Originally Posted by
jonkster
He obtained 3 seperate forecasts prior to departure each indicating IFR conditions and still launched in a vintage aircraft he only bought that day.
WX was OVC 600' with vis below the base under VMC .
Sure sounds bold to me.
He may have had 21000 hours but that was not the action of a timid pilot.
Add to that how many current instrument rated pilots do not have much in the way of current hand flying IF skills? How many engage auto pilot as soon as possible? (either due SOPs or because they prefer to?)
I do not believe you will find a C140 with an autopilot. Lucky if the venturi driven AI even functions. He just bought the plane that morning.
How much recent time in light aircraft did he have? How much in a 140? A 140 is a sweet little aeroplane but a lower performer even than a 150.
I have recently flown in light aircraft with a couple of current LHS airline pilots and had to take over when they got out of shape, thousands of hours doesn't mean bullet proof or current on type. Especially not in marginal conditions.
Claiming the accident was obviously due turbulence when he was in the clag (the base 600' and he was tracked between 800 and 1500' when he lost control) in an aircraft not equipped to fly in the clag really seems a long stretch. The wind speed was recorded as 6kts. The turbines would be barely turning. How much turbulence would you be expecting?
I don't care how many tens of thousands hours you have - fly a C140 into the clag at low level and you are pushing your luck. If it had been high voltage towers or radio transmission towers that he was avoiding instead of turbines the exact same accident description would not raise an eyebrow. But because it was a wind turbine it suddenly must be turbulence and loss of control in IMC seems unlikely? Really?
You obviously have a set against wind turbines which is fine, everyone is entitled to an opinion. That makes me suspect though you will chose to post and argue anything that paints them in a bad light rather than look at the evidence in a dispassionate way.
Which is fine, we all have our pet peeves and biases but if that is the case here, there is not much point discussing this as you have already made up your mind for reasons other than analysis of the evidence.
Just briefly, the met station report is from KAUM, which is Austin airport in Minnesota. About 13NM from the crash site. The wind speed quoted is for gusts at ground level - Not the 400' tower height (Unknown if that is the turbine centre height or highest blade tip height ?) New Richmond airport, which is about 13 miles north of the wind farm were showing ground gusts to 10knots at the time. What do you think the wind speed might have been at 400'
?
https://www.wunderground.com/history...ic=&reqdb.wmo=
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