A grass take-off in that heavy six cylinder aircraft with little pavement wheels was always going to be long. Add to that the sprinklers near half way causing ground softness and extra drag. So glad everyone was ok
@@thewhitefalcon8539 true on pavement where drag from the runway is minimal. Not true on grass with small wheels where you want to minimize the weight of the airplane (ie increase lift) as soon as possible on the roll because that full weight on grass is holding you back - big time!
I own a Lance I. This is a Lance II. Soft field, no flaps, T-tail (a very bad design on the Lance II) and a pilot that did not calculate the distance required for take off (having failed to do the first calculation, he would have failed to calculate weight & balance as well). This accident occurred before he even stuck the key in the ignition! I'm glad he was OK.
I have about 3500 hours in Lance's, from bank check days. Both T's and straights. Those T-tails were always a little tricky. I didn't like them near as well as the straights.
I agree. Any pilot with common sense taking off of a runway made of wet grass with a 20-foot obstacle at the end will use flaps set for short field takeoff setting. What is not known if he also employed soft fiend techniques combined with short fiend takeoff.
I saw episodes of air crash and I was amazed at the number of fatal accidents due to pilots forgetting to put the flaps in the take-off position this is the first thing that any pilot must do before any takeoff after start-up flaps flaps flaps
Those pesky elevation changes will jump right out when you least expect them … It’s almost like there should be some directory of airport facilities or something … if only that existed
Turbo P32R. They require a stage of flap for a normal take off. And the T-tail model has less control authority due to being positioned above the slipstream. Unfortunately, sluggish acceleration is sometimes difficult to detect. Pre-takeoff safety brief should cover this. Possibly used to flying off long, paved runways. Short, water logged grass strip had the odds stacked against him. It’s a terrible feeling when you know you’re running out of runway.
@bigteam6919 Sprinklers would have undoubtedly made soft ground..but it looks like there's a couple times when the spray coming up from the tires..pops up...did hitting berms of water..large puddles..arrest speed? Including other factors..
Unfamiliar wet grass runways call for short field takeoffs every time. This plane was in a clean configuration as if it was on pavement. He was not set up for success.
@@kombolashasoft field and short are both 10 degrees of flaps, but soft is yoke back until you see the plane wheelie up, then release a little yoke and as the plane lifts off, push the nose down to gain speed before climbing out above the obstacle. Short field is a normal take-off with flaps, but much more ground roll, which isn't necessary on a wet runway like this. No reason not to do short field.
@@Kassiusday That concept does exist and is called the V1 speed also known as decision speed. It mainly only applies to jets though with multiple engines since in the event of an engine failure, their remaining engine is more then powerful enough to continue the takeoff safely. Smaller aircraft on the other hand tend to not have that luxury so crashing it as "safely" as possible is your best option.
@@steilkurbler4973When getting your ppl you practice soft field takeoffs and landings. You are supposed to deploy flaps and not be in a clean configuration. This pilot is at fault
@@FinnACurran That's right, but the wing generates lift no matter what the ground surface is. Soft fields just have much more drag to overcome to build up airspeed. IIRC the rule of thumb was around 40% than hard surface runways. You can still take off without flaps, it just takes way longer, which is a problem when space is limited.
A few things wrong with this I believe. I haven’t read the AFM for this aircraft but most soft field/short field takeoffs require flaps as well as using as much possible usable runway. Then holding the breaks and using full throttle until manifold pressure and rpm are stabilized at full before starting takeoff. Plus grass adds to your total takeoff distance depending on what it says in the AFM.
@@rtbrtb_dutchy4183 The premise is still sound... rev up, hold spot ... release for max distance. Also FLAPS ! (Engage flaps partway down the runway if you need to get speed early)
Better then him panicking and rotating then still not clearing the trees and stall spinning it into the terrain. So that was the better decision he made.
One hundred percent. A ground base, the board beats taking an emergency into the air below V1 rotation speed. As others have said, there's an error on display here by not having flaps deployed. But the judgment in aborting the take off was smart.
I know that for larger aircraft that gave two or more engines, there is a speed called V1, meaning that you must either have made a “go” decision for the takeoff or already taking action to abort the takeoff. I think it’s different for the small lightweight aircraft that have only one engine. There must be a point to where once you meet certain criteria in terms of speed and distance, you must continue with the takeoff.
That big spray coming up about halfway through the takeoff run is proof that those sprinklers caused a flooded area. That is standing water which increases drag significantly. That could have made all the difference if it was dry.
For all the people saying that flaps wouls have prevented the accident; ..im assuming that what you mean to say is: treat this as a soft-field take off, set your flaps, apply brake, max throttle, release brakes, apply back pressure, get your wheels off the ground asap, fly in ground effect , then upon reaching takeoff speed, pull back and fly Vx
This is wrong, you NEVER apply brakes and stop on a soft field. I hope you’re not just mixing together short field and soft field together. Soft field you constantly roll and never stop so you don’t potentially get stuck in the grass….
Wouldn't you walk the runway first? Like if I'm not sure my car will clear a bump, I go check it out, and thats driving 2 dimensionally - I'd probably be out there with yard stick and surveying tools if I had to lift a plane off a grass strip
The pilot aborted early enough not to lose his life. We're all human. Even experienced 5,000 hour pilots are prone to make major mistakes. The pilot got the most important part right, and that involved deliberately crashing it. There's nothing 'instinctive' here - many pilots have died in similar circumstances, being mentally unprepared to call such a decision.
The pilot was not using the soft field take off procedure, partial flaps and elevator back to get the weight off the nose wheel, that is why he crashed it
Soft field takeoff's usually require the use of flaps plus MINIMAL nose pressure, unless the POH states differently. When doing a soft field takeoff you lift off at rotation speed and hold ground effect until you can build up speed to hold Vy. If its s short soft field you use the Vx climb out speed and hold until clear of obstacle and decrease flaps incrementally holding a positive rate. I did not see any of this from this pilot, also looked like no pre-takeoff briefing, and the pilot should have calculated their takeoff performance prior to the flight.
A lot of unqualified arrogance in this comments section. Unless you know the exact model of aircraft that this is, have read the specific hanbook for it and know the soft field takeoff proceedure, you probably shouldn't be on your high horse about flaps and taking the pilot's licence away and such. Maybe start off by reading the NTSB report or something basic.
Part of flight planning is comprehensively studying the runway chart for elevation changes before takeoff. We've got a 10000 foot runway and it's got a few up and downs along the way. When it's very wet it affects the aircraft's takeoff and landing rollout. Yes, it's grooved, but that doesn't do much when we have relatively high volumes of rain coming down per second. The fastest jets can have the most aggravating time trying to smoothly decelerate.
Appears that he didnt have aft pressure on the elevators during takeoff roll. This takes the weight off the front gear and reduces rolling drag on grass strips....
The runway is a big problem too, alongside the plane’s gear of course. There should be an emergency stop net at the end to avoid this because it could’ve ended badly.
It was 100F with minimal wind on a soft field. And he didn't use flaps. Complacency is a killer. Good news is he was the only one in the plane. No info on whether he had loaded any extra weight into the plane.
this aircraft was on a clean configuration which lead to this . had he been set up with flaps (dirty configuration) for a short/soft field takeoff, the outcome would’ve been a lot better .
See, he wasn't stubborn, nor arrogant, and didn't let his EGO get in the way and lived to see another day. This should be a training video for all future private plane pilots.
The best place to find free airplanes are in the bushes at the end of runways. I've taken home 3 free airplanes already just by scouring the bushes at my local state airports.
Dear hit the breaks ,go 4 full throttle and once engine is full run , realise the break , again abrupt speed and take of consuming short distance.... Good head wind will further shorten take off distance
Idk what the winds were, but the tree line at the side he left from were way shorter lol. Flaps obviously since it's a soft field. Idk what the POH says for his plane though...
The pilot didn't know what he was doing - he didn't know the runway. It doesn't need to be "redesigned". The runway is just fine. There are hundreds of runways in the world that are tricky to fly in and out of.
My old instructor told me a long time ago…. There will come a time as pilot that you’re faced with two choices, a bad one and a real bad one. This is the example of the correct “bad choice”. The “real bad choice” would have been to try and make they ac fly. One was at 50 knots, the other would have at 100knots.
For every flight, pilots are supposed to determine the available and required runway distances for takeoff and landing Some factors that increase the runway distance an airplane requires for takeoff include grass runways that are wet, upward slopes, increased ambient air temperature, and low atmospheric pressure, and, of course, pilot technique, just to name a few Pilots are trained to calculate the required distance for takeoff from the airplane's operating handbook and compare this distance with the length of the runway chosen. If the runway is too short for the airplane to takeoff, then a different runway should be chosen, or the flight canceled altogether This scenario typically happens when pilots fail to accurately calculate required distances, or when they don't calculate anything at all and just try to "eyeball" it... which isn't a very safe operating practice in aviation in general
