http://www.komonews.com/news/local/111708924.html Obviously, it didn't end well for them, but I would have expected the maneuvers to be a bit more extreme. I guess the thing was just way too slow. Very sad.
wow. And to think, had he just leveled it off without any aileron, it just would have been routine, but no, had to bank it around after takeoff like it was a fighter. Needless loss.
The C-17 demo team at March ARB does the same routine in there flight display. It is a sight to see them whip around the Globemaster III like that. IIRC they are the only C-17 flight demo team out there, why they did not fly this demo routine has not been addressed.
Steep climb out=loss of energy, hard left bank after steep climb out= greater loss of energy, hard right bank after hard left bank after steep climb out= total loss of energy=stall with the up-side wing at a high angle of attack and no lift. Shades of the B-52 incident at Fairchild. Hot dogging a big sky-truck at low speed and low altitude always ends up the same way.
Eww, yeah...that was horrific as well. I wonder if the accident pilot in this case had a similar record. I doubt it, but the crew obviously wasn't paying enough attention.
That's weird. Always hard to tell by video. Looks like he did level out but he kept his flaps out. Looks like in that right turn he just tried to make it too tight and slowed down too much. Dumb mistake but he's not the first to do it and probably wont be the last. Outside of weather, it's probably the most common cause of aviation accidents.
Precisely STUPID. SAD. CRAZY. I see C-17's fly over my house all the time - just saw one this afternoon, with this story in mind... as I was pulling in to the driveway. Just watched it cruise by in dignity and control... and thought of this ******* cowboy who ended his life and 3 others for NO GOOD REASON. Just makes me mad. I live very close to McChord AFB in Tacoma and one of my neighbors in the Cul de Sac is a C-17 pilot. Great guy. This story just makes me really sad. Jedi
I believe they were practicing for an air-show demonstration..it's not like this guy was flying around all willynilly just for the heck of it.
Once you're checked out in an airplane be it civilian or military you are expected to operate it within the design envelope for that aircraft. A little thing called discipline. This tragic class A is what happens when a person puts that discipline aside and in this case didn't get away with it. The concepts and physical laws that allow planes to fly are terribly unforgiving.
More interesting facts in this report. http://www.flightglobal.com/articles/2010/12/17/351032/c-17-crash-report-exposes-cracks-in-usaf-safety-culture.html
The problem with hot dogging large aircraft is that there are always others with you that have to live with your mistakes. At least when a pilot lawn darts an F-16 he is only hurting himself (usually). GT
Well, with all due respect, he SHOULDN'T have been. He obviously (to me) lacked a major component in self-control and judgement. Wrong guy, wrong circumstances. Just sayin'. Hard to have respect here for his "skills" otherwise. Jedi
More than interesting....That clears a lot up. I wondered why I didn't see them try to level the aircraft. Apparently they were not even close to completing the turn. I think he would have needed an additional 3k-4k feet agl to do what he wanted. There is also mention of the flaps being retracted. If the pilot flies this profile routinely and didn't know the flaps were retracted, well, that's that... Sad - Though it does seem like the straight and level flight after the 80 degree left turn was intended to build up airspeed. He might have been waiting for an IAS thinking the flaps were in position. Then the plane not responding appropriately might confuse you... with no time to understand what happened and correct. Esp. for a guy who ignores stall warnings. edit: I also want to mention something else. There were probably many factors that contributed to this crash. As pilot in command, the pilot is ultimately responsible and if you're pissed, mad, whatever, then so be it, but consider these shows are intended to get support for military funding and new recruits. I'm sure this pilot had a lot of leeway creating a show that was impressive. Then when the **** hits the fan they want to distance themselves from it. I fault the brass for not reigning in this pilot. His name is Maj Michael Freyholtz, by the way..... Sad all around.
Guys-this was a classic example of ignoring established procedures, lack of CRM (crew resource management), overconfidence, and flying the airplane beyond its limits. This guy had a history of doing this, which is the worst part. As Bob stated, it was a culmination of errors, starting with the max performance climb out at 40 degrees nose pitch angle. The target Vmco (minimum climb out speed was 133kts) but he only reached 107kts during climb-out. The routine called for a climbout to 1500 ft AGL, but he only reached 850ft before leveling off and executing the left turn since he was slow. After he executed his 80 degree left turn he sped up, brought the flaps in, and banked right for his 260 degree reverse turn, where he brought the slats in too early. When he banked right, the combination of full right rudder, control stick aft, and slats retracting, got him about 6 kts below stall speed. He continued the turn, and at one point was at 82 degrees of bank.......he would have needed THOUSANDS of feet to be able to recover. Sad, sad situation.
Thanks. The article said it wouldn't be released. Then I saw the name in your post and thought you may have been referring to the officer in charge of the airshow.
The Air Force released the names of the crew but they did not release who was flying in which seat. The C-17 community up there is pretty small and with the results of the investigation, I think it was proper not to release that info. This guy left behind a wife and kids, and they don't need to bear any consequences to his actions.
http://www.flightglobal.com/articles/2010/12/17/351032/c-17-crash-report-exposes-cracks-in-usaf-safety-culture.html Is where I got my information. I'm not sure why you think the info should be withheld. NTSB reports don't filter PIC information. It just seems like the military was allowed to put this on a "need to know" basis.... and that's just like the military. If you feel that it's a disservice to the surviving family of the PIC to disclose, do you think it's a an honorable service to the surviving family members of the crew that was not in command? I think the ambiguity leave a mark on everyone and, in this case, also the military for secrecy.
Don't get me wrong, I'm sure the AF let the family members of the crew know who was flying, but beyond investigation purposes, why do they need to release who was at the controls? What good is that going to do?? This was a military flight, that killed military members, on a military airplane, on a military base..........the NTSB has nothing to do with it, so your comment about the NTSB releasing names is invalid. Also, it's not military secrecy, it's protocol.
True. But three innocents were on the plane who's reputation is under a cloud. Release the name of the pilot. Clear the other three.
The C-17 has an angle of attack limiter to prevent the deep stall you can get into in T tail aircraft where the wing can block/disrupt the flow over the horizontal tail so it loses its effectiveness. In that case, it is hard to pitch the nose over to break the stall and you slide down tail first out of the sky. In testing at Edwards developing the angle of attack limiter and stall warning system, we almost lost an aircraft because the test pilots stalled it while fixing a flight control problem and broke the stall by putting slats out but lost 6,000 feet recovering from it. The test aircraft had a spin chute in the back and the crew had parachutes to escape through a tunnel. The high risk testing involved hundreds of flight hours and the spin chute was never used, luckily. In this case, it sounds like the angle attack limiter may not have been in play since it was a condition of overbanking/over G with insufficient airspeed to complete the tight turn and the only way to recover was to reduce bank, increase thrust and trade altitude for airspeed, of which there was not enough altitude to trade. I am sad since we tried to develop systems to prevent this but an overly agressive pilot that exceeds the critical flight envelope limits clearly stated in the flight manual and ignores stall warning horns and stick shackers, then allowes himself to get into a slow condition close to the ground, is difficult to design for. The laws of physics are not forgiving to those people.
