Sad accident here yesterday. In danish only…
https://www.bt.dk/krimi/soendagstur-endte-fatalt-for-vennepar-de-omkomne-var-fra-horsens
Not sure which aircraft, but apparently hit trees and burst into flames at EKFU on departure.
It was two couples. Both women are dead and the men in coma.
According to the owner of the field they attempted a tail wind takeoff. The field is 600 m grass.
https://www.tvmidtvest.dk/skive/flyvepladsens-ejer-jeg-har-det-saa-daarligt-over-det
What type?
Saw this on ASN this morning. A Commander 114 (not exactly known for good short field performance), 4 POB, at a challenging strip (Fur)…
Really tragic, the Commander is really +800m hard surface type with 3% glide & climb slope, hard to believe it can go off 600m grass (even landing will be tough), was that the aircraft homebase? or visiting an airfield?
Some pilots don’t seem to take tailwind seriously enough.
One experience from just a couple of weeks ago:
Airfield has a limitation that for noise abatement between 12 and 2pm takeoffs are only allowed in one direction. At that day that meant an 8kt tailwind. I did the numbers 2 times (just me with my Malibu and tanks half full) to decide that this is out of my safety margin and I’d rather wait 2 hrs (As I was not aware of that limitation I was literally 5 minutes late and wanted to take of 5 mins after noon).
While I was shutting down my ride and checking where I could grab a coffee, 3 adults were boarding a Mooney and taxiing to the takeoff point. What shall I say: If the fence on the far end of the runway (there is a grass strip of about 100m between end of the concrete runway and the fence) would have been one meter higher, they would not have made it.
My friend had a 114B. I assisted in the purchase of the plane. I also supported him to fly the thing. My view was a nice, roomy tourer, but with limitations.
We went one evening to a grass strip fly in. The strip is 600m. I was wary and asked him to go in my plane. Nope, wanted to take his Commander. I did manage to get him to depart alone. I would take his passenger. On departure I watched it scrape the hedge, turn to avoid the tree, and claw the aeroplane away near stall. I thought he was gone. He had to cut all foliage from the undercarriage bay when he landed.
Gave me the fright of my life. Actually he was unperturbed, which perplexed me even more, and I always thought he and that plane were an accident waiting to happen.
I am struggling to imagine 4 up, grass, a tailwind, 600m, and thinking…..lets go.
Malibuflyer wrote:
Some pilots don’t seem to take tailwind seriously enough.
I agree, for takeoff one will get surprised how much tailwind compares to slope
As proxy the ratio of tailwind to stall speed breaks even with slope gradient
If you take SEP with 60kts stall and 10kts tailwind, you need 16% downhill slope to make it worth it, 10% slope you should takeoff into wind, in Cub with 40kts stall 10kts tailwind, you need to be downhill at Courecheval to break-even vs into wind
Malibuflyer wrote:
Some pilots don’t seem to take tailwind seriously enough.
Did you mean about concord last flight? …
This is crazy.
I also recently watched 4 fulladults climb into a Robin on a 37C day on a 650m grass strip and I was worried for them.
They managed to get 10’ off the ground by the end of the runway and flew straight for quite some ways before slowly ascending.
I can’t understand the logic in either of these cases.
