This accident happened right in front of me. I happened to be pulling out from my hangar just as he rotated. The runway runs just about perpendicular to the hangar alleys, so the aircraft passed about 100 yards or so in front of me, about 15-20 feet off the ground. It was clearly stalled, and was wallowing at a high angle of attack, eventually rolling about 90 degrees to its left, dug the left wing into the ground and cartwheeled down the runway, breaking up in the process. I can’t speak to what happened on his initial roll, because it was hidden from view behind the ILS and glideslope equipment on the field. I can tell you that it was snowing pretty good, and the snow was accumulating fast. By the time emergency vehicles got to the plane, there was about 1-2 inches of heavy wet snow on the aprons. The plows were working the taxiways at the time and were the first vehicles on the scene. What struck me as odd in the moment was how early he was in the air. The airplane rotated, flew for a few seconds, and crashed-all in about 1500 feet of runway. If what you mentioned about the pilot trying to fly his way out of a loss of directional control on the ground is true, it would make sense as to how and why he became airborne so early. It was a very surreal experience, and one that I just can’t unsee.
Wow. I'm sorry you had to witness that. I live just a little north of the airport and frequently fly out of Woods Cross. This accident was pretty shocking. Many of my friends knew the pilot and word spread very fast before the official announcement of who was involved got made. I've been eagerly waiting to hear why this plane seemingly STALLED given the power of the engines and proficiency required to have a type rating. Nothing has added up until Juan explained the issue of directional control. This should have been a RTO... not a "push through" response. Get-there-itus kills more pilots than almost anything.
Phenom does not have auto throttle. 99% of my takeoffs are rolling takeoffs. So much more comfortable for the passengers as well as the airplane stock stays in place. A rolling takeoff should have nothing to do with the accident. If it did, it was poor pilot technic. Flew a Phenom for 2 1/2 years. Decent airplane that climbs very good. Don’t want to be judgmental but sounds like poor pilot skills to me.
Does anyone know what's going on with the flap actuator linkages on the Husky? All four (left and and right) have a white cover with what looks like orange Velcro straps or tape wrapped around it.
FADEC runs the engines on the Phenom 300, but no auto-throttle system. I have seen directional control become an issue if pilots are using excessive differential thrust to make the hard turn onto the runway. It’s not as much poor technique as it is the handling characteristics of the airplane during taxi operations. Very narrow wheel stance, so lots of differential braking and thrust to make the tighter turns. It would be interesting to see if ATR was activated during the takeoff as that would indicate a greater than 20% split in thrust when the engines were spooling up for takeoff power. For the record, I have been flying the Phenom 300 for nearly 8 years and 2500 hours. Thank you Juan for your content.
Very interesting comment re: the ATR. Looked it up and found it stands for Automatic Thrust Reserve. My experience is on the Citation Mustang and the CJ3+. Neither have ATR. Downloaded the Phenom 300 Pilot Guide. The inclusion of ATR opens up a series of questions. First was it enabled or disabled by the PIC for this take-off roll? Did the accident aircraft have asymetric thrust on this takeoff? As you wondered, did ATR activate? Did it need to do so? Was it even a factor in the crash? Need to do more research.
Phenom 300 and Phenom 100 pilot here. Both acft are extremely docile and have very benign flight characteristics, imo. So much so, that both aircraft can be easily hand-flown with the yaw damper off. Stick pusher is momentarily disabled on the very early stages of takeoff, so you can theoretically stall them at the time of liftoff. But honestly, you would have to be trying very hard. Especially on the Phenom 300, which has an abundance of excess thrust available and generous wing area. No autothrottle on the Phenom, but there is FADEC. Best regards from Brasilia, Brazil.
Although Embraer doesn't offer autothrottles on the 300, after-market company, Innovative Solutions & Support, began offering autothrottles in late 2022 for the Phenom 100/300 family. (Which is good because Embraer will most likely offer it soon.)
The pusher is disabled on ground so your only stall protection comes from Vr being above Vsr, Vmu and Vmc. But the in-air stall characteristics are defined by the pusher. Only the test pilots who did the development and certification of the aircraft know what the pusher-off natural stall characteristics are. In this case, based on the outcome and eye witness accounts, in ground effect it would appear that the stall characteristics anything but docile. In fairness the wing might have been contaminated which doesn’t help. This is common for many swept wing business jets which is why they have stick pushers to begin with. This is nothing against the Phenom, there are many swept wing aircraft with aft mounted engines that depend on stick pushers to meet the part 25 requirements for stall characteristics and/or deep stall protection. During takeoff if you don’t respect Vr you are NOT protected. Vr is your only protection. Go yanking it into the air, probably at a higher pitch rate than recommended on top of everything else, and you become an untrained inexperienced test pilot.
@@sblack48 Yep. Minor correction though: the Phenom 300 is certified under part 23, not part 25. Other than that, I cannot fault your arguments there. Obviously, the stall characteristics are at least somewhat not straightforward, thus the presence of the stick pusher. However, pretty much any airplane, even a j3 cub, will spin if provoked hard enough. In the case of the Phenom 300, we are talking about a very high-performance twin jet, capable of departing at max gross and quickly climbing to FL450 at that weight with no step climbing required. When I consider the airplane's level of performance versus how docile and easy it is to fly, I cannot help but be amazed.
@@sganzerlag Ah ok I didn’t know it was part 23. I’m not experienced with that. But the ability to climb well has nothing to do with handling characteristics. That is purely (T-D)/W. You are saying that in the operational environment it is easy and docile to fly and I get that, no trouble believing that at all. These days they should all be docile. But when you go off the reservation all those things that kept you safe are gone and lots of airplanes will reveal a very ugly side. Getting a swept high performance wing to stall well either involves slats (GX, Dassault, citation X) or droops and fences and stall strips (Lear, Gulfstream) or a stick pusher. If you see a swept wing airplane on a ramp with no slats or fancy doodads on the LE then it is almost certain that it has a pusher or is fbw. Or it doesn’t have much sweep. If you have a pusher but you effectively defeat it then all previously held notions of docility don’t apply. Btw are you sure it is easy to hand fly YD off in all configs? Are there no envelope restrictions with YD off? Can you dispatch with it inop? The airplanes I worked on had parts of the envelope that were fine and a couple of corners where it was ugly. Guess which ones the marketing guys demonstrate to customers. In fact they might not even know where the corners are - marketing and trainjng people had no connection to engineering (kinda like Boeing). Then again it might well be absolutely fine everywhere. I just ended up being a sceptic. Got burned too many times.
Yup, after a couple of rolling takeoff issues like that in turbo-charged twins, it hit home what a handful (or two handful and feet-fulls) it can become. What's worse is having one engine bog on a go-around on short final. I watched from the ground my dad almost kill himself and 4 people in an old fixed-waste gate Cessna 320 when he did an emergency go-around, applied power too fast, and one engine bogged and flooded, while the other had a turbo surge.
If the accident was caused by doing a rolling take off on a slippery runway, I wonder how much time it would have cost to stop and spool up the engines first. 10 seconds? Now I'm only a flight simmer. That said, in my opinion if a take off having a 10 to 15 second delay could cause enough accumulation on the wing to endanger the flight, the flight should probably be put off till a better day.
We’ve all heard about ‘get homeitis.’ The pilot owner of the aircraft was flying his wife (in the back seat) and friends down to SoCal for the Rose Bowl game that afternoon where Utah was playing Penn State. If I recall correctly, the game was mid to late afternoon, so he was probably feeling some personal pressure to ‘get there’ before the Provo weather got any worse. Nothing good ever happens in aviation when personal pressure to get somewhere overrides better judgment.
hold over time in this mode is short....btw nobody is going to like what comes out of the JFK event nobody this is a complete breakdown of cockpit managment
The Blancolirio Paradox: You don’t want to see him because there has been an aircraft accident, but you want to see him because there has been an aircraft accident.
I'd feel comfortable having Juan investigate aviation crashes. His knowledge of the science of flight and how various planes act/react is impressive. He would be a valuable asset to the NTSB after the commercial pilot days are complete
Agreed. He should have rejected the takeoff immediately... not floor it and hope you can get airborne without stalling. Poor decision on the pilots part.
I've never flown an aft-fuselage-engine aircraft, but one would think that asymmetrical thrust during the takeoff roll would be less of an issue than on e.g. any wing-mounted-engine twin. It will be interesting to see what the investigation turns up as the cause of the loss of directional control. The attempt to lift off below V1 after departing the runway instead of aborting is another, well, food for thought.
I fly aft mounted engine airplanes for a living and I can attest that asymmetrical thrust is still a big deal. When one spools up faster than the other it is still very very noticeable.
@@rynetreatch9558, in that case I stand corrected. The engine offset from the aircraft center-line SEEMS much less on tail-mounted engines, but is probably at least half the wing-mounted offset, probably more.
Looks nice like summer... Shorts and t-shirt. I'm buried in 3 feet if fresh snow. Been digging out for days. Dunno how the folks in Buffalo/lake effect country deal with 7 feet at a time 😳
Oroville water lake level 795 ft, could break 800 ft by Monday. Top level last year was 777 ft. Will the new spillway, at 900 ft, earn it's keep this year?
It is strange that unlike so many other aeroplanes, the Trent powered Airbus 330 has had MEASTO installed from the get go - it prevents asymmetric power application and prevents stall surge. It holds the first engine to reach a set thrust until the other matches, then advances them through a fan blade flutter avoid zone and onto the selected thrust. Makes takeoff a breeze - just advance the thrust levers to either FLX/MCT or TOGA. Shame other engine/aeroplane manufacturers haven't adopted a similar system.
I love Juan how you do not jump to conclusions and make judgements. Your evaluations are always extremely professional and you lay out the things that will enter into the investigation. Well done, unlike some of the others in this arena that are quick to come to conclusions and make snap judgements. Keep it up. You do a great service to the GA community.
Sorry to hear of this. Maybe the pilot miscalculated that he'd be better off in the air. Sometimes it really is best to ere on the side of caution. I'm sorry about the folks who had to bear witness here. That would not have been easy. I've been on the scene of 1 or 2 bad accidents so I have some sense of what they went through. The only thing you can do sometimes is pick up the pieces, set the ones you can to peace, and move on. Condolences to all family and friends. RIP. Hope for good healing. Support. Thank you for sharing.
@@sledawgpilot Recently saw on some aviation channel about Save the plane syndrome? (or something to that effect) The commentator alluding to, it being better to run off a runway, (that's what insurance is for) than uncontrolled flight, back into a runway....
Did a rolling Mito TO 3 ship KC-135E's and number 4 was really lagging behind 1 2 and 3 almost turned in to a cross country as we spun towards the woods. Quick abort aloud us to take all three back around for static TO
I have heard of people accidentally trying to takeoff with only one engine operating in these airplanes. Apparently if you start both, and then for some reason shut one down (I.e. late passenger addition, someone needs to run grab something, use the bathroom etc.) you still get a Takeoff config ok. Since it is FADEC the thrust lever moves no problem. Busy pilots on tight time lines and before you know it, can’t maintain directional control and abort. As silly as it sounds it does happen.
Very good of you to take your time to share with us what you know of those incidents and accidents. Thank you also for helping us stay relevant on cases like those.
Thanks for the quick update, seems a true pilot blunder of trying to get the airplane off to quickly... Sad results for the pilot passengers and the wonderful Phenom 300 airplane
Makes sense! $AUS 150,000 to sit in the right seat. Ryanair will be kicking themselves. Expect to see a lot of low hours pilot redundancies with that company.🙃
Juan I'm hoping you will look over the incident with a Qantas 737 QF144 that issued a mayday as it was flying over the Tasman Sea between NZ & AU. The left engine failed mid flight, forcing pilots to land the Boeing 737 with just one engine. Initial reports was a compressor failure BUT what was very interesting about this mayday was the passengers were not informed the aircraft had lost an engine. Some passengers did hear a bang and noticed a change while many didn't notice anything. An argument point related to telling passengers there's a major problem will cause panic in the cabin, so tell them nothing was the call on this flight. The whole incident was smoothed over but said to be 'uncommon yet very serious'. This incident gets back to the whole idea of twin jet aircraft flying over water and what happens if you lose an engine 2 hours into a 4 hour flight.
United flew a B777 for over 5 hours on one engine several years back. As I recall it was SYD-LAX and had to do a precautionary shutdown at some point. 5+ hours to HI. Pucker-pucker. After the landing, the crew was taken to a medical facility to have their sphincters checked for distortion and spasms due to the stress of them producing enough suction to keep the plane in the air for that long. They were issued a new class of medical, Class 1+++
My experience as cabin crew is the best captains just tell it as it is, without embellishment. Be up front with pax and don’t muck around. I cringe when I know a serious system issue or mechanical breakdown has occurred and the captain (or flying pilot) makes a silly PA about minor problems or defects and doesn’t specify what it is. Most pax (apart from the scared flyers who are scared no matter what) find it really interesting and informative if they know the details.
It will be interesting to learn the survivors accounts. I presume then the second pilot was just a passenger in the front seat. I hope he/she survived, albeit with apparently heavy injuries. No disrespect to the PIC. There could be multiple causes. Standing back from this one, I would always have a little concern in general about any distracting interactions with passengers on a small high powered craft. Pressures from celebrity clients, real or imagined, by the pilot would make it worse. Again referring to other well known though often unproven incidents. We don't know the people here. Left wing down and cartwheeled according to a witness here. Horrible.
This such a common mistake, to try differential power to lineup then pressing to auto throttle switch and get one engine with higher power than the other. Specially in an contaminated runway will lead to loss of control or over control. There is very little need for power differential unless it’s a very tight turn, in very close quarters at very slow speed. If you have engines close to the fuselage, then it’s even more futile. Bad habit. RIP for the pilot that died.
Arnt all of the Phenom series basically Centerline thrust with the closely mounted tail engines? Never flown one but I wouldn't think adverse yaw would be as much of an issue?
The fadec from idle will spool up both engines simultaneously to takeoff power. The phenom does not turn on the ground well requiring a large turning radius. If you use differential breaking an asymmetrical thrust to line up on the runway, you’re going to have a problem with fadec. You have to give the engines computers time to re-sync at idle.
FAA and contractors must never have heard of Change Control. Apparently the FAA IT doesn’t know how to manage a mission critical system. Contractor or not, someone in FAA is the application owner.
One would expect the FAA to have a Change Control management system in place, and the contractor would be expected to follow it - this *should* be written in the contract.
I think the Phenom 300 only has CSC which can only vary thrust a small amount, I don't know how much. Not enough to go from idle to takeoff power though. Maybe there's been an upgrade?
eh, imo the only rookie mistakes in avieation accidents is jumping to conclusions instead of doing root cause analysis. my opnion from the heatlhcare side of things
Great explanation. I fly an Ultra. 90% of the time I do a static run up, usually to about 70-80% N1 then release the brakes. On long runways, usually a class B airport where they need a quick departure I will do a rolling take off but I still get the power even because I have so much runway. Hurrying up the process usually ends bad. Thank you for the analysis.
New 2 your channel & your H2O updates for Cali are super! ? 4 you.. What is your thoughts on MH370? Will it ever be found? To me the pilot or co-pilot had 2 have done for ?
Nice review. RIP. The other Phenom accident in LA/Hawthorne is also interesting, t hough thankfully no one seriously hurt, but to have 7 pax on board and nearly run the airplane through the end of the back fencing is incredibly strange. Not sure but it looked like the pilot landed almost half way down the runway...would be interesting to hear your thoughts as the accident has teachable moments, it would seem.
Thanks for the update, Juan! Even on our da42s in which I am doing my MEP rating we only perform static takeoffs. And now I know for what reason... I guess with jets, where spool-up times take considerably longer than on your piston engine, you really have to pay attention to your engine indications to be stabilized before applying full power and releasing the brakes....
Hi Juan, When you said rolling takeoff I immediately re-played in my mind, as a passenger on big jet in mid 60's. He made the turn, and with NO hesitation gave it takeoff power. I thought we're dead!! Thanks Juan, great video
@@TonyRule When was the last time you were at a major airport? What's unsafe if the runway is clear and dry? If you are holding short and tower clears you for takeoff, as you are aligning with the runway slowly add power and when the engines are spooled up, advance the power smartly.
Juan I like you when talking off in the King Air or the 310 I fly for fun like that do the static takeoff. In the 310 I bring the power up to 20 inches with everything stable power up brake release and go. King Air brakes on and power to where auto feather is armed and props on the governors. In the CRJ we more often than not we all did standing takeoffs.
These rear engine jets have a sort of ground loop moment, like a taildragger in reverse, and little asymmetry is needed to produce a yaw moment. At near zero ground speed, all that thrust pushing a mass far in front of it, and no aerodynamic controls to counter the yawing forces, veers off the runway, and the pilot, who should abort, plays the last card he has, and pulls back on the stick............
I very much appreciate all the work you put in on these reports. Any loss of life diminishes us all. It may be cliché, but is very true. In a way, I'm sorry to see you enjoying such great weather. CA still needs a lot more snow in the high country. Latest reports I've seen on the reservoirs is promising. Oroville was up over 116'.
Just had a dream we were on a flight over the Pacific sitting front of economy. You come walking back saying all the instruments were out and you were going to the back to get a position star check. The plane started a steep dive and then we landed in Australia. Then the dream entered the twilight zone. One hour later here you are.
i couldnt help but look at the Husky tyres. how many miles will those do? i know they are bush man floaters, but wouldn't a decent tread pattern be useful on them for wet tarmac/ ashphalt?? just asking.
