Wednesday, October 14, 2020

Cirrus SR22T, N626BG: Accident occurred October 13, 2020 near Sutter County Airport (O52), Yuba City, California



Federal Aviation Administration / Flight Standards District Office; Sacramento, California

Aircraft ran out of fuel and deployed the parachute. 

Amazing Concepts LLC


Date: 14-OCT-20
Time: 00:10:00Z
Regis#: N626BG
Aircraft Make: CIRRUS
Aircraft Model: SR22
Highest Injury: NONE
Aircraft Missing: No
Activity: PERSONAL
Flight Phase: EN ROUTE (ENR)
Operation: 91
City: YUBA CITY
State: CALIFORNIA


SUTTER COUNTY (CBS13) — A small plane carrying three people had to deploy its parachute and make an emergency landing in rural Sutter County, authorities say.

The plane landed in a rice field near the 3900 block of Schlag Road, about 10 miles southwest of Yuba City, just after 5 p.m. Tuesday.

According to the FAA, a Cirrus SR22 pilot reported that he had run out of fuel while flying to Colusa County Airport from Hollywood Burbank Airport.

The pilot then deployed the plane’s parachute and the craft came to a rest in a field about eight miles southwest of Sutter County Airport.

From pictures taken after the plane touched down, it appears the aircraft landed upside-down.

All three people on board were not hurt in the emergency landing, the FAA says. 

Mike Shannon says he’s never seen a plane with a parachute attached. “This is a first for us,” he said.

He’s certainly never had one land in his rice field in Sutter County.

“It almost hit the wires, got past the wires and all I know it was sitting in the rice field when we found it,” he said.

Shannon rushed over to help the three people onboard Tuesday night.

“They just said we had a fuel leak and ran out of fuel, and didn’t make it to the airstrip,” Shannon said.

Winds were strong enough to move the plane again on Wednesday.

While the plane was moved from its original landing spot by Wednesday morning, winds in the area were strong enough to move the plane to another part of the field later in the day.

The FAA will be investigating the incident.

An FAA investigator who spoke with CBS13 on the scene says it was the parachute that likely saved their lives.

Gerry Sevenau works on the property and saw the landing happen.

“I thought at first they clipped the wires there, but when I looked at the plane this morning, it was on its belly. So I believe the parachute saved them,” he said.

The parachute is attached to the airframe in the center of the plane. The pilot has access to a lever or a cord that can deploy the parachute in case of an emergency.

In this case, the plane, a Cirrus SR22T, was one of the first models to use this life-saving technique. One that aviation experts say you’ll now see more often.

Augustine Joseph, CEO of JetExe Aviation said, “A lot of the newer airplanes are coming out with parachutes.”

“I didn’t know they made airplanes with parachutes, Thank God, they did,” Shannon said.

The FAA said they will need to use a crane to remove the plane from the property.

46 comments:

  1. Ran out of gas in an airplane owned by "Amazing Concepts" how ironic.

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    1. "we had a fuel leak and ran out of fuel"
      a failed PIC not admitting responsibility, and then looking for an excuse to his pax for almost sure casualties missing those wires ....

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    2. "we had a fuel leak and ran out of fuel" - that excuse ain't going to fly..yuk..yuk..yuk.

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  2. Ugh. This is going to be an expensive insurance year.

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    1. They should give you a break for not flying a cirrus. Seriously, there are enough incidents with the cirrus that they should have their own insurance rates and risk pools. The insurance carriers could do a "carve out" for the cirrus owners to separate liability risks from the recovery cost of the aircraft. The pilots that do not own a cirrus should not be penalized.

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    2. Hardly. Rather have this than a forced landing into a brick wall. Lots to criticize here, especially with fuel exhaustion, but glad there were no injuries.

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    3. Parachute systems give some pilots a false sense of security and they do boneheaded things like this and run out of fuel. Pulling the chute in a Cirrus is not a cheap fix, and that's assuming the aircraft comes down with no damage...which rarely they ever do because you don't control where you land once the handle is pulled. Trees, buildings, and parking lot vehicles are all a roll of the dice hitting.

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    4. My thoughts would be if he had a fuel leak he would have seen the gauges going down much quicker than normal as well as he would see the fuel light come on. If this was the case he would have contacted ATC and declared and emergency which none of that was done based on what we are hearing. Sounds to me like there was some errors made by the pilot and his fuel managment but it will be interesting to hear the facts once released.

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    5. Insurance rates for aircraft are determined by the risk pool, ie., other Cirrus owners. When a Cirrus is totaled, it doesn't affect similar aircraft by other manufacturers, that's silly. If someone buys a sports car by Some Company and someone else buys an SUV by Some Company, do you think the insurance rates are the same? Even for drivers with good credit and safety records? No, of course not. The only rate this accident will affect is that of other Cirrus owners.

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    6. Thank you for the clarification. It makes sense. There are probably a lot of details that will be brought to light as this incident is investigated.

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    7. unless the aircraft is a 737 max then everyone's rates are going up!

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    8. "Insurance rates for aircraft are determined by the risk pool, ie., other Cirrus owners. When a Cirrus is totaled, it doesn't affect similar aircraft by other manufacturers, that's silly."

      Well with all due respect, clearly you have never worked in the insurance industry in any capacity in any form. If you honestly believe that your automotive insurance driving a "safer" Tahoe is not subsidized for coverage for a Corvette owner in your premiums, then my guess is you would also believe that your price of retail goods from clothes to food is not padded for theft loss.

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    9. Seems like there are plenty of airplanes running out of fuel, with and without a parachute.

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  3. It's too bad the pilot didn't know there are numerous crop duster strips in the area of his chute deployment. Had he been an aware pilot and dilligent, he would have kept a landing location in his ongoing flight path. No chute deployment needed, just a simple dead stick with no damage. I hear litigation and a Cirrus mechanical shop filing NO MAS OPEN

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    1. Actually, the Cirrus training stresses "pull early, pull often" for a reason. When weighing a 99% chance of everyone on board surviving riding the chute, versus a 90% chance of survival riding it out in a situation where an airfield isn't clearly within gliding distance, I'm pulling it too.

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    2. He was over rice fields... with dirt roads nearby. And cropdusting strips... look at the video from the news, look at the pictures. There were tons of places to go. You're part of the problem if you'd pull an airframe parachute in this scenario, too.

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    3. I like this debate. As a 3000 hour cessna 172 CFI, hmmmmmm. Depends on few factors but, I'd likely look for an open field first.

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    4. Cirrus has a stall speed of 59kt in landing configuration. Cessna stalls at 43kt. Cirrus has almost 2x of energy to dissipate once it touches down.


      Let alone the risk of hitting wires on the approach, rolling on small Cirrus wheels at 68 mph in a rice field? No, thank you.

      From a Cirrus CFI.

      P.S. More damage was done by not cutting the chute after the incident. The plane landed upright, and was dragged to the ditch overnight.

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    5. Hey "Cirrus CFI," which Cirrus and Cessna aircraft are you randomly quoting stall speeds for? A G1 SR20? A G6 SR22T? A Vision jet? A C-152? A C-550?

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    6. You obviously understand the intended message. Maybe he's using speeds from the type in question which is implied and pertinent to the article we just read. When you say vision jet, do you mean the Cirrus SF50? Troll.

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  4. Fuel Leak = Possible corrosion of the fuel return lines?

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  5. @Unknown - "Had he been an aware pilot and dilligent [sic]" he would have had a better awareness of his fuel situation.

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  6. I'm glad they made it to the ground alive. We have lots of scenarios where a dead stick landing SHOULD have been possible ... but wasn't and ends in tragedy. N236KM is a good example.

    At least here we have three people alive. And who really cares if a Cirrus gets banged up? I know I don't care.

    Here we're not talking about children who no longer have parents.

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  7. "Winds were strong enough to move the plane again on Wednesday."
    I'm confused. Was the parachute still attached to the plane and allowed the plane to be dragged inverted over the ground after the incident?

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    1. Accident occurred on Tuesday. Parachute still connected on Wednesday. Unbelievable.

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    2. Insurance might not cover damage to a plane dragged around a bean field for two days ... because no one could come up with the idea to disconnect the parachute.

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    3. Sad that nobody bundled and secured the chute canopy after landing.

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    4. Once the CAPS is deployed in the Cirrus, the airplane is considered a loss. Regardless of damage level.

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    5. It's true about the loss after the deployment rips gel coat where the straps come through and the gear takes a whanging, but seems a shame to submerge a salvageable engine during the after-dragging.

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    6. "seems a shame to submerge a salvageable engine"
      Ditto for the avionics.

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  8. Strong headwinds out of the North for that trip that day....may explain the 'fuel leak'...

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  9. O08 → KBUR
    348 nm / 645 km
    Route: O08 HONEZ V23 PONDD KBUR

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    1. This could have been his planned return trip, but he was heading TO Colusa FROM Burbank
      "According to the FAA, a Cirrus SR22 pilot reported that he had run out of fuel while flying to Colusa County Airport from Hollywood Burbank Airport."










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  10. I nearly ran out of fuel in a Cirrus SR22 several years ago when a seal came apart on the fuel injection spider. Was in a very remote part of the country and noticed the fuel gauges were coming down much quicker than usual. The fuel computer showed a normal fuel burn. I opted to divert to the closest airport which was not really that close. Upon landing blue fuel stains could be seen across the cowling. I landed with about 10 gallons. Probably enough for 3 or 4 more minutes of flight. So it IS possible they had a real problem.

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    1. Apparently his math included the leak rate added in.

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    2. A strong headwind could have also led to a miscalculation.

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  11. Not to pile on, its a great lesson to the rest of us in the GA community, situational awereness is key, better fuel management, awereness of suitible runways along the flight route. CAPS is a last resort. Fly the airplane fly the airplane!

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  12. FlyQ would have shown heads up display of all fields and distance. At least pilot did not try to save the plane if not competent to do a dead stock landing. They walked away and that is what’s most important.It can be parted out.

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  13. Some fuel exhaustion events like this that happen close to the destination airport may be due to continuing on based on automotive experience bias.

    Believing that there is additional margin beyond level indications and low fuel warning trigger point is a state of mind for drivers of some auto/truck platforms and fits the 5 hazardous attitudes profile.

    Everybody knows someone who is not concerned driving a car or truck around on minimum fuel remaining. Don't fly with them...

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  14. A year + or - from the Cuba missile crises, we lost an F-106 and pilot near the tri-cities Washington state. I don't know the details why he didn't eject but the assumption was he wanted to save the airplane. I assume pilot training after that incident encouraged it's better to save the pilot and not a sick flying machine.

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    1. It was always better to save the pilot unless it was a U-2!

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  15. Pulling the CAPS for fuel exhaustion isnt something to celibrate. How many duster strips, golf airports and delta airports did they fly near, where with some humility the PIC could have or should have landede and fueles up. These loss stats just increase our insurance rates.

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  16. This one could be a repeat of the N5PF fuel starvation scenario. The N5PF pilot got distracted, stopped alternating his tank selection and flew the right tank to empty while fuel was still available in the left tank.

    The N5PF pilot did not get a FUEL caution light indication for low fuel because he still had 22 gallons in the left tank and the floats in both tanks must be lower than 14 gallons remaining to illuminate the warning.

    And he did not attempt to select the left tank and restore power on the way down. Flipped mags, pulled the chute late. Interesting to read about:

    http://www.kathrynsreport.com/2017/05/cirrus-sr-22-n5pf-accident-occurred.html

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  17. Good VFR weather and strong North winds, why didn’t he just do a off field landing on the paved County Road?

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