portzy
MB Enthusiast
- Joined
- Apr 10, 2004
- Messages
- 1,580
- Location
- Ulrome, Driffield, East Yorkshire.
- Car
- An SLK R171 with lots of toys and a Golf Plus for fishing.
Some months ago a few of you asked me to post some of my recollections from my days as a flying instructor. Its taken a bit of time to pick some which stood out most of all but this is the one that has always stayed with me, tragic though it is. I'll see about posting some which are a bit light hearted later. I have recounted it as best I could but it may confuse in places, feel free to ask or comment though!
Many years ago the captain of a North Sea trawler had a very unusual surprise during the examination his nets following a period of drift fishing. In amongst all the freshly caught cod and haddock etc he came across the detached remains of a four cylinder Lycoming aero engine showing early signs of corrosion.
After emptying his nets of fish he made contact with HM Coastguard to report his find and they commenced an investigation of their records to ascertain if any aircrew had recently been reported missing. In the meanwhile, both he and the rest of the crew took the engine to one side of the vessel and began to clear away all the silt and various other marine growths from its data plate with the help of a hose pipe and nylon brush and, before long, the serial numbers and other unique identifiers of the engine became clear.
This information was relayed back to HM Coastguard and, within minutes, it was sadly confirmed that some twelve months previous a single engined Cessna 150 light training aircraft, based at a northern flying club had, in fact, been reported missing along with its crew of one and that the serial numbers of the retrieved engine matched those of the missing aircraft.
We now have to move back in time some twelve months or so. It was a typical late autumn day with an associated late autumn anti-cyclonic high-pressure system centred and steady over the North of England. To those who understand weather you will know the type of climatic conditions that this will bring but to those who don’t just think crisp mornings, very slight breeze, small amounts of turbulence in the lowest layers of the atmosphere, temperature rise causing lifting and mixing of any dew and moisture into the atmosphere producing low cloud mist or fog, a temperature inversion follows and generally speaking your visual, as opposed to instrumental, flying visibility suffers a marked reduction.
As is typical of most aviation incidents, no one particular event ever becomes the sole cause of a tragedy and it is usually a combination of several factors. In this instance, the above weather feature was just one of many.
Earlier that morning two students presented themselves at the flying club with the intention of undertaking their solo cross-country navigational flying tests. One was scheduled to leave about mid morning and the other about mid-day. Both of these student pilots had become good friends whilst going through their training and had decided to plan their routes together at the same time and, in doing so, they could check each others calculations before having a final check carried out by the chief flying instructor (CFI).
At about 10.00 am both students approached the chief flying instructor for final sign off to carry out their solo cross-countries. Track, heading, and groundspeeds were all accurate as was times on route, fuel burn, and weather suitability at all destinations and alternates. In a nutshell the sorties were on and each students aircraft were carefully checked and fuelled for the trips.
Pilot ‘A’, we shall call him, departed the circuit of the airfield at approximately 10.30 and set heading for his selected first arrival point which was an ex-RAF aerodrome, but still in use commercially, somewhere in the midlands. About forty-five minutes later Pilot ‘B’ began his preparations and became airborne some sixty minutes later than pilot ‘A’. In this instance though he was flying the reciprocal route to pilot ‘A’ and in fact was making his way towards a much smaller airfield near to the coast of East Yorkshire.
You may, quite rightly, assume that both pilots had radio communication at their disposal and you would be correct in assuming this but, it must be appreciated, that because each one was flying a route which was a reciprocal of the others then they would select completely different VHF frequencies and report their progress to completely different flight information service providers and this was indeed the case. In effect both students were oblivious to each others progress.
Pilot ‘A’, after about sixty minutes flying time, reported to his destination aerodrome that he was experiencing difficulties in both maintaining visual flying conditions and also actually managing to locate the airfield and he felt that, time wise at least, he had overshot its location.
Pilot ‘B’ was unaware of this event.
More by a stroke of luck and fortune than management the destination airfield of pilot ‘A’ had at its disposal a ground based system of navigation called RDF (radio direction finding) and, coupled with a similar system installed at a near by active RAF station, both ground installations were able to triangulate his position and, in doing so, they were able to guide him to within a couple of miles of the destination aerodrome a which point the pilot became visual with the runways etc and was able to land.
We now have to go back to the typical autumnal weather conditions, which we discussed sometime earlier. What had actually happened is, despite the atmosphere being rather stable at pilot ‘A’s departure point and similar conditions both actual and forecast at his destination point that, after slight warming of the lower atmosphere by insolation at the destination, a small amount of instability had occurred and this had manifested itself by the production of low cloud / mist and it is this which affected and degraded the visibility of pilot ‘A’.
After signing in and after numerous nervous cups of coffee pilot ‘A’ had to formally announce his arrival by telephoning his home airfield and this he did but, he added a comment to the effect that he was very reluctant, to say the least, to continue with his sortie due to the now adverse weather conditions.
This next part is the true turning point in all of this. Pilot ‘A’ had an evening engagement and, in order not to miss this, he cleared it with his CFI to arrange for his partner to collect him from the destination aerodrome and take him home instead of being flown back. Remember that piece of information, as it is crucial to the outcome of this sad story.
This situation placed the entire club in a predicament. How do you get a stranded aircraft back to base? Well, the only way is to transport a suitably qualified pilot to the location and bring both the aircraft and any crew member/s back home and this is what happened except, without the no longer stranded pilot who, if you remember, was now being collected by his partner.
The CFI, along with the only other instructor at base, departed to the midlands aerodrome in another two seat aircraft. Before departure the CFI left instruction with the ground staff to clear all remaining aircraft away into the hangars for the day and to close the airfield. This they did.
By the time all aircrew were flying back in separate aircraft towards base the daylight had began to fade and, because there was no approach or runway lighting at the base aerodrome, a diversion had to be made to a local commercial airport and this diversion was reported to base. Safe landings were made by all and, with both aircraft parked for the night, taxis were ordered and all personnel went home. Remember, there were just these two, pilot ‘A’ was not present and therefore no discussion about pilot ‘B’ took place and further, both the CFI and his other instructor were preoccupied with the retrieval of the stranded aircraft.
Typically, whenever aircraft are removed from their hangars at the beginning of the day at a flying club each one has an inspection, of sorts. They are fuelled if not already fuelled; windows cleaned, oil checked, tyres inspected. All very minor stuff as in fact the actual pilot who flies them is the one who maintains ultimate responsibility for the aircrafts’ fitness to fly. Another check, quite a simple one really, is to make sure that your fleet does in fact contain a full compliment of all the aircraft, which you are supposed to own.
There was a slow dawning realisation on this particular morning that instead of ten aircraft, as there should have been, there was only nine. I have not mentioned pilot ‘B’ for some time and it was in fact the aircraft signed out to pilot ‘B’ which was not in the hangar.
After several phone calls there was acceptance that the worse possible thing that could happen to a flying club had in fact happened. An aircraft had gone missing, along with its pilot, and no one knew about it. Clearly there was an enquiry as there often is and, after examining all the available information, the conclusion was that the reason for the incident was inconclusive!
It appears that pilot ‘B’ only made one frequency change to that of the local flight information centre, established who he was and, after giving his intentions nothing more was heard from him. At the time there was no formal obligation for this flight information centre to track or monitor his progress nor did they have any navigational or legal duty towards him either as he was flying in completely uncontrolled airspace. The assumption, based on weather etc, is that he became disorientated in cloud, as did his friend, but continued on hoping to establish visual contact with the ground, which he obviously did not and instead he missed his destination. It is assumed that he made attempts to back track, became further disorientated, and ran out of fuel.
All of the above is very sad but also very true. As they say, just the names and places have been left out or changed in order to protect the living, so to speak. If I post any more they will be on a more cheerful note.
Portzy.
Many years ago the captain of a North Sea trawler had a very unusual surprise during the examination his nets following a period of drift fishing. In amongst all the freshly caught cod and haddock etc he came across the detached remains of a four cylinder Lycoming aero engine showing early signs of corrosion.
After emptying his nets of fish he made contact with HM Coastguard to report his find and they commenced an investigation of their records to ascertain if any aircrew had recently been reported missing. In the meanwhile, both he and the rest of the crew took the engine to one side of the vessel and began to clear away all the silt and various other marine growths from its data plate with the help of a hose pipe and nylon brush and, before long, the serial numbers and other unique identifiers of the engine became clear.
This information was relayed back to HM Coastguard and, within minutes, it was sadly confirmed that some twelve months previous a single engined Cessna 150 light training aircraft, based at a northern flying club had, in fact, been reported missing along with its crew of one and that the serial numbers of the retrieved engine matched those of the missing aircraft.
We now have to move back in time some twelve months or so. It was a typical late autumn day with an associated late autumn anti-cyclonic high-pressure system centred and steady over the North of England. To those who understand weather you will know the type of climatic conditions that this will bring but to those who don’t just think crisp mornings, very slight breeze, small amounts of turbulence in the lowest layers of the atmosphere, temperature rise causing lifting and mixing of any dew and moisture into the atmosphere producing low cloud mist or fog, a temperature inversion follows and generally speaking your visual, as opposed to instrumental, flying visibility suffers a marked reduction.
As is typical of most aviation incidents, no one particular event ever becomes the sole cause of a tragedy and it is usually a combination of several factors. In this instance, the above weather feature was just one of many.
Earlier that morning two students presented themselves at the flying club with the intention of undertaking their solo cross-country navigational flying tests. One was scheduled to leave about mid morning and the other about mid-day. Both of these student pilots had become good friends whilst going through their training and had decided to plan their routes together at the same time and, in doing so, they could check each others calculations before having a final check carried out by the chief flying instructor (CFI).
At about 10.00 am both students approached the chief flying instructor for final sign off to carry out their solo cross-countries. Track, heading, and groundspeeds were all accurate as was times on route, fuel burn, and weather suitability at all destinations and alternates. In a nutshell the sorties were on and each students aircraft were carefully checked and fuelled for the trips.
Pilot ‘A’, we shall call him, departed the circuit of the airfield at approximately 10.30 and set heading for his selected first arrival point which was an ex-RAF aerodrome, but still in use commercially, somewhere in the midlands. About forty-five minutes later Pilot ‘B’ began his preparations and became airborne some sixty minutes later than pilot ‘A’. In this instance though he was flying the reciprocal route to pilot ‘A’ and in fact was making his way towards a much smaller airfield near to the coast of East Yorkshire.
You may, quite rightly, assume that both pilots had radio communication at their disposal and you would be correct in assuming this but, it must be appreciated, that because each one was flying a route which was a reciprocal of the others then they would select completely different VHF frequencies and report their progress to completely different flight information service providers and this was indeed the case. In effect both students were oblivious to each others progress.
Pilot ‘A’, after about sixty minutes flying time, reported to his destination aerodrome that he was experiencing difficulties in both maintaining visual flying conditions and also actually managing to locate the airfield and he felt that, time wise at least, he had overshot its location.
Pilot ‘B’ was unaware of this event.
More by a stroke of luck and fortune than management the destination airfield of pilot ‘A’ had at its disposal a ground based system of navigation called RDF (radio direction finding) and, coupled with a similar system installed at a near by active RAF station, both ground installations were able to triangulate his position and, in doing so, they were able to guide him to within a couple of miles of the destination aerodrome a which point the pilot became visual with the runways etc and was able to land.
We now have to go back to the typical autumnal weather conditions, which we discussed sometime earlier. What had actually happened is, despite the atmosphere being rather stable at pilot ‘A’s departure point and similar conditions both actual and forecast at his destination point that, after slight warming of the lower atmosphere by insolation at the destination, a small amount of instability had occurred and this had manifested itself by the production of low cloud / mist and it is this which affected and degraded the visibility of pilot ‘A’.
After signing in and after numerous nervous cups of coffee pilot ‘A’ had to formally announce his arrival by telephoning his home airfield and this he did but, he added a comment to the effect that he was very reluctant, to say the least, to continue with his sortie due to the now adverse weather conditions.
This next part is the true turning point in all of this. Pilot ‘A’ had an evening engagement and, in order not to miss this, he cleared it with his CFI to arrange for his partner to collect him from the destination aerodrome and take him home instead of being flown back. Remember that piece of information, as it is crucial to the outcome of this sad story.
This situation placed the entire club in a predicament. How do you get a stranded aircraft back to base? Well, the only way is to transport a suitably qualified pilot to the location and bring both the aircraft and any crew member/s back home and this is what happened except, without the no longer stranded pilot who, if you remember, was now being collected by his partner.
The CFI, along with the only other instructor at base, departed to the midlands aerodrome in another two seat aircraft. Before departure the CFI left instruction with the ground staff to clear all remaining aircraft away into the hangars for the day and to close the airfield. This they did.
By the time all aircrew were flying back in separate aircraft towards base the daylight had began to fade and, because there was no approach or runway lighting at the base aerodrome, a diversion had to be made to a local commercial airport and this diversion was reported to base. Safe landings were made by all and, with both aircraft parked for the night, taxis were ordered and all personnel went home. Remember, there were just these two, pilot ‘A’ was not present and therefore no discussion about pilot ‘B’ took place and further, both the CFI and his other instructor were preoccupied with the retrieval of the stranded aircraft.
Typically, whenever aircraft are removed from their hangars at the beginning of the day at a flying club each one has an inspection, of sorts. They are fuelled if not already fuelled; windows cleaned, oil checked, tyres inspected. All very minor stuff as in fact the actual pilot who flies them is the one who maintains ultimate responsibility for the aircrafts’ fitness to fly. Another check, quite a simple one really, is to make sure that your fleet does in fact contain a full compliment of all the aircraft, which you are supposed to own.
There was a slow dawning realisation on this particular morning that instead of ten aircraft, as there should have been, there was only nine. I have not mentioned pilot ‘B’ for some time and it was in fact the aircraft signed out to pilot ‘B’ which was not in the hangar.
After several phone calls there was acceptance that the worse possible thing that could happen to a flying club had in fact happened. An aircraft had gone missing, along with its pilot, and no one knew about it. Clearly there was an enquiry as there often is and, after examining all the available information, the conclusion was that the reason for the incident was inconclusive!
It appears that pilot ‘B’ only made one frequency change to that of the local flight information centre, established who he was and, after giving his intentions nothing more was heard from him. At the time there was no formal obligation for this flight information centre to track or monitor his progress nor did they have any navigational or legal duty towards him either as he was flying in completely uncontrolled airspace. The assumption, based on weather etc, is that he became disorientated in cloud, as did his friend, but continued on hoping to establish visual contact with the ground, which he obviously did not and instead he missed his destination. It is assumed that he made attempts to back track, became further disorientated, and ran out of fuel.
All of the above is very sad but also very true. As they say, just the names and places have been left out or changed in order to protect the living, so to speak. If I post any more they will be on a more cheerful note.
Portzy.
( he used to fly the Pit Special 
.
