Quote:
Originally Posted by greglepore
Yeah. We lost a good guy, 30 y/o Pennsylvania dude(from a conservative Lancaster county bacground) in a Cherokee 6 in a night incident here last weekend, lost oil pressure, somehow descended from 6k to 3k for unknown reasons, and couldn't coast to the nearest real airport (cho). Went down in rugged terrain just east of the BRP. The atc tapes are chilling. Had he had Foreflight running he would have made a highway, maybe. RIP pilot.
Bottom line-don't fly at night near terrain. His nearest alternate was over the ridge, and he couldn't do that.
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Yeah, nite flights over terrain are dicey. When I would commute in our C-150, half of my flight was always over terrain in the dark. On my day leg, I was always scanning for places to land in an emergency at night. Still, doesn’t make it comfortable to think about inflight emergencies. As they say, “It’s not IF, it’s WHEN” it will happen. The saving grace was that in the 150, 40 degrees of flaps and such a slow speed, your chances of surviving are increased by a couple of tics. The ever changing glide ring in ForFlight helps dramatically.
Years ago, here at Placerville the broker sold a 210. It was on its way home when there was a engine stoppage(fuel) at night. When the guy touched down, gear up, he skipped off of the only large pond for miles. Skipped across the surface and stuck on the far bank. Minimal metal damage and walked away. Sometimes you have luck when it’s needed.
RIP to the brother aviator who was lost in the Cherokee-6.
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