The white VW is stuck into the tail, so I'm guessing as usual the news couldn't figure out the small difference between 'oncoming' and 'with' traffic.
Standard incompetence on the part of both news media and the American driving public.
True, the media probably has that wrong....I hope!
I seem to recall that we used to try to run them as close to empty (sputtering anyone?) as we could to make sure that we used all of the fuel available. It was a good check of actual fuel burn per hour, and gave a pretty accurate picture of how much fuel was left in the total system. Maybe it was poor fuel management on our part, but I must say I'm not really convinced of that at this point. Kind of like to hear you expound on that a little if you'd care to.
Sure, I'm glad to expound on it. Yes, in some situations it might be common practice to run tanks close to empty before switching, but it was always in what I would call a "controlled environment". When I flew Navajo's for charter, there were times when I would run the outboards pretty low before switching back to the inboards to get max fuel usage [never dry...1) passengers don't like to hear engines sputter, and 2) you can spread your reserve across multiple tanks, right? Good insurance against just this kind of situation
]. Takeoff and landing was required to be on the inboard tanks. The switch to the outboards happened at cruise (at altitude and/or within range of a landing site), and the switch was staggered, ie: one at a time. Switching back to the inboards was the trickier one, <i>because if something went wrong, I was fully aware that I might get stuck on a tank with little fuel</i>. For this reason, the switch back to inboards always occurred at altitude and staggered by a minute or so. I had the luxury of being in a twin, meaning that I always knew that if I had problems switching back to the inboard on one side, I would have to be extremely unlucky to have a similar problem on the other, completely independent side. It would suck to go single engine, but at least I had the other engine and altitude to get me were I needed to go.
I would say that running one tank nearly dry in a single Commanche before switching is a completely different story, if for no other reason than that you lose the redundancy in a single....you have to realize that you've painted yourself into a corner in that kind of situation.
And what's wrong with calculating an accurate gal/hr by filling the tanks, flying for a while, fill 'er up again...I don't see why you have to run a tank dry to get this information. Gallons used is gallons used no matter how dry the tank.
All that being said, I realize that it is unfair to jump to the conclusion that any of this had anything to do with this accident.
It's fairly common practice to run the tank nearly dry before switching. I guess there are (now obvious) reasons not to; but I doubt the poor guy had any idea the fuel selector would break off in his hand, though!
I honestly didn't consider that perhaps the selector "broke" at some midpoint that caused fuel flow to stop altogether. I wrongly jumped to conclusions here, mainly because it's painfully common for pilots to run out of fuel, and 99% of the time it's because of something the pilot did or didn't do or misjudged.
I hope, for the pilot's sake, that this accident really was something unavoidable. History isn't on his side, though. In the meantime, as other posters have said, it's best to resist the urge to speculate, and let the investigation sort everything out.
