Wasaya caravan missing

[SAR_YQQ]

Speculation is evil - you guys need to wait for the report. Been working this file all day. RIP to the Pilot.

Kudos to the Boys in Orange - they climbed a damn mountain to get to the site.

[SmokinJoe]

Only one crew member found ?
I thought they agreed to operate two crew in the Caravan after the summer beaver crash ?

Only two crew with pax on board. Sometimes with 2 crew when bringing freight up to a destination then installing seats to carry pax after freight is dropped off. Single pilot for strictly freight flights.

[Old fella]

Kudos to the Boys in Orange - they climbed a damn mountain to get to the site.[/quote]

You bet. If there is anybody in DND who deserves the very best equipment money can buy, tis these guys/gals.

[Kzanol]

Who was the base manager on duty yesterday in Pickle Lake?

[SmokinJoe]

Speculation is evil - you guys need to wait for the report. Been working this file all day. RIP to the Pilot.

Kudos to the Boys in Orange - they climbed a damn mountain to get to the site.

+1

[snoopy]

"Twin turboprops, flown by experienced crews. 1/2 mile departures are safe and legal. And.....I'm sure they didn't stay under the ceilings. No worries. Illya"

Off topic but I'm not letting that one go - particularly in a fatal accident thread! If they were filed VFR and they didn't stay under the ceilings then they were flying illegally. Especially if they were staying "VFR" to avoid carrying IFR fuel.

['CauseTheCaravanCan]

Sorry to hear this.
My condolences to everyone affected.
You guys are so right, we should really abolish the Caravan and go back to a better time when there were only Beavers, Norsemen, Navajos to get the job done. Back then there were no accidents. Unless there's a book called King Air 200, The Swiss Army Knife of the North. Every job has an appropriate aircraft.
Whether it WAS ice, engine, PDM, company culture, whatever, right now...like right now, right this minute, it's not the point. Someones son, their little boy, is dead.
Hang your heads.
F*ck.

[Illya Kuryakin]

"Twin turboprops, flown by experienced crews. 1/2 mile departures are safe and legal. And.....I'm sure they didn't stay under the ceilings. No worries. Illya"

Off topic but I'm not letting that one go - particularly in a fatal accident thread! If they were filed VFR and they didn't stay under the ceilings then they were flying illegally. Especially if they were staying "VFR" to avoid carrying IFR fuel.

Ah, except you can't go in 1/2 mile unless you have filed. Below that, you couldn't leave YRL. SO, they couldn't have been VFR.

[snoopy]

Let's hope not. Awitzke's orriginal assertion, to which you responded, was that the DC-3 was flying VFR when everyone else was grounded. Perhaps there is more to the story.

[Meatservo]

Kudos to the Boys in Orange - they climbed a damn mountain to get to the site.

Must have been Tarp Hill? If so, I guess the aircraft was not landed on a lake as someone reported earlier? Must have still been in the clag at that point then. Sorry- I guess it doesn't matter now.

I'm uncomfortable launching invective at the company at this point, not having been able to see the GFA for that day. I recall almost exactly a year ago a Caravan out west launched on a night IFR flight and turned back, too late to make it back to the airport and pulled off a fairly miraculous night landing on a lake that was only frozen around the edges... everybody was pretty quick to jump to his defence, including his company. The thing is, I was able to check out the GFAs for that night, and saw that the plane had launched into an approaching warm front. There weren't any reports of freezing rain along the path of this warm front, which was brought up during the ensuing discussion on this channel, and people made a lot of hay out of this fact, even though the outcome of the flight, given the textbook winter weather and the kind of aircraft involved, was kind of unsurprising. Now in this pretty-near identical accident (though with woefully different outcome) people want to know who the base manager was (when I worked in Pickle Lake the "base manager" at Wasaya was some local yokel whose forklift ticket constituted a post-secondary education) or the "accountable executive" to hang 'em from the nearest yardarm. I find it interesting how many differing opinions there were last year (in this very parish!) on whether or not a warm front approaching an unfrozen Great Lake in the NWT in December constituted weather that was "bad enough" to make flying a Caravan unwise... now we want to send a manager to jail because the pilot died this time. Where were the other pilots at this base, and what were they doing at this time?

To me it seems like we need to spread the word on how much ice it takes to bring one of these birds down. Like exactly what "too much" looks like. I used to fly Caravans and I can tell you, I have no damn idea. I never picked up more than enough to lose maybe five knots. Was I just about to die the whole time and didn't even know? In fact I've flown in the North my whole life, in all kinds of different planes, and I've never really found out how much ice it took to seriously wound the performance of any of them. Well, on the piston driven Beavers and Otters it would be when the windshield iced over- long before the wings quit doing their thing! Maybe they should take the heaters off the windshields on those Caravans- seems like a step in the wrong direction, but take the heaters off and the pilots will turn around while they can still see good enough to land! I think I can honestly say, if I was in a Caravan right now that was picking up ice, and I had some reason to believe I might be getting out of the icing conditions pretty soon, I would have no idea when to turn around! I like to think I would figure it out, but would I? Would you? Of course you would. Right?

[xsbank]

Just try and remember that this is just a job. Many are passionate about it but still, it's just a job. Nobody who goes to work in the morning should have the expectation that they are going to die at work. When it comes down to it, you are selling your labour for somebody to make a profit.

"He died doing something he loved." Maybe try something you don't love quite as much and come home tonight?

I'm so sorry that we lost another. Please let him be the last.

Know your airplane.
Don't break ANY rules or laws.
Know the weather.
Know your own limitations.
Just say no. Ass. License. Job.

[Bede]

Speculation is evil - you guys need to wait for the report. Been working this file all day. RIP to the Pilot.

I think if there's anyone with the moral authority to say that it would be you. However, I believe that it's never too soon to learn something. There are facts we know now, such as icing conditions, that may as well be disseminated now so the guy pushing himself next week thinks about before he launches. Why should we wait 2+ years for a sanitized version telling us what we already know now?

Thank you for your service.

[Gorgons]

Must have been Tarp Hill?

Any chance "they climbed a damn mountain to get to the site" was just an expression? One that describes the extraordinary effort required to get the job done. Low ceiling prevented them from jumping directly into the site, instead they drove up the north road and then humped it 5 or 6 hours through the bush, in the dark, in crappy conditions.

These guys are nails! They may not have the best of equipment but you don't hear them whine, they simply just get the job done. Regardless of terrain, conditions or circumstance. Take comfort in knowing that if they see you its only a matter of time before they get to you.

[awitzke]

Yes it was Tarp Hill.

[D_Thissen]

Sorry to hear this.
My condolences to everyone affected.
You guys are so right, we should really abolish the Caravan and go back to a better time when there were only Beavers, Norsemen, Navajos to get the job done. Back then there were no accidents. Unless there's a book called King Air 200, The Swiss Army Knife of the North. Every job has an appropriate aircraft.
Whether it WAS ice, engine, PDM, company culture, whatever, right now...like right now, right this minute, it's not the point. Someones son, their little boy, is dead.
Hang your heads.
F*ck.

This.

[Firebird67]

This is a flash back to the air tindi crash a year ago, flew into icing could not make it back, pilot did not know he was on the ground until the gear ripped off...

[bobcaygeon]

Now comes the interesting part. Relatively intact airplane, shit wx, hadn't been airborne long, no fuel at his destination, freighter, and it's Christmas rush........interesting to see how accurate the math was.

[TheFrankestFrank]

Destination was KB6, Wasaya has a fuel cache in YTL a mere 13 miles away and another in NM5 that would have been available as an option if low fuel was a concern. I was told the flight turned around due to the onset of airborne icing. The intention was to return to YPL, and the decision to return to YPL was made long before the aircraft got close to its planned destination.

I would also say Wasaya has no history of intentionally overloading caravans or running around thin on fuel, same goes for pushing weather. Don't know for certain whats been the norm in the last few years but my experience was there was no negative ramifications for holding or cancelling for weather, I would expect with the inclusion of ALPA in the mix it's still the same.

[Illya Kuryakin]

Have to agree with Frank on the fuel side of things. Don't recall having load issues. The WX side of things could lead to a debate though. Or, so say my sources.
Illya

Actually, come to think of it, I've never had any company hassle me about the fuel I carry.

[Illya Kuryakin]

Now comes the interesting part. Relatively intact airplane, shit wx, hadn't been airborne long, no fuel at his destination, freighter, and it's Christmas rush........interesting to see how accurate the math was.

I don't think there would have been math issues. They never played that game. The fact Tarp Hill was the resting place speaks volumes. Tarp Hill has been the final resting place for others. Screams .. running. Which equals low ceilings, low vis. It's the only "high" spot for miles. Also, it might take icing out of the equation.
Illya