AOPA Turbine Pilot Magazine - December 2018 - 20

PROFICIENT PILOT

Being creative can be lethal

BY BARRY SCHIFF

The hazard of building a better mousetrap

BARRY SCHIFF

has been formally
involved in accident
reconstruction for
more than 45 years.

RICK AND I WERE CLOSE FRIENDS. We shared a highschool locker and were members of the same Hi-Y
club. I got him an after-school job as a line boy at the
airport and eventually became his flight instructor. He
was a good pilot.
Rick became an extraordinarily gifted graphicarts designer. He was so talented that he was retained
to create corporate imaging that included the FedEx
logo; the display structure for the Spruce Goose in
Long Beach, California; and an "erotic" shape for the
Carlsberg beer bottle.
He was as meticulous as he was creative. All of his
airplanes were maintained so well that they always
appeared showroom-new. He would not tolerate any
imperfections or blemishes. This attitude, however,
seems to have led to tragedy.
While overseas and riding in the jump seat of a foreign-built airliner, Rick noticed that the crew taxied
for departure with the control lock in place. When he
inquired about this, he was told that this prevented the
elevator from banging around (especially when taxiing
over rough surfaces) and damaging the control hinges.
Rick appreciated this logic and concluded that this
would be a smart way to protect the controls of his own
airplane, a Cessna 340A. The control lock on his airplane-as on most Cessnas-incorporated a rectangular
metal flag that covered the magneto switches. With the
control lock and its flag in place, you could not gain access
to the mags. You had to remove the control lock to start
the engines, a clever idea that might have originated with
Cessna. This is when Rick got creative-he cut off the
metal flag so that he could start the engines and taxi out
with the control lock in place.
I had flown Rick's airplane a number of times and
queried him about his jury-rigged control lock. Each time
he insisted that this protected the elevator and even the
ailerons. "But this makes it possible to forget to remove
the locking pin," I said admonishingly.
"There's no way," Rick replied insistently, "that I
would ever forget to remove a control lock."
During an early evening in the autumn of 2001,
Rick and I and a few friends gathered for hors
d'oeuvres-including exotic and edible insects-at
the Typhoon Restaurant at the Santa Monica Airport.
(There had been no drinking.) I had to leave early, but
others stayed long enough to see Rick and his passenger hop into N2RR and taxi out to SMO's Runway 21.

20 | AOPA PILOT December 2018

It was reported that he never stopped long enough to
make a complete runup.
The aircraft was then seen accelerating southwesterly. It continued to do so well beyond the area where
liftoff normally would occur. Speed became increasingly
excessive. Eventually the throttles were retarded and
aggressive braking began with only 1,000 feet of runway
remaining, not nearly enough to stop the speeding twin.
The airplane skidded off the end of the runway, vaulted
over an embankment, nosed into a guardrail, and burst
into flame. Neither Rick nor his passenger survived.
An NTSB investigator found that the control lock
had not been removed.
Speculation, backed up by performance data
obtained from another Cessna 340, indicates that
Rick likely did not discover that the elevator was frozen in position until attempting to rotate. At that point
it appears likely that he attempted to remove the control lock while still accelerating. Dynamic pressure
against the elevator, however, made removing the
modified control lock so difficult that he finally gave
up and attempted the abort.
This is a sad and classic case of how being creative
and modifying established standards and procedures
can be lethal.
Although it might be tempting at times to be creative, we need to remind ourselves that the established
standards and procedures involved in flying an airplane evolved during more than a century of aviating
(including countless accidents). Almost everything we
do procedurally is for good reason, even though we
might not always understand why.
Another example of creative flying practiced by
some pilots involves retracting the wing flaps during a
landing flare. One reason for doing this is that it makes
it easier to touch down at a specific point along the runway (such as during a spot-landing contest). Another is
that this reduces lift and shortens the landing roll.
The rapid change in lift, drag, and required elevator
force can challenge a pilot beyond his ability to cope.
The FAA strongly discourages this landing technique
because it also is easy for a pilot flying a retractablegear airplane to inadvertently raise the landing gear
instead of the flaps. The administrator concedes, however, that such an error certainly would quickly and
substantially reduce landing distance.
AOPA
www.barryschiff.com

http://www.barryschiff.com

AOPA Turbine Pilot Magazine - December 2018

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of AOPA Turbine Pilot Magazine - December 2018