Originally Posted by
First_Principal
Such reports are intended to investigate the cause of accidents and incidents, and report on those dispassionately so that others may learn from them. They are not intended to lay blame nor prosecute a person, the quid pro quo being the full and frank disclosure from those involved - which may well reveal important facts that could otherwise remain undiscovered (thus possibly leading to others, unnecessarily, following the same path).
The pilot involved in this accident appears to have been a young person who did a whole lot of things right, who has learnt and operated within the company culture, but in trying to be helpful at the request of a senior person has implemented and experienced something that could have been avoided. Given what I read in the report I've every reason to think that all those involved will have learnt from this, and from their misfortune we are all reminded of something that may assist us the next time we think about loading some item into our 'plane, or car, or whatever.
Most certainly I don't consider this well qualified (albeit not highly experienced) young man to be an 'idiot', and I suggest to you that such a comment is particularly unhelpful as far as future disclosure is concerned, and nor is it justified from what I read.
The term idiot is not appropriate but would incompetent be appropriate?
The storage of the container near the control stick and subsequent jamming reminds me of a different type of situation I encountered last year that I thought I might share.
It involved a taildragger with tandem seating. It has limited space in the baggage compartment which was pretty much full. So I thought that I would strap some stuff in the aft seat using the lap belt and shoulder harness to keep it secure. The forward edge of the item was aft of the front edge of the seat. Which seemed safe.
Fortunately, I decided to move the control stick fully aft and discovered that it was being blocked by the item in the seat. The control stick is not straight but has a significant curve in it halfway up allowing the upper portion to overhang the seat when moved from neutral toward fully aft.