Riverside, CA Plane crash

[melax]

http://www.cnn.com/2017/02/27/us/california-plane-crash/index.html?adkey=bn


Small plane crashes into homes in California
By Sonya Hamasaki and Darran Simon, CNN

Updated 9:36 PM ET, Mon February 27, 2017

Officials are on the scene of a small plane crash in Riverside, California.
Story highlights

• The plane crashed in Riverside, California, while en route to San Jose
• It was not immediately known whether anyone was killed or injured

(CNN)A small plane crashed into two homes Monday in Riverside, California, authorities said.

It was not immediately known whether anyone was killed or injured.
The Cessna 310 crashed about a half-mile northeast of the Riverside Municipal Airport, according to Ian Gregor, a Federal Aviation Administration spokesman. It had departed from Riverside en route to San Jose.
The crash occurred around 4:41 p.m. PT (7:41 p.m. ET) on Central and Streeter avenues, Lt. Charles Payne of the Riverside City Police Department said. Payne said passengers were removed from the plane. Adjacent homes have been evacuated, authorities said.
"I heard an explosion, witnessed a large plume of smoke coming from the scene and rushed over," Chloe Hirohata, who lives nearby, told CNN in an email.
She added: "I did not know the people that lived in the house, sadly."
Authorities are investigating the cause of the crash.
Riverside is located about 54 miles southeast of Los Angeles.
CNN's Amanda Jackson contributed to this rep

 

[azmedic]

There was a 310 that left KRAL around that time frame going to San Jose...N1246G


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[A Life Aloft]

Video and interview with Captain Reynolds, Riverside FD

http://losangeles.cbslocal.com/2017/02/27/small-plane-crashes-into-home-in-riverside/

What a mess. It's a miracle that the man in the first house escaped uninjured. He believes that the couple next door at the adjoining house were not home from work yet, fortunately.

 

[Retired in SAN]

Any parent's worst nightmare.. Sad

 

[n77j]

There was a 310 that left KRAL around that time frame going to San Jose...N1246G


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Yep, that was the one..very sad.

 

[A Life Aloft]

Latest from KTLA here, is three homes caught on fire, five souls on the plane including the pilot. Three deceased, two women survived, both in very critical condition. Sad indeed.

 

[FlyingAccountant]

There's a poor quality video of the incident. Looks like it's in a stall before it hits the ground.

 

[SeanD]

I saw on the news that one of the survivors (teenage girl) was thrown from the plane and walked aways with a few scratches and was able to tell the FD what had happened.

 

[mshunter]

There's a poor quality video of the incident. Looks like it's in a stall before it hits the ground.

I saw that video too. What's hard to figure out, is if it had lost one engine, it would have rolled over by that point. It's as if both had quit. I saw it on the news this morning, and they had zoomed in on a prop. It didn't look like what you'd see it it had been at a high power setting.

 

[A Life Aloft]

From KTLA currently: NTSB Lead investigator Stein on scene and giving a live press conference.........They are interviewing witnesses, looking for more witnesses....plane has not yet been recovered/moved to an off site location, went over a detailed synopsis of what they will be looking at/collecting data wise and examining.......debris field is pretty large........really nothing new. Two surviving women both in critical condition, one with burns over 90%- so that is really bad, the second woman with various injuries and possible airway burns and lung damage. Both surviving women had been ejected from the aircraft. The three deceased occupants are a man, a woman and a teenage girl. Two homes destroyed, 4 other homes damaged- two seriously and uninhabitable. No one on the ground injured, thankfully.

RIP and I hope the two women make it. So sad.

 

[bkey79]

I saw that video too. What's hard to figure out, is if it had lost one engine, it would have rolled over by that point. It's as if both had quit. I saw it on the news this morning, and they had zoomed in on a prop. It didn't look like what you'd see it it had been at a high power setting.

I hate to guess, but something is telling me he was improperly fueled... Maybe a ramper filled it with Jet A? Big fire, no rollover and according to the news the pilot was "highly experienced"

 

[dustoff17]

Since this showed up in “Similar Threads”, I thought I would add a close-out report.


“The airline transport pilot and four passengers planned to make a 300-nautical-mile cross-country flight in the airplane to return home. They arrived at the airport about noon and loaded their bags into the airplane. The pilot made an unsuccessful attempt to start the engines, and the occupants deplaned and waited for some time. During a second attempt to begin the flight, a ground controller informed the pilot that he was required to file an instrument flight rules (IFR) flight plan before departure. After the occupants deplaned a second time, they went to the airport terminal where the pilot asked a flight school employee to provide instructions for filing an IFR flight plan. According to the flight school employee, the pilot appeared rushed, and the passengers were anxious to complete the flight. According to the surviving passenger, after one of the other passengers started to make ground transportation arrangements, the pilot's wife insisted they would fly the passengers home. The pilot filed an IFR flight plan, and the pilot and passengers boarded the airplane for the third time.

At the time of the accident, IFR conditions prevailed at the departure airport with a visibility of 2 miles in light precipitation and mist, scattered clouds at 600 ft above ground level (agl) and an overcast ceiling at 4,200 ft agl. It could not be determined when the pilot had last flown in instrument meteorological conditions or when he had last completed an instrument competency check. However, it is likely that the pilot was not instrument current as he was unfamiliar with basic instrument flight planning procedures and had to be coached through the readback of his IFR clearance.

The airplane departed normally and entered a climb. Seconds later, the airplane entered a cloud and began a turn, at which time it began to shake violently as the stall warning horn sounded, consistent with an aerodynamic stall. The airplane descended from about 900 ft above ground level and impacted multiple residences about 1 nautical mile from the departure airport. Examination of the airframe and engines revealed no evidence of any preimpact mechanical malfunctions that would have precluded normal operation. The blades of both propellers displayed rotational damage signatures that were consistent with the engines producing power at impact.

Toxicology results indicated that the pilot was not impaired by carbon monoxide or drugs. Although the pilot's autopsy showed that he had coronary artery disease and was at increased risk of incapacitation from a cardiac event, the surviving passenger reported that the pilot was manipulating the controls during the descent to impact. Therefore, pilot impairment or incapacitation likely did not contribute to the accident. The pilot's decision to complete the flight despite the IFR weather conditions was likely driven by his own self-induced pressure, influenced by the passengers' need to return home and his wife's insistence that the departure would proceed as originally planned.

Calculations indicated that the airplane was loaded over its maximum gross takeoff weight by about 300 pounds. Additionally, the airplane's center of gravity (CG) was forward of the forward limit for its maximum gross weight. Although CGs that are forward but within the approved envelope generally result in more favorable stall characteristics, the airplane was loaded outside of published limits, and its performance under these conditions was unpredictable.

Probable Cause: The pilot's failure to maintain airplane control upon entering instrument meteorological conditions, which resulted in the airplane exceeding its critical angle of attack and an aerodynamic stall. Contributing to the accident was the pilot's personal pressure to complete the flight despite the weather conditions.”

Sad….no reason to push these flights…

 

[FlyingAccountant]

I feel like you could attribute that same probable cause to a couple dozen crashes yearly.

 

[🦈💜]

I always feel my anxiety ratchet up a little when I see "the ATP rated pilot." It's not necessarily rational, but it's really easy to forget how to do "small plane things."

 

[roundout]

After the occupants deplaned a second time, they went to the airport terminal where the pilot asked a flight school employee to provide instructions for filing an IFR flight plan. According to the flight school employee, the pilot appeared rushed

this is fine.gif

 

[Skåning]

The 83-year-old pilot

There’s your problem

 

[Skåning]

According to the flight school employee, the pilot appeared rushed, and the passengers were anxious to complete the flight. According to the surviving passenger, after one of the other passengers started to make ground transportation arrangements, the pilot's wife insisted they would fly the passengers home

Always trust your gut. If your spidey sense is tingling, there’s a reason. These people would still be alive if they chose the other “arrangements”.

 

[Richman]

Le sigh.

There is a relatively light amount of GA traffic compared with back in the day. So it begs the question, if accident rates back then were higher (haven't checked) and there was far more GA activity....then....yikes.

But no interwebz back then, so all news was local.

 

[Murdoughnut]

Le sigh.

There is a relatively light amount of GA traffic compared with back in the day. So it begs the question, if accident rates back then were higher (haven't checked) and there was far more GA activity....then....yikes.

But no interwebz back then, so all news was local.

Maybe not relevant to this accident, but I have wondered if higher GA costs are resulting in pilots flying less frequently, thus contributing to risk. I have a set flying budget each month. When I joined my flying club three years ago that would get me about 5 hours of flying a month. That same budget gets me about 3 hours in a basic piston single, and two in the HP/complex I was flying (until someone had a gear up in it two weeks ago).

I decided to cancel a trip a few weeks back because of IFR conditions. Two years ago it would have been within my personal minimums, but less flying and less IMC flying of late has resulted in me raising those minimums.

 

[Richman]

Maybe not relevant to this accident, but I have wondered if higher GA costs are resulting in pilots flying less frequently, thus contributing to risk. I have a set flying budget each month. When I joined my flying club three years ago that would get me about 5 hours of flying a month. That same budget gets me about 3 hours in a basic piston single, and two in the HP/complex I was flying (until someone had a gear up in it two weeks ago).

I decided to cancel a trip a few weeks back because of IFR conditions. Two years ago it would have been within my personal minimums, but less flying and less IMC flying of late has resulted in me raising those minimums.

GA is heading for a hard landing. The duffers don't want to recognize it and most are whistling in the woods like a 64 YO hoping to make it to retirement.

The collapse of the entire GA eco-system is becoming a real possibility, and it's ripples will be felt throughout the whole industry.