And another Ottawa plane crash... near Calabogie

[Doc]

PilotDAR. We hear you. But (and this can not possibly reflect anything negative towards the pilot here) there are such a limited number of things that can cause something like this. CFIT (unless trying to top Everest) can not be considered. "Maybes" are things like pilot incapacitation, for whatever reason. Structural failure. Equipment failure (pressurization, wild trim runaway? Again, I've never been in a TBM, but the "list" of what can go wrong at FL270 is pretty limited. Do these airplanes have FDR's?
Was there any communication indicating a problem?

[5x5]

Funny that in a reply where you are

gently rising to not support idle speculation about the cause of accidents

you in fact are the first one to introduce any speculation other than a sudden, unexpected occurance i.e. O2 failure or heart attack.

All of us pilots know that we are honour bound to maintain our health as best we can, and not act as flight crew if we suspect we are not medically fit.

No one else had even hinted of that, so why would you bring it up in your post against speculation?

[costermonger]

I met Bob a few years ago in Wiarton. I was hanging out in the terminal waiting for a passenger and he was there working with a young student to prepare a VFR nav log. As much as you can tell from 20 minutes of overheard teaching, he was a hell of an instructor.

RIP.

[skymarc]

No FDR but the G1000 as an SD card with all data. Im not sure what condition was the cockpit after the crash so this data might not be available if the card as been burnt, lost or damaged.

[PilotDAR]

Well, I just read:

"to me this sounds like a "classic" case of of a massive heart attack in flight"

and thought of that as speculation, which personally I try to avoid as much as possible. I make no suggestion whatever as to what happened in this unhappy event, because I have no idea!

[Doc]

Well, I just read:

"to me this sounds like a "classic" case of of a massive heart attack in flight"

and thought of that as speculation, which personally I try to avoid as much as possible. I make no suggestion whatever as to what happened in this unhappy event, because I have no idea!

Well you should pay attention here. Frankly, this is the kind of thing that scares the crap out of me. There is NO defence against sudden incapacitation. No defence against structural failure. Very little defence against a sudden lack of breathable air. Even chocking on lunch. Again, no defence.
Most of the time here, we speculate about accidents that CAN be defended against. Stall, spin accidents. Descending below limits. Pushing weather. CFIT. Here we have a complete mystery. A brand new airplane with the most modern of "do-dads" known to aviation, flown by a very high time and experienced pilot, just gives up flying. So sorry if we've offended you, but tough titty.
We need an answer to this one.....long before TSB takes their usual 2 years to come out with the correctly worded bi-lingual version.

[black hole]

I knew Bob when was first doing his private license training back in about 1963-64. He was an autobody man then; and good at it. I was a young tad then about 13,14,15,16 and followed him through his training to CPL and multi. I figure he was about 7 or 8 years older than I; so that would make him about 70 now. He was a likeable guy, always had a smile on his face.
Bob was instrumental in the development of the Port Elgin Airport,and the Port Elgin Flying Club, among other things and truly loved aviation.
I crossed paths with Bob from time to time and i seemed like we could have talked for day; but time was always too short. He was always sincere and positive.
He will be missed by many! My condoences to all.

[cgzro]

Listen to:

http://www.liveatc.net/archive.php

Then select October 8th/1600-1630Z for CYOW you can hear FBKK talking to Ottawa and then handoff to Montreal at about 4:20 into the recording. Unfortunately Montreal center does not seem to have a recording for that time period.

[bizjets101]

Wreckage via TSB photos, note anti-icing panel photo - obviously very important as
this is what brought down the last TBM whose decent was errily similar.

http://i845.photobucket.com/albums/ab20 ... ngleft.jpg

http://i845.photobucket.com/albums/ab20 ... -FBKK2.jpg

http://i845.photobucket.com/albums/ab20 ... -FBKK3.jpg

http://i845.photobucket.com/albums/ab20 ... -FBKK4.jpg

http://i845.photobucket.com/albums/ab20 ... -FBKK5.jpg de-ice panel

http://i845.photobucket.com/albums/ab20 ... -FBKK6.jpg

[Colonel Sanders]

G1000 as an SD card with all data

Recently the TSB used similar data to figure out exactly
what had caused fatal structural failure on a homebuilt.

I hope they figure out what happened here, but I'm
afraid the fire will have destroyed the SD card.

[trey kule]

PilotDAR
Well put!! I am going to copy, and paste on future threads as you have expressed an honourable position much more eloquently than me calling them classless ambulance chasing ghouls who under the guise of "learning" revel in the details of tragedy.

There are no lessons to be learned from posting pix, charts, links....mindless mob speculation.

Before posting, most of you should think of your family and friends and how they would feel if it was you and their tragedy being "speculated" about.

My Saturday am rant

[bizjets101]

Statement made from Bill Reany (older brother)

"(Bob) had radioed in after he left Ottawa en-route to Wiarton," Bill told 1310BNews. "I think he was at 27, 000 feet and he indicated he had mechanical problems. In two minutes it was all over."

[RatherBeFlying]

Pressurisation and incapacitation accidents in turbine a/c typically result in the a/c following autopilot until fuel exhaustion and a usually wings level descent into terrain or water.

Stall/spins from high altitude all the way down do happen: a turboprob single came down over the prairies, a Challenger in Missouri (well both engines did flame out), AF 447. No evidence of crew incapacitation.

[Colonel Sanders]

think of your family and friends and how they would feel if it was you and their tragedy

When I dig a hole in an airplane, feel free to say
whatever you want. I surely won't care.

[Rowdy]

think of your family and friends and how they would feel if it was you and their tragedy

When I dig a hole in an airplane, feel free to say
whatever you want. I surely won't care.

you might not give two hoots... but what about your son?

[TSB Tasker]

I am the Investigator in charge of the Transportation Safety Board investigation into this aircraft accident.

If you have any information relevant to this accident that you would like to share, or are aware of any specific issues that you believe we should focus our investigation on, please feel free to contact me via the email below.

I may not be able to answer every email, or respond directly to speculation, however would certainly appreciate your input.

Take care,

Ewan Tasker
ewan.tasker@tsb-bst.gc.ca

[skymarc]

Anyone know if the TSB report is out? Were can we find this info?

[burhead1]

Anyone know if the TSB report is out? Were can we find this info?

http://www.bst-tsb.gc.ca/eng/enquetes-i ... 2o0170.asp

[Colonel Sanders]

http://www.tsb.gc.ca/eng/rapports-repor ... 2O0170.asp

Findings as to causes and contributing factors

The pilot lost control of the aircraft for undetermined reasons and the aircraft collided with terrain.

[pelmet]

I was hoping that would not be the conclusion but when you see such a small amount of total wreckage, it is not surprising.

I flew a brand new TBM 700 from Tarbes, France to Wilkes-Barre once along with another pilot. It is a hell of a machine. FL290 and 290 knots true. The fuel system has an automatic selector to cycle back and forth between wing tanks for maintaining balance.

[B52]

http://www.tsb.gc.ca/eng/rapports-repor ... 2O0170.asp

SOCATA TBM 700N C-FBKK Oct 12, 2012

IMHO

This Accident Report as usual leaves a lot to be desired. It reeks of an under-investigated accident.

The problem with accident reports is that more often than not,
political consequences determine what will be included or omitted from the report.

This report has several parts to it that raise the question that there might be others who
may have information that would shed a light on how and why this accident occurred.

Alarm #1. He flew from the right hand seat when it appears no sane person would do that. Why? I would speculate that its not the first time he did that.

Alarm #2. He took off knowing that he did not have the Oxygen bottle turned on and it was unavailable without landing and turning it on. He chose to fly with it OFF.

These two decisions show that something was wrong with his mental abilities that were most probably related to his ongoing and escalating medical problems.

Then there are his medical problems and a serious weight problem. To be blunt, his life expectancy just watching TV was very much on the short side, so much that it begs the question as to the incredible decline in medical standards that have occurred over the years.

I recall one transport inspector, had a heart attack and was back flying shortly thereafter. The stress that triggered that heart attack was still there.

Flow Control Shutoff Valve (FCSOV) was off. With 5 reasons for the valve being closed, how and why would he ignore the aural and visual warnings?

Did you deliberately choose to fly unpressurized? - Probably not, he knew what the time of useful consciousness was, he knew his medical problems but most probably underrated them.

Speculation.
I'll guess that he was taking medication that we did not know about, that his medical problems were worse than what most people knew. I'll guess that there is another doctor who prescribed medication that we don't know about.

I'll guess that his ability to fly was severely compromised before he started the engine and made a series of mistakes that may be due to being hypoxic when he took off and in the first few thousand feet and by the time ...

From 12:04 at 7,000 to 12:16 at 25,000 is 12 minutes and with that rapidly increasing altitude cam rapidly decreasing useful consciousness.

The sudden obvious loss of control could well be a combination of problems and then what is really disturbing is all the witness reports of loops, inverted flight etc.

It appears that the final cause of this accident was disorientation caused by the hypoxia and his medical problems that led to the decisions that caused the hypoxia.

[Diadem]

The problem with accident reports is that more often than not, political consequences determine what will be included or omitted from the report.

How did you reach the conclusion that politics had anything to do with what was included in the report? On what evidence are you basing that? You said yourself that

Speculation.
I'll guess that he was taking medication that we did not know about, that his medical problems were worse than what most people knew. I'll guess that there is another doctor who prescribed medication that we don't know about.

I'd say that the problem with accident reports is that, more often than not, a lack of solid evidence means the investigators can't come to a firm conclusion. They aren't allowed to speculate, so even if they wanted to interpolate and formulate a hypothesis, they wouldn't be allowed to do so. All they can do is make a determination based on the best available evidence, and if that doesn't point to any specific conclusion then all they can say is that they couldn't determine what happened.

[Old fella]

"A pathological examination of the pilot was not possible.”

Taken directly from the report which of course means fluid samples to determine any issues related to medication couldn't be done nor could it be determined if the pilot suffered any condition aka "heart". Yes, the pilot was an elderly (75) gentleman who was overweight and on medication for blood pressure and a cholesterol inhibitor (statin) but to suggest this was the cause and contributing factor is just pure speculation.
As for politics to withhold information or deliberately omit such in this particular case well…….. You do see silly commentary from posters.

[B52]

How did you reach the conclusion that politics had anything to do with what was included in the report? On what evidence are you basing that? You said yourself that

My comment was directed at most if not all accident investigation reports. It is what I've observed to be a factor in why accident reports are often so generic in appearance and lack of conclusions be it speculation as to the causes of the accident. I'm not expecting most readers to agree with me either. Most readers and posters in Canada adopt a politically correct lens though which to read and write. It means valuable opportunities to learn and prevent future accidents are largely lost.

I'm not an accident investigator and not tied by politically correct unofficial rules. I looked at the whole picture and the facts and what I wrote is what jumped out of the document at me and what I felt should be said. At his age, medical problems, his BMI, his life expectancy, all tell me another story that is at least a possibility. He reminds me of other cases I've known where multiple doctors prescribed meds, and the aviation medical doctor was out of the loop.

It's rather eerie speaking to a pilot one day and seeing all the signs and hearing about him dead a short time later.


My "educated hunch" is that he had at least one other doctor in his life, and that he had other problems that were secondary effects of his medical problems.

The question that jumps out of the report is that Flight Manual requires the pilot to sit in the left seat. The CARS require oxygen, he chose to not to sit in the left seat, and chose not to turn on the oxygen, he chose to ignore all the warnings.
That right there, convinces me that there were at least psychological and ore personality factors that led to improper operation of the pressurization, the lack of auto-pilot that all contributed to hypoxia.

The ultimate cause of the accident, based on witnesses is a loss of control which was precipitated by the above factors. It did loops, inverted flight etc, which all involve High G that he most probably would not have been able to handle.

The report could not apparently "link" the factors together but the issue I have is, every accident is a learning opportunity and while we may never know the exact cause, unless all the possible scenarios are explored.

I've posted the scenario's that leap out of the document and which I've posted.

My conclusion is that like most accidents, personality and or mental health issues drive most accidents.
It's frequently a combination of errors and this accident starts with a medical, medical problems, a walk around, a decision to go with out Oxygen contrary to the CARS which is proof positive that he had a personality issue that affected his ability to make decisions.

That's confirmed by his decision to sit in the Right Seat which may have fatally prejudiced his ability to fly the airplane.

On the balance of probabilities Hypoxia was a cause which with the above factors made him an accident going to happen
and that will not please a lot of readers...



The Moral of the story is, who else do you know that fits that profile?

Where are the recommendations regarding

(a) medical
(b) Oxygen?
(c) pressurization?
(d) Single Pilot operation by a pilot with known medical problems.
(e) Revision of medical standards.
(f) Mandatory reporting by doctors who prescribe medication to pilots.
(g) BMI requirements for passing medicals.


I did not see any of the above.

Now for the flak.


...

[RatherBeFlying]

My new glider didn't have an oxygen system, but the lift was there and it's legal to go a bit over 10,000 for half an hour.

So I indulged to 12,500, but noticed that I was having trouble interpreting the new 57 mm altimeter. Also developed a headache and decided it was time to come down and install oxygen in my new glider.

I dropped a lot of IQ points in that legal half hour.

So if he had a pressurisation failure at FL260, he would be incapacitated during the emergency descent. Once below 10K, your brain will need some time to recover.

Some decades ago, a glider pilot in Argentina got sucked into a CB. He woke up sitting in a field with a shortened wingspan -- very, very lucky.