a crash video worth watching

[OVEREASYGUY]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5JsSbGdIDzE

I wanted to post this in a new thread so everyone would see it. All the way down this guy is on the edge of a stall. He's too preoccupied with fixing the problem and not paying attention to flying the airplane - in my opinion anyway. About the time the camera comes into focus on him (or at 30 seconds into this video clip) -that's about the time he should have chopped the power and committed to landing. He had a nice lake to land on.

Here's a topic for debate - I think chopping the power and committing to landing would have been a good move. Suppose he didn't chop the power and as he got right down on the lake power came back in -now he starts to hope it will fix itself - suppose he burns up a nice lake he could have landed on and as he approaches the trees - things don't work out and the engine sputters again now he's perhaps passed up his chance to walk away.

There is a right time to make a decision to go down and do it gracefully.

well that's my thought for the day.

cliff in Maine

[12 Geezer]

I can't help but wonder if this is a computer-synthesized event??

[HydroCub]

Despite not keeping the "maintain thy airspeed" rule... looks like his rudder skills let him control a stall to a flat impact which probably saved their lives.

Why are power pilots so reluctant to point the nose down when power isn't available..? Is it the lack of training in power off landings that the FAA has minimized since the 60s..?

.

[OVEREASYGUY]

I think the only think which "saved their lives" was sheer luck.

if he kept his speed up he could have flared out and landed nicely on the water and probably not ended up with back problems!

he probably did pull back on the stick as he approached the water , however with speed just a hair above stall speed it wouldn't flare -hence the Plop into the water.

There sure are some interesting videos on youtube.

cliff in Maine

[Cubdude]

When I ditched, I had to push the stick almost all the way forward to maintain 60 mph. (felt like I was going down at least 45 deg) At about 100ft I pulled full flaps and flared hard just above the surface. It stalled tail low at about 6 ft and then nosed over on the 26" goodyears. Got a huge rush of water to the face but very little damage to the plane or me.

[skunkertx]

Man there are some crazy people posting comments on Youtube these days.

[eslboat]

I used to live right by this lake and have flown in there many times. It is about half mile from Pontiac airport at the departure end of the main runway .Runway many trees then lake. It looks to me he was trying to get over the trees which he just did and then went in. Anything sooner and it would have been a lot worse . At least he flew it straight and didn't try a 180 back to the runway. Just my 2 cents.