​​​​​​​common purpose
 

There is always the potential for a police investigation in the aftermath of any accident where it is suspected that a crime has been commited (cf. Shoreham).

If that is the case here (and I have no idea whether it is), the police investigation will be completely separate from and independent of the AAIB's, for obvious reasons.

I am aware that weather changes, however I flew in from London Luton that night. We arrived into Guernsey around 1745 LCT. We were then driving around lost until around 1900, the weather was more or less the same as when we arrived.
The tops of the clouds from Luton to Guernsey were around 5000ft for the whole flight. I can't comment on the icing other than there was some. We only had the anti-ice for the engine and windshield on and it was light at best. However, we were doing 250kts descending through it and therefore our TAT was around +3 if I recall correctly. The SAT was certainly below zero. We were only in it for around a minute or so before popping out the bottom of it. Ceilings at that point were 1900'

The really foul weather didn't start rolling through until around 0200 LCT. I would hazard a guess that at around 2023, the weather would still be well within the realm of that aircrafts capability. And certainly able for the aircraft to turn 180 and fly back out of the icing.

@Truthseeker, The message regarding the "Same company" text was sent through on the 21st, the day of the accident flight, at around 1623. A few hours prior to departure.

I'm not sure where the eclipse that you are talking about fits into all of this, but interestingly enough, it is shown to be going into Guernsey at 1800 LCT that day. Probably a complete Red Herring and not worth going down that road.

Point of note, the flight that Sala did in the N-registered Eclipse earlier would also almost certainly also have been illegal - not on an AOC and almost certainly paid for by someone in the process

Not necessarily by all means, you could construct a legal constellation. Conviction before assessment and trial has not been proven a good idea, let's wait for the investigation results.

I join posts #690 and #691 above. We had life insurance to cover our mortgage which covered aviation only as passenger in a multi-engined aircraft flown by a pilot of not less than commercial rating. They wouldn't budge (very wisely, it took about 400 hours to discover how little I knew) so instead of flying we paid off the mortgage instead. When I started a business later my partners and I took out life insurance on one another, and I was charged 15% extra premium to cover my PPL/IR activity.

The Wingly helo advertisement earlier is appalling, Wingly is clear that whatever their insurance covers it is not helicopters, and 70 hours is little enough on fixed wing never mind a helo. My message for those contemplating such a trip would be to go for it if you're a youngster with no dependants or debts. If you have commitments, understand that you will have no life cover as required by mortgage companies so your dependents will lose their house; if you suffer permanent injury you won't be compensated unless you can fund a claim against the pilot whose negligence you will have to prove. Good luck with that; and fellow Pruners will forgive me if I have a certain cynicism with regard to insurance companies paying out.

I understand what you mean that the left engine has the same probability of the right engine as quitting, but unless you didn't put enough go juice in the plane, you are essentially doubling down on your odds of getting to the destination with one engine still working. Its a bad bad day in the office if you have two blow up.

I don't think that any of us here are saying that single engines are dangerous and shouldn't be flown, however, and this is the big however, you have to start weighing up the conditions.

Day VFR over the flat land parts of Europe. Piston single, A-OK.
Day VFR in the summer over the English Channel at a reasonable altitude, with calm-ish sea conditions. Still fine.
You can see that the levels of safety are slowly being peeled away. At that point, it becomes when you are comfortable for those layers to stop being peeled off.

IFR - No time to find suitable landing spots, as most singles have a low approach speed, most field landings become akin to a car accident.
Night - As above, and unable to see unlit obstacles on approach.
Piston - Not as reliable as turbine.
Water conditions - possibility of a successful ditching. Same considerations as if flying over mountains or forest.
Water temp - survival and more importantly, ability to function.

This flight was attempted :-
1) At night.
2) Single engine.
3) Piston engine.
4) IFR.
5) Over rough waters.
6) Over winter waters.
7) In poor weather.
8) At low level.
9) Icing conditions at low level.

There was at least 9 layers of safety that were peeled away from this flight prior to it even leaving the ground. Some can argue the single pilot point as well in that it may have encouraged better decision making. Personally, with around 2500hrs single pilot ops, I think that the risk from that aspect can be negated, or at least reduced to a negligible level, with professionalism and planning.

As per the satellite tracking, 2.5 minute intervals vs Radar pings? At 180kts, thats still 7-8nm between pings. A search area of 64nm2.
Just prior to me leaving my last flying job, a PC-6 crashed into the mountains only 7nm from the departure airport. The aircraft was using spidertracks. Even with that, it still took a long time to find the aircraft and it was only spotted with the aid of some locals on the ground waving them towards the crash site.
Radar pings in this part of the world are about as accurate as the current cheap tracking software that is used. In the more remote parts of the world such as in America, Africa, Australia, Canada etc etc, then the satelitte tracking makes absolute sense.

In my years of GA, I have met a lot of interesting characters. Some are saying this if this was a commercial operation, then the both of them would still be alive. I disagree.

Regulators only really pay attention to small operators once they start making mistakes, or they have been shown to be dodgy when it comes to audit time. There are still many AOC holding operators who push their young pilots out into horrendous conditions. I have had that happen to me in Canada. It nearly cost me my life.
Other commercial pilots will still "give it a lash", relying on their skills to get them out of trouble if it occurs. Stopping briefly to have a cigarette after landing, before coming back tomorrow to do it all again.
To me, a life is a life. I don't care if its a celebrity who's paying me to fly them from A to B, or a friend on a cost sharing flight. Both are just as valuable and the same degree of mitigating factors can be applied before going flying. I've applied these to just about every one of my flights since day dot with my flight training.
I feel that this pilot would have conducted this flight whether it was an above or below board operation. The flight profile speaks volumes of this.

Well that Eclipse Sala flew in is down as being privately owned by a Mark Farmer and a Jason Bannister (50% each) through another owner trustee in Delaware - Feggair Inc. So, via what channel(s) did Farmer/Bannister 'loan' the aircraft for the purposes of transporting Sala? Who paid and who flew it? For those thinking 'ah, but it could have been loaned as a favour', I suggest we get real here, unless Farmer/Bannister are in the football transfer business and their fees from this or another Mckay-related transfer deal more than compensated for the costs of lending their privately registered/operated Eclipse for the exercise.

On the 18th January Sala flew to Cardiff in N531EA to complete the transfer & medical to join Cardiff FC. ( SEE MESSAGE BELOW )
(18th January 2019) Sala plane from Nantes landed at Cardiff airport at 9.17am this morning and is now on his way to Hensol for the medical
Landing at 09:17 from LFRS/Nantes Atlantique is "N531EA" Eclipse EA.500 N531EA ..parking on the Cambrian apron

Now here is a reliable report on the prevailing wx conditions. It does go some distance to raise doubts over the speculation on icing and introduces more credence on the possibility of mechanical malfunction and failure.
Yes I do agree with most of the sentiment and outrage expressed over the matter of cowboy operations, grey charters, illegal flying, etc., nevertheless my real interest lies in the actual cause(s) of this accident. In that respect, unless the wreckage is recovered from the sea bed, the truth is most unlikely to come to light. Charts of the area show relatively shallow sea bed depths, so it should not be a difficult task to locate the wreckage. The main issue is who might be willing to foot the bill. Particularly given that this accident involved a N reg private aircraft with two on board. Of all the interested parties involved, I can only think the aircraft insurers may be the most likely to do so, within the terms of the liability cover under the policy.

I'd say if this flight had been conducted at (say) FL160, that both of them would still be alive. If they couldn't maintain 160 in the prevailing weather, they'd likely have found out before crossing the French coast and would have had good diversion options.

Does anyone know if N264DB was FIKI-approved? The photos I've seen show it with boots, but the system may have subsequently been placarded INOP.

AIUI there's an issue with the windshield deicing on some PA46 aircraft; I've no idea if this has any relevance here.

Another twist to the story, the Eclipse 500 has Bruce Dickinson of Iron Maiden fame's name and logo on the nose along with the Mark Farmer mentioned above. So, is Bruce (who sells Eclipses as one string of his extensive aviation interests) a silent partner in N531EA - or not so silent with his name on the nose?! So who did they lend the aircraft to?

https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....061b0a5916.jpg

Exactly my point. You don't have to be a commerical op to be at FL160. FL100 would have been enough that night.

And the same Mark Farmer of the above 'Aircraft Charter' company (and reputed part owner of the Eclipse 500, N531EA that flew Sala) is also a director of an aviation charity too. Unfortunate.

I wasn't trying to imply that there wasn't icing about, as there most certainly was. Only that I wasn't in it for long. It wasn't freezing drizzle or rain. Prolonged flight at 5000' however.....