingairer mentioned in his response regarding a complex segment of the flight in icing and Wx,
much less in cruise when clear and a million. All good points here and a factor that should be addressed by the NTSB for both appropriateness and timeliness of texting as an acting crewmember, especially in these conditions.
 
Texting is SOP in this world. We’re essentially expected to text with the entire company constantly. Between sales, brokers, owner assistants “dispatch” and logistics almost every 135 crew is in constant communication including engine start texts and wheels up texts.

Completely standard. So of course pilots are going to text other people the whole time.

The entire culture will need to change, but it won’t. Until someone kills the next Kobe because of a text.
 
T/O w/FSII said:
Texting is SOP in this world. We’re essentially expected to text with the entire company constantly. Between sales, brokers, owner assistants “dispatch” and logistics almost every 135 crew is in constant communication including engine start texts and wheels up texts.

Completely standard. So of course pilots are going to text other people the whole time.

The entire culture will need to change, but it won’t. Until someone kills the next Kobe because of a text.
Click to expand...

interesting. Granted, this wasn’t a Kobe sports celeb onboard, but it was a very high monetary value customer plus family and friends. Be interesting to see how this particular finding is addressed and whether it will be judged a distraction from the flight conditions they were dealing with at the time.
 
nocturnalaviator said:
We don’t do enough in the bizjet training world to train and truly evaluate critical thinking, decision-making, and non-tech skills. These are skills critical to avoiding accidents and incidents. Many times pilots show up to training to “check the box” circle at a large footprint airport (unrealistic to their real ops), do the same dance and go back to flying or worse, dance on the edge of safety every day. Millions of dollars for the level D sim and approval is given for KMEM KJFK and any other large airport that no one would ever circle at? Come on. Yes, I know how approvals work, I know the difference between training and checking. But checking and testing should be relevant in real world scenarios and their geographical locations. When the inspector is concerned with the amount of 3D or 2D approaches given versus how the crew is actually performing, when it’s all about marathon endurance during a 2.5hr repetitive check… there’s a problem with that. I also question some NSP inspectors’ judgement in certifying borderline passing FTDs every year. The excuse, “I don’t want to affect the business.”

We’ve been seeing complacency every month. Runway incursions, excursions, too high, too fast, too loose with stands. On a good day crews can get through the cookie cutter training and checking curriculum with no extra days or issues. However, it’s been the norm in my personal experience to witness several extra training events, and struggling pilots trying to get through a 2 week type rating course or recurrent. My hope is that something is recommended to look at and rethink/reshape bizjet training methods that do more than just “check a box” because something is really missing here at the schoolhouses.
Click to expand...
We are trying. My groundschool recurrent is heavy on systems questioning and scenario based decision making, but not all are…
 
T/O w/FSII said:
Texting is SOP in this world. We’re essentially expected to text with the entire company constantly. Between sales, brokers, owner assistants “dispatch” and logistics almost every 135 crew is in constant communication including engine start texts and wheels up texts.

Completely standard. So of course pilots are going to text other people the whole time.

The entire culture will need to change, but it won’t. Until someone kills the next Kobe because of a text.
Click to expand...

Oh come on. Texting your boyfriend when in the middle of significant weather while the CA does nothing?

I've flown enough 135, I know how it goes between communication with the company, broker, FBO etc. but don't put that in the same column as what she did.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top