Skymaster down in Los Angeles

[Learjetter]

Very sad news coming out of California (KWHP)

Link to Kathryn's Report:
http://www.kathrynsreport.com/2022/0...3jb-fatal.html

[ljmolina]

Very sad to see. God speed to the pilot and prayers for the family.

[mshac]

Helmet fire must have got him. He maintained 2000' as his airspeed bled off to the point of a stall, then he apparently didn't initiate a stall recovery. May have had the AP on altitude hold, reduced power too much after the takeoff, then was messing with the gear rather than flying the plane.

R.I.P.

[patrolpilot]

RIP fellow.

I picture the landing gear doors being fully extended open. I've had it happen twice.

The first was when I had the main power cable from the battery short, killing all the power and filling the cabin with smoke. This happened at gear retraction just as everything locked into place. It went right back to the airport as I pumped the gear down. It takes an amazing amount of power to maintain level flight—much more than expected.

The second was after one of my "Hurricane" patrols. I had been out in the Gulf of Mexico for 5:30 in some very nasty weather, bone tired. That 5:30 had been flown at 500' ASL as I had never been able to get any higher. It was almost dark as I turned final at GLS. When I lowered the gear, I heard the "thump" and saw the amber gear light, but I experienced the "speed brake drag." I brought up a considerable amount of power, the flaps back to 1/3, and landed. This was caused by a gear microswitch failure on the pilot side main. It had not been made, so the system thinks it is not locked and leaves all the doors open.

Owners focus on the gear door removal as an item to remove the momentary negative performance with the door cycle during an engine failure before or at that point. I see the doors being locked out as an emergency, and the two experiences caused me to remove the doors immediately after the second event.

[patrolpilot]

I understand that this happened at the same airport, KWHP, as the recent "airplane being hit by the train" event... yep.


"In January, U.S. Rep. Tony Cardenas joined local lawmakers in calling for a review of operations at Whiteman Airport, following numerous crashes in the area in recent years. A plane that crash-landed on a set of train tracks in January was struck by a train just moments after police yanked its pilot out of the wreckage. In November 2020, the pilot of a Cessna 182 attempting to land at the airport died when the aircraft slammed into a residential neighborhood.

Los Angeles City Councilwoman Monica Rodriguez expressed condolences to the family of the pilot in a statement Wednesday. She has been a vocal critic of Whiteman Airport and has repeatedly called for it to be shut down."

[patrolpilot]

The comments on Katherine's Reports speculate an engine failure, but I think he would have stated that over the retraction comment.

I thought I would add a bit to my comments about the hand pump. I'm a tall dude with long arms and, even though crouched over, can fly the airplane and pump the gear down.

I did three Skymaster transitions last year, and none of the pilots could reach the pump handle while flying the airplane; they had to be completely bent over to reach it. So I drilled in them; five pumps max, fly the airplane while looking for traffic, and repeat. This year, I had a 210 transition guy, L model, and had the same problem. Five pumps max, fly the airplane while looking for traffic, and repeat. There is always a rush to get the gear down along with fixation on this specific task.

Here is an interesting comment on Kathryn's Report...



No one can say that about my airplane, the $$$$$ are probably going to put me in the ground.