Thanks for the video guys; just loading it up now to watch.
Also taking my pilots license, I bought a Cessna that has no de-icing features! Just some rubber on the front of the wings?

I've been through the carb icing courses, and a little on icing, but not alot. Being in Canada, you'll bet I'm gonna become an expert at this. I could tell from Michael's post that this thing was hitting a little closer to home than most, my heart goes out to you pilots.

God Bless those people, what a tragic shame. Keep us posted with any results as to the cause. Thanks again.

Post of the year, so far.

The auto lands (2) I have been sitting in the jumpseat for were not very soft...

fingpilot +1

Was watching news this am. Guy on there ( former NTB official I think) said he NEVER allows his familiy or himself to fly commuter prop planes in bad weather ( icing or thunderstorms) due to the lack of hot wings..
I"ve inadvertently caught 2-3 inches on an approach in a Cessna 172 XP and I still get nightmares... I really hate ice....

Comments like from a former NTSB official are irresponsible and not based on reality. Prop planes with boots have flown literally millions of hours through bad weather and ice over the past...oh...70 years or so, with only a very, very rare incident or accident related to ice or thunderstorms.

Hot wings are great - no doubt better than boots - but to say or imply that airplanes with boots are unsafe in ice is patently false. He should know better.

I can tell you I lived in Lebanon NH for almost ten years , flying the commuter in and out almost weekly.. When those boots went off , it always scared the hell out of me,, Mostly in Beech 99's or the big boxy Shorts.. I'm thinking those had boots on the tail as well...

Update...NTSB just announced that the plane was on autopilot when it crashed in violation of company rules

In severe icing (ice on areas of the plane that should be protected), the autopilot will be turned off. That's in our manual and has been for years - ever since the Roselawn ATR-72 crash. One of the things learned in that accident was that the autopilot does a very good job of masking handling issues that any competent pilot would otherwise be able to "feel" with his own hands on the controls. The autopilot will hang on until the last instant and then will just let go when it reaches its control force limits, which can and usually will leave the crew unprepared for the possible resulting unusual attitude.

Next time you are on a turboprop in the ice and you see those boots expanding and contracting, try to be comfortable in the knowledge that those tried and true systems have worked beautifully for 70+ years, through countless winter storms.

Since they descended quickly from 17K and kept asking for lower, I assume to get to warmer air and help with the icing, could the already cold aircraft skin kept the deicing equipment from keeping up the with problem?

It may not have helped, but remember this: airliners routinely fly in the upper reaches of the atmosphere where normal temperatures are in the -20 to -45 Celsius range. The airplanes are almost always super cold after some time up there. The de-icing equipment normally can deal with that. Severe icing, by definition, is a different story.

I have this theory about pilot pay. If it was up to me, it is how it would be.

The guy slogging it out in a piston powered commuter day and night in the low teens and high tens (altitude) hauling freight, short hop passengers and packages is out there every day. He is busting his butt every flight, probably loading and unloading everything himself, checking and adding oil himself (probably every leg), doing his own paperwork and load manifests, and going in and out of small fields, with usually non-precision approachs, if any at all. He knows every pecularity of the plane he is flying cuz he has had his butt strapped to it for the last six months. He knows it needs a new left main tire, he knows the right gear door actuator needs to be replaced and it makes him cycle the entire gear system 2 or 3 times to get that door to close after every takeoff. He knows the second ADF is marginal, he knows in spite of being 'pressurized', water leaks IN past the center windsheild post every time he flies thru heavy rain. That water ends up in the radio stack located right under the glarescreen.

He knows if he writes these things up, management or maintenance (on management's orders) will find a reason to defer them, or find another guy to fly the trip, and he'll have no idea about the 'peculiarities' of this plane. All he wants to do is build enough time to get on with one of the feeder-commuters that fly the modern turbo-props, like the one that went down the other night. He's making $18k a year for the priveledge of doing this.

The Turbo-prop commuters have come a long way in the last 10 years. New equiptment, some of it even jets (the EMP's Dorniers and CRJ's). These guys now have dispatch, bag smashers (loaders), computerized weight and balance all done for you, all in the name of squeezing every possible flight hour out of you and the plane (legally, of course....). These guys make anywhere from $18K to mid $60K, maybe more or less depending on other things too. They are working just as hard as the small plane guy, but in different ways. They probably have fewer maint. squawks, but there is always a tradeoff between making money and spending it on an airplane that is out of service being repaired. It might not be as obvious as the first case, but it is there no matter what... that pressure to get the trip done.

Two guys flying together for a long time will express that pressure with a special glance as the captain calls for the start checklist. They know they are gonna have to be good tonight, cuz Murphy was spotted in the departure lounge. I used to talk about Murphy's alter-ego named Mulligan. Mulligan was always in the plane ahead of you on a horrible night, bad weather, approachs to minimums, rough ride, you name it, Mulligan was up there cuz if Mulligans' plane can take it, so can we, and on we plod. My standard joke was two planes heading for a remote airport, both probably with min fuel for a real alternate, and I am in the second plane listening to Mulligan up ahead starting the approach, and I will slow down intentionally just to hear Mulligan somehow now has Murphy with him, cuz those guys just missed the approach and never saw the airport. Before those guys can get back on my freq and ask for the priority return to departure airport, we have already done the same.

Back to pay. I lucked out and went thru and survived those two stages very quickly. I started flying heavy iron at the just the right moment in the industry. Corporate aviation had discovered jets, and my starting pay in 1978 was just shy of $90k in a G2. I had landed in hog heaven. I got a jury summons near the end of that first year, and responded from Paris with a copy of my Marriott year-end summary showing over 250 nights in the Marriott chain the previous year. I never heard from them again to this day. My total time at retirement was over 26K hours, only 500 piston powered, and I had less than 200 hours IFR, meaning actually in the clouds.... we were always above everything. Dealing with weather was usually a very transitory thing. Not that we were not working any less than these other guys, just differently.

I did not know either of the two pilots from Buffalo, but I have known a lot like them, all at the top of their game. Sometimes you don't have a Mulligan in an airplane on the approach in front of you, but Murphy is almost always aboard your plane somewhere.

There are only a few pilots that I will read about in the papers in the future, but read about them I will. It is because I have flown with them, and they had no business being there.

My theory is that the guys at the bottom of the pile should be making the big bucks, and the guys at the top should be the $18k guys.

Yes.

Michael, you should be a writer. That was beautiful.

Spot on! With the autopilot flying the ship you have no idea of the forces going on. When you are hand flying you can feel and have to manually put more trim in to compensate for the ice buildup.

Used to fly Viscounts years ago. Big 4 engine turboprops. Lost a lot of them in the 1960's when they were flown in icing conditions. Turns out that they would handle the first notch of flaps but past that they would nose dive towards tierra firma if there was any ice on the tail. SOP was to keep your hand on the flap handle if there was any chance of ice and immediately retract them to recover.

News was reporting that they had just put the flaps down when the ship did a 180 degree reversal. Wondering if the nose headed down, FP pulled the stick back a bit too hard and it went into a secondary stall, then pancaked in?

Sad to hear, I flew for Bombardier for many years and their products are usually very good.

Joe A

So then new pilots would fly the 747s and then move onto flying turbo props?

Your theory could be applied to a lot and a lot of fields. It's the guys at the lower end that are always working harder and getting paid less.

Pay is not a measure of how hard you work but how valuable you are.

Interesting theory never the less. On a side not I am currently flying pistons and making a lot more than 18K. ;)

One hears this a lot, not just in aviation. In many fields people will say that compensation should be proportional to how hard you work. Naturally, the guys just starting out do often work the hardest.

It is the ultimate populist idea, I suppose. Everyone is equal, from the wet-behind-the-ears comrade to the seasoned grey-haired politburo member, so pay them per ounce of sweat expended.

However, this idea goes against the basics of demand and supply. There are plenty of just-starting-out pilots, there are fewer super-experienced pilots. What market-based economic system could possibly result in the former making $100K and the latter $18K?

This idea also devalues experience and the kind of skill that is gained by experience, and ultimately would banish those qualities from the workforce. Make less as you get better at your job - who the heck would stay in such an industry?

(Would Capt Sully have kept flying if his pay kept moving down every year?)

It probably has.

There are a glut of experienced pilots right now. However, prior to the economic downturn, our airline was considering an ab initio program, in order to hire enough guys. We'd pay for all of their training (private through commercial MEL), in return for a 10 year commitment.

Less and less people are getting their ratings these days, and after this economic quagmire, we'll be back in the situation of needing pilots. It goes against supply and demand. Instead of increasing our guys' salaries, we just lower minimums in order to make lower time pilots accessible to us. Regionals don't increase salaries...they just scrape the bottom of the barrel even further, which in itself is starting to dry up.

Furloughed 75 Captains with 14,000 hours of flight time aren't going to go to a regional and make 23K a year. It's just not going to happen. Either they are getting out of aviation or going overseas.

Making 18K a year, flying checks in a Cessna 340, in all kinds of ice and crap is insane. It's dangerous, and this in itself should pay a premium. There's a high pucker factor, and a good chance of death with this kind of flying.

An MD88 FO should make more money than a 757 FO....the sheer amount of work involved with flying the MD compared to the 75 should pay more. Yeah, the 75 is bigger and carries more pax, but that's all relative.

Bigger shouldnt necessarily equate to more money. I fly an Embraer E175. It's big by regional standard (76 seats)....however, should I make more than a Brasilia pilot? I'm glad that I do, but I'll be the first to admit that a Brasilia is a harder plane to fly, requiring a higher level of situational awareness. A monkey could fly the 175.

I've been on both sides of the table with 121 flying...management and as a seniority list member. I can't wait to get out, and go to the Feds.....

That's what I've done...four years ago....Nooooo regrets.....:)
I mean...going on the Fed's side.

I'm not advocating the newbies start at the top. never said that. What I did say was that the guys flying the bottom rung stuff earn every dollar. The guys flying the big and new stuff work just as hard, but have the equiptment and are dealing with a different enviornment, and probably should not be earning more because of that sole reason.

I was asked to retire early because my salary as a senior captain was 7 times that of a newbie F/O. They offered several years salary in stock and incremental pay for me to quit early. Did I F myself? You bet. Stock two years later is worthless, medical insurance (with no claims or health issues for 30 years has become unaffordable (3 premium rate 'adjustments' in 2 years). So now what?

Yep, am looking to work for the Govt. Not gonna happen.

Oh wait! Our newbie president says he and Nancy baby are gonna 'create or save' 3 million jobs this week.

I truly am in luck.