DA40 night over water
Having flown across Bass Strait some hundreds of times, mainly in single engine certified aircraft, day and night, IFR and VFR I fail to see why everybody is so worried about a little bit of water. Devonport to Wilsons Promotory is 125 nautical miles, one hour in a 182. Assuming a properly maintained 182 the engine has a service life of either 1500, 1700, or 2000 hrs depending in the model. If it is properly maintained the odds are extremely good it will fulfill this requirement without a catastrophic failure. The engine always runs rough once you are out of gliding distance from land but only if you can see the water. If you go into cloud or put a layer of cloud between you and the water it smooths out again. I have always carried a switlick helicopter life jacket, a life raft, a personal epirb and a portable aircraft band radio transmitter in a water tight cover and had liferaft entry and egress training. I wore a Mustang survival suit for a while but it was too hot and too hard to fly in, so after a while I left it at home. I planned for the worst and hoped for the best. In those crossings, plus many thousands of hours spotting fish offshore I have never ever even had a sick engine, let alone a dead engine. The odds of losing a properly maintained engine are such that I would probably have to do it all three of four times over again before the odds came up against me. To be quite honest, if I had to ditch at night I think I would prefer to take my chances with a landing in the water than the same thing in cloud, in darkness, in the winter, in the central highlands.Single engine aircraft that are certified IFR and are flown IFR by a properly qualified and current pilot, day or night, are many times safer than VFR scud running and trying to keep out of cloud. Flame me if you like but after doing it for over fifty years I am still here.
Well said fly watcher! The risk of my engine failing while I am out of gliding rang is so infinitesimally small that I am happy to take it, along with all the other risks that make up my days. It’s a personal choice but I think if you calculated the risk based on actual occurrences (rather than perceived risk) it would come far below other things people do in everyday life without a second thought.
Heres a really interesting article on risk and perceived risk. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-02-...sation/8293356
Heres a really interesting article on risk and perceived risk. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-02-...sation/8293356
Odds.
Lose and engine over Bass Strait and you’re most likely to die*.
Lose an engine over 90 miles of land around say Southern Victoria and your are highly un-likely to die.
It’s not about the level of risk, but rather the impact should the risk be realised.
* Note we have determined that nobody has ever survived a fixed wing ditching in Bass Straight.
Lose and engine over Bass Strait and you’re most likely to die*.
Lose an engine over 90 miles of land around say Southern Victoria and your are highly un-likely to die.
It’s not about the level of risk, but rather the impact should the risk be realised.
* Note we have determined that nobody has ever survived a fixed wing ditching in Bass Straight.
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Odds.
Lose and engine over Bass Strait and you’re most likely to die*.
Lose an engine over 90 miles of land around say Southern Victoria and your are highly un-likely to die.
It’s not about the level of risk, but rather the impact should the risk be realised.
* Note we have determined that nobody has ever survived a fixed wing ditching in Bass Straight.
Lose and engine over Bass Strait and you’re most likely to die*.
Lose an engine over 90 miles of land around say Southern Victoria and your are highly un-likely to die.
It’s not about the level of risk, but rather the impact should the risk be realised.
* Note we have determined that nobody has ever survived a fixed wing ditching in Bass Straight.
exactly Squawky but some prefer to be hero's!
Just how many single engine aircraft have fallen out of the sky because of engine failure over water in the last ten years or so? I can’t think of any off the top of my head. Maybe I just put them out of my mind!
Last edited by Cloudee; 5th Jun 2019 at 09:55.
Not Bass Strait, but being a single engine aircraft apparently lost over Australian coastal waters, it's topical:
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-06-...ak-52/11183322
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-06-...ak-52/11183322
This takes me back to some 20 years ago. I had a C210 charter from Darwin to Kalumburu with passengers returning home from a trip somewhere down south. The well known Father Anscar from Kalumburu mission was in the back row alone, and two locals in the middle row and one next to me. It was a wet season day, but still early and I tracked down the coast to Cape Ford(?) so that it was less than 100nm over water across to the Kimberley coast. The multi hued green floodplains were on my left and the turbid brown and aqua blotched ocean stretched away to my right.
The aircraft was a lovely 210 white with big red Cessna style stripes, very well maintained and looked after. I'd only flown it a few times before and it was the fastest in the fleet at the time.
Now like many of us, once over water or at night in a single, the engine makes odd sounds. I've been there, done that, "grown up" and was convinced that it was completely part of the imagination. Completely and absolutely.
Turning westwards from Cape Ford out over the calm but murky water, I turned around to see that pax were asleep. I was cruising at 8500, so not unexpected in the smooth air. All was going nicely, no autopilot but easy flying with a nicely trimmed straight aircraft. Nevertheless, I did take note of the trawlers and other white dots of boats in the Gulf below just in case. Not that I was worried, but basic airmanship, no different to knowing where safe landing ground is flying anywhere in a single.
It was pre GPS, and I remember checking my watch and flight plan and thinking just one more minute and I am halfway across the Joseph Bonaparte Gulf and then closer to the Kimberley on the far side. It was my first trip into the Kimberley since my lap of Australia in PPL days, so I was looking forward to it. I relaxed, and enjoyed the view. Happy that fate and coincidental timing had me landed a job in Darwin inside a week - almost unheard of in the 90's - and here three weeks later I was getting paid to fly around the outback, a place I loved, in a nice aircraft.
With happiness and a pride in my thoughts damned if I didn't hear the engine run rough for a split second. I didn't move my head from staring out the window so as not to alarm any awake pax, but my eyes were quickly fixated, sideways on the small instruments like a hawk. Fuel pressure was OK. Oil good. Fuel quantity was just fine, and I'd dipped them an hour before and knew it wasn't starvation. I started cursing myself, thinking my irrational fears were overriding my rational feelings.
I stayed motionless, pretending to stare out the window, but repeatedly scanning every thing in front of me. About 15 seconds later, she properly did cough for a second. There was no imagination there. This was real. As reflex action, fuel pump on, switch tanks. Still I had my head turned out the window, but eyes cast askew at the panel. All normal readings on everything. All 300 horses were still humming away outside. I took note of some trawlers in gliding distance and started thinking about wind and ditching direction, looking on the water for clues. Fortunately it was like a mill pond in the tropical doldrums so that made it easy.
As the engine seemed to be running just fine, the adrenaline waned, and I casually looked around to see if the pax had noticed our oh-so brief interruption to the flight. The locals' eyes were wide, like white saucers contrasted again their jet black skin. Yep, they'd noticed alright.
I turned further to see if Father Anscar had been awoken by the noise. The sight I saw I will take to the grave. There he was in the back of my aircraft, hands clasped together tightly raised in front of his chest looking towards the low ceiling of the cabin saying prayers aloud....
The aircraft was a lovely 210 white with big red Cessna style stripes, very well maintained and looked after. I'd only flown it a few times before and it was the fastest in the fleet at the time.
Now like many of us, once over water or at night in a single, the engine makes odd sounds. I've been there, done that, "grown up" and was convinced that it was completely part of the imagination. Completely and absolutely.
Turning westwards from Cape Ford out over the calm but murky water, I turned around to see that pax were asleep. I was cruising at 8500, so not unexpected in the smooth air. All was going nicely, no autopilot but easy flying with a nicely trimmed straight aircraft. Nevertheless, I did take note of the trawlers and other white dots of boats in the Gulf below just in case. Not that I was worried, but basic airmanship, no different to knowing where safe landing ground is flying anywhere in a single.
It was pre GPS, and I remember checking my watch and flight plan and thinking just one more minute and I am halfway across the Joseph Bonaparte Gulf and then closer to the Kimberley on the far side. It was my first trip into the Kimberley since my lap of Australia in PPL days, so I was looking forward to it. I relaxed, and enjoyed the view. Happy that fate and coincidental timing had me landed a job in Darwin inside a week - almost unheard of in the 90's - and here three weeks later I was getting paid to fly around the outback, a place I loved, in a nice aircraft.
With happiness and a pride in my thoughts damned if I didn't hear the engine run rough for a split second. I didn't move my head from staring out the window so as not to alarm any awake pax, but my eyes were quickly fixated, sideways on the small instruments like a hawk. Fuel pressure was OK. Oil good. Fuel quantity was just fine, and I'd dipped them an hour before and knew it wasn't starvation. I started cursing myself, thinking my irrational fears were overriding my rational feelings.
I stayed motionless, pretending to stare out the window, but repeatedly scanning every thing in front of me. About 15 seconds later, she properly did cough for a second. There was no imagination there. This was real. As reflex action, fuel pump on, switch tanks. Still I had my head turned out the window, but eyes cast askew at the panel. All normal readings on everything. All 300 horses were still humming away outside. I took note of some trawlers in gliding distance and started thinking about wind and ditching direction, looking on the water for clues. Fortunately it was like a mill pond in the tropical doldrums so that made it easy.
As the engine seemed to be running just fine, the adrenaline waned, and I casually looked around to see if the pax had noticed our oh-so brief interruption to the flight. The locals' eyes were wide, like white saucers contrasted again their jet black skin. Yep, they'd noticed alright.
I turned further to see if Father Anscar had been awoken by the noise. The sight I saw I will take to the grave. There he was in the back of my aircraft, hands clasped together tightly raised in front of his chest looking towards the low ceiling of the cabin saying prayers aloud....
Last edited by compressor stall; 5th Jun 2019 at 11:41.
You're lucky you had the Fr there, obviously that saved the day: the power of prayer. Reminds me of when I had to pick up a catholic priest at O'Hare in Chicago and drive him to the South Side, in 5pm traffic. Normally 1 hr, but with Fr Pat beside me, all traffic on the Kennedy and Dan Ryan expressways instantly parted, like the proverbial waters, allowing 75mph all the way, in rush-hr traffic. Did it in 20 minutes. I'm usually an avowed atheist BTW.
PS: did you work out what was wrong with the 210?
PS: did you work out what was wrong with the 210?
Compressor Stall,
Loved that story!
To some of the others, we are talking about trainees here, so what experience do they have to assess the risk, and did they have any say in it anyway? You bet that the engine knows not night or day, nor water or land, however if it does stop your chances at night, over water are pretty bloody dim. As some have pointed out chances of it failing are slim, but if it does the consequences are monumental.
I can recall my former CFI, a very well regarded Dutchman doing my NVMC rating, who hated flying at night. I don't recall him saying anything positive about it. I did a lot of NVMC in singles in the 80s in the Kimberly and S/E IFR night out of Jandakot and actually liked it, but I was young and bloody dumb. I would never choose to do that again, spent too much time in multi-engine turbines and jets to even consider it anymore. I think it's likely that those who look upon it as dumb, have moved on from that flying and see the risk with different eyes.
Loved that story!
To some of the others, we are talking about trainees here, so what experience do they have to assess the risk, and did they have any say in it anyway? You bet that the engine knows not night or day, nor water or land, however if it does stop your chances at night, over water are pretty bloody dim. As some have pointed out chances of it failing are slim, but if it does the consequences are monumental.
I can recall my former CFI, a very well regarded Dutchman doing my NVMC rating, who hated flying at night. I don't recall him saying anything positive about it. I did a lot of NVMC in singles in the 80s in the Kimberly and S/E IFR night out of Jandakot and actually liked it, but I was young and bloody dumb. I would never choose to do that again, spent too much time in multi-engine turbines and jets to even consider it anymore. I think it's likely that those who look upon it as dumb, have moved on from that flying and see the risk with different eyes.
Odds.
Lose and engine over Bass Strait and you’re most likely to die*.
Lose an engine over 90 miles of land around say Southern Victoria and your are highly un-likely to die.
It’s not about the level of risk, but rather the impact should the risk be realised.
* Note we have determined that nobody has ever survived a fixed wing ditching in Bass Straight.
Lose and engine over Bass Strait and you’re most likely to die*.
Lose an engine over 90 miles of land around say Southern Victoria and your are highly un-likely to die.
It’s not about the level of risk, but rather the impact should the risk be realised.
* Note we have determined that nobody has ever survived a fixed wing ditching in Bass Straight.
I can't remember the specifics but I recall at least three ditchings where all survived. There was a Partenavia I believe that ditched near Wilsons Promontory and a father and his young son survived OK, I remember a Cherokee doing the same trick, and I know that an ultra light ditched near Clark Island. Off those that did not survive, all the ones I know were multi engined, going right back to the early De Havilland airliners, a twin engined freighter, (Argosy) and also on 17th July 1983 an Aero Commander 685 Whisky Juliet Charlie. I would hazard a guess that the death toll in multi engined aircraft is probably much higher than in singles. Please note, I haven't mentioned Frederick Valentich on 21st October 1978 because 1. It is not known if it was a ditching and 2. it was never proved that he ended up in Bass Strait.
There will be a technicality there that if it was adjacent to Wilson’s Prom it’s possibly not Bass Strait and the Thruster ultralight a few years back was in Banks Strait unless I’m horribly mistaken.
There was a guy many years ago in a very lightweight ultralight took off from Latrobe Valley headed for Yarram. He went on top of cloud and picked up a screaming northerly and when he came down he was over one of the islands off Wilson’s Prom, such as Rabbit or Cliffy. He was able to land safely due to the strong winds and through some amazing luck he was rescued by boat from the island. They would probably have never found him otherwise.
a twin engined freighter, (Argosy) and also on 17th July 1983 an Aero Commander 685 Whisky Juliet Charlie
The various other helicopters available can be discounted as first priority rescue craft on the grounds of unsuitable location, being single-engine, or not being winch-equipped. The possible exception was one of the Bell 205s at Longford. These, although single-engine,are equipped with floats and a suitable winch, and being on SAR standby for the oil drilling platforms, had a better response time than either the S76 or one of the B212s.The situation at Longford on 17 July was unusual. Regular helicopter flights had been cancelled because of an industrial problem on the oil rigs, with the result that the S76, B212 and B205 helicopters were all on the ground, with one standby crew and maintenance personnel immediately available. The B205 was ready to go and the operator estimated that the S76 or B212 would have required 20 minutes to fit a winch.The SARMC did not check the availability of the helicopters at Longford. He reported later that this decision was based on his view that the response time would have been too long, from his personal knowledge of the organisation gained in previous visits and discussions.
https://www.atsb.gov.au/media/5226548/198302284.pdf
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Was a Bristol Freighter rather than four engine Argosy, the Aero Commander event the chap could highly likely been rescued had their not been a balls up in organisation. The response time of the 205 and S-76 were similar, although the 205 had a winch permanently fitted it still required refuelling, seating removed, stretcher, slings etc loaded. The S-76 likewise, with the addition fitting the winch which was a quick job. Cruise speed of the S-76 would have put it on task quicker than the 205, 155 versus 100 knots cruise, the Vne in both cases. We only found out about the ditching on the TV news that night, no body contacted us. Was working that day, there would have been at least four other crews also, caused us a fair measure on angst.
https://www.atsb.gov.au/media/5226548/198302284.pdf
https://www.atsb.gov.au/media/5226548/198302284.pdf
Last edited by machtuk; 7th Jun 2019 at 08:00.
how much better are the systems today
Folks,
Once such matters were taken out of the hands of Airservices and handed to AMSA, there has been huge improvement, but it was a lot of work to get there, and non-AMSA bureaucratic artificial obstacles in Canberra did not help.
I never cease to be amazed that the "Princes of Process" cannot grasp the idea that getting to job done (particularly where life is at stake) takes, or should take, precedence over "the imperative of approve process"..
Tootle pip!!
Once such matters were taken out of the hands of Airservices and handed to AMSA, there has been huge improvement, but it was a lot of work to get there, and non-AMSA bureaucratic artificial obstacles in Canberra did not help.
I never cease to be amazed that the "Princes of Process" cannot grasp the idea that getting to job done (particularly where life is at stake) takes, or should take, precedence over "the imperative of approve process"..
Tootle pip!!