it demonstrates one thing that even in a glide you are master of where the aircraft goes! Why choose trees when as you said there was a field and even a motorway to the right anywhere but those trees which this pilot CHOSE to land in by allowing himself to be a passenger to what could have been a fatal event.
The only reason the pilot got away with it was the right wing took the brunt of the collision with the tree the fuselage impacting a much softer section another six feet to the right and the pilot probably would have been killed and was incredibly lucky.
Yes Mary I agree the most important thing was to keep it flying but even there I am not sure the speed was controlled as the aircraft seemed fast in a descent which kept it flying more than any planned inputs from this pilot (( who didn't seem to be controlling anything
addendum
Looking more closely at the pilots line of sight I do now think he was looking at that wide road to land on but went through the centreline and didn't have enough height to get back onto the motorway while on a continuous descent into the trees very lucky guy. But that is the point realising that things were not working on plan A the pilot should have been already aware of the field on the left as plan B and gone for that when plan A was no longer working.
The motorway would have worked if he had made a steeper bank while pushing the nose over and landed on the side with the traffic flow rather than against it
a good example of fixating on one point while being oblivious to other options
Pace
Last edited by Pace; 13th Jul 2015 at 21:05.