Zachary Rainey
~
Don and Carol Goldberg
~
Investigator In Charge (IIC): Gunther, Todd
The National Transportation Safety Board traveled to the scene of this accident.
Additional Participating Entities:
Federal Aviation Administration / Flight Standards District Office; Las Vegas, Nevada
Transportation Safety Board of Canada; Ottawa
Pratt & Whitney Canada; St. Hubert
Piper Aircraft; Vero Beach, Florida
Textron Aviation; Wichita, Kansas
National Air Traffic Controllers Association; Washington, District of Columbia
Gold Aero Aviation LLC
Location: Las Vegas, Nevada
Accident Number: ERA22FA318
Date and Time: July 17, 2022, 12:04 Local
Registration: N97CX (A1); N160RA (A2)
Aircraft: Piper PA 46-350P (A1); Cessna 172N (A2)
Injuries: 2 Fatal (A1); 2 Fatal (A2)
Flight Conducted Under: Part 91: General aviation - Personal (A1); Part 91: General aviation - Instructional (A2)
On July 17, 2022, about 1204 pacific daylight time, a Piper PA-46-350P airplane, N97CX, and a Cessna 172N airplane, N160RA, were destroyed when they were involved in an accident near Las Vegas, Nevada. The two pilots in the PA-46, and the flight instructor and student pilot in the Cessna 172, were fatally injured. The PA-46 was operated as a Title 14 Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) Part 91 personal flight, and the Cessna 172 was operated as a Title 14 CFR Part 91 instructional flight.
Both airplanes were maneuvering to land at North Las Vegas Airport (VGT), Las Vegas, Nevada, when the accident occurred. N97CX had been instructed by air traffic control (ATC) to fly left traffic for runway 30L and N160RA had been instructed to fly right traffic for runway 30R. The airplanes collided about 0.25 nautical miles from the approach end of runway 30R. Figure 1 shows a simplified flight path diagram for the accident flights based on Federal Aviation Administration Automatic Dependent Surveillance – Broadcast (ADS-B) data.
N97CX was operating as an instrument flight rules (IFR) flight and had departed from Coeur d'Alene Airport - Pappy Boyington Field (COE), Coeur d'Alene, Idaho about 0943, destined for VGT. N160RA was operating as a visual flight rules (VFR) training flight at VGT.
N160RA was in the VFR traffic pattern for runway 30R, flying a right-hand traffic pattern and communicating with the VGT local controller. N97CX was inbound from the north on an IFR flight plan from COE.
At 1156:08, the Nellis Radar Approach Control air traffic controller cleared N97CX for the visual approach and instructed the pilot to overfly VGT at midfield for left traffic to runway 30L. Air traffic control responsibility for the flight was transferred from Nellis Radar Approach Control to VGT at 1158:26.
At 1158:43, the pilot of N97CX contacted the VGT local controller and reported “descending out of 7,600 feet msl for landing on three zero left and ah Nellis said to cross midfield.” The VGT local controller responded, “continue for three zero left.” The pilot acknowledged and stated, “okay continue for runway three zero left nine seven charlie x-ray we will cross over midfield.”
At 1200:03, the pilot of N160RA requested a “short approach.” The VGT local controller transmitted “zero romeo alpha short approach approved runway three zero right cleared for the option,” which was acknowledged by N160RA.
At 1201:36, the VGT local controller transmitted “november seven charlie x-ray runway three zero left cleared to land.” The pilot of N97CX responded “three zero left cleared to land nine seven charlie x-ray.”
At 1201:57, the VGT local controller transmitted “seven charlie x-ray I think I said it right runway three zero left seven charlie x-ray runway three zero left.”
At 1202:02 the pilot of N97CX transmitted “yeah affirmative runway three zero left that’s what i heard nine seven charlie x-ray”.
There were no further transmissions from either airplane.
Examination of N97CX revealed that the airplane impacted in a nose low, right wing down attitude. The landing gear was down, and the right main landing gear was displaced outboard. The right wing displayed an impact separation around wing station (WS) 93. The right inboard wing section remained attached to the fuselage but was canted aft. The right wing flap was fractured about midspan; the inboard section remained attached to the wing and was found in the extended position. The outboard half of the flap was found about 10 ft forward of the right wing.
The right wing leading edge displayed a series of crush impressions to the leading edge about 2.5 ft outboard of the wing root. The impressions contained flakes of green primer, and cuts to the de-ice boot.
The outboard right wing section remained attached to the inboard wing by the aileron control cables. The aileron remained attached to the outboard wing section but was impact damaged. The outboard leading edge was crushed up and aft. The right wingtip fairing and pitot tube were also impact separated. Longitudinal scratches were visible along the right side of the fuselage.
Examination of N160RA revealed that, the airplane had impacted terrain in a left-wing and nose-low attitude before coming to rest inverted on a 304°magnetic heading. Both inboard portions of the wings sustained thermal damage in the areas surrounding the fuel tanks, and the cabin and fuselage, except for the cabin roof, were consumed by a post-impact fire.
Blue paint transfer was observed on the lower surface of the separated outboard left wing and the lower surface of the left wing flap. Black de-ice boot material transfer was observed on the lower surface of the separated outboard left wing, the lower surface of the attached portion of the left wing at approximately WS 100, and for an approximate 5 ft long distance outboard of the strut attach point, along the lower leading edge.
About 4 ft of the left wing, which included the left aileron, was separated from the left wing, and was found on the edge of a culvert just south of the main wreckage. The left outboard wing section aft of the forward spar was found to be separated near the aileron-flap junction. The left wing flap was found to be separated from the wing.
The wreckage of both airplanes was retained for further examination.
Aircraft and Owner/Operator Information (A1)
Aircraft Make: Piper
Registration: N97CX
Model/Series: PA 46-350P
Aircraft Category: Airplane
Amateur Built:
Operator: On file
Operating Certificate(s) Held: None
Operator Designator Code:
Aircraft and Owner/Operator Information (A2)
Aircraft Make: Cessna
Registration: N160RA
Model/Series: 172N
Aircraft Category: Airplane
Amateur Built:
Operator:
Operating Certificate(s) Held: None
Operator Designator Code:
Meteorological Information and Flight Plan
Conditions at Accident Site: VMC
Condition of Light: Day
Observation Facility, Elevation: KVGT,2190 ft msl
Observation Time: 11:53 Local
Distance from Accident Site: 0 Nautical Miles
Temperature/Dew Point: 38°C /12°C
Lowest Cloud Condition: Clear
Wind Speed/Gusts, Direction: 4 knots / , 320°
Lowest Ceiling: None
Visibility: 10 miles
Altimeter Setting: 29.91 inches Hg
Type of Flight Plan Filed:
Departure Point:
Destination:
Wreckage and Impact Information (A1)
Crew Injuries: 2 Fatal
Aircraft Damage: Destroyed
Passenger Injuries: N/A
Aircraft Fire: None
Ground Injuries: N/A
Aircraft Explosion: None
Total Injuries: 2 Fatal
Latitude, Longitude:
36.210703,-115.19444
Wreckage and Impact Information (A2)
Crew Injuries: 2 Fatal
Aircraft Damage: Destroyed
Passenger Injuries: N/A
Aircraft Fire: On-ground
Ground Injuries: N/A
Aircraft Explosion: None
Total Injuries: 2 Fatal
Latitude, Longitude: 36.210703,-115.19444
Those who may have information that might be relevant to the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) investigation may contact them by email witness@ntsb.gov, and any friends and family who want to contact investigators about the accident should email assistance@ntsb.gov. You can also call the NTSB Response Operations Center at 844-373-9922 or 202-314-6290.
Federal Aviation Administration / Flight Standards District Office; Las Vegas, Nevada
Midair collision with N160RA during landing.
Date: 17-JUL-22
Time: 19:00:00Z
Regis#: N97CX
Aircraft Make: PIPER
Aircraft Model: PA46
Event Type: ACCIDENT
Highest Injury: FATAL
Total Fatal: 2
Flight Crew: 1 Fatal
Pax: 1 Fatal
Activity: PERSONAL
Flight Phase: LANDING (LDG)
Operation: 91
Aircraft Missing: No
Damage: DESTROYED
City: LAS VEGAS
State: NEVADA
Federal Aviation Administration / Flight Standards District Office; Las Vegas, Nevada
Midair collision with N97CX during landing.
Date: 17-JUL-22
Time: 19:00:00Z
Regis#: N160RA
Aircraft Make: CESSNA
Aircraft Model: 172
Event Type: ACCIDENT
Highest Injury: FATAL
Total Fatal: 2
Flight Crew: 1 Fatal
Pax: 1 Fatal
Activity: PERSONAL
Flight Phase: LANDING (LDG)
Operation: 91
Aircraft Missing: No
Damage: DESTROYED
City: LAS VEGAS
State: NEVADA
~
The Clark County Coroner identified the last victim as 40-year-old Anthony Chiaramonti.
LAS VEGAS (KSNV) — The Clark County Medical Examiner's Office released the names of two of the four people killed in a midair collision between two planes at the North Las Vegas Airport (VGT) on July 17.
Donald Goldberg, 82, and Carol Scanlon, 76, both of Las Vegas, were identified as the pilot and passenger, respectively, of the larger Piper PA-46 Malibu aircraft.
Though the coroner didn’t make it clear, James Holden, a close friend and fellow pilot at VGT, said the two were married for 26 years. Both of them were pilots.
“Just a tragedy and just full of life,” Holden said. “Wonderful people. Everybody at the airport here, which is a very tight community—we have lunch upstairs every Thursday—everybody's devastated.”
Holden said he knew the Goldbergs for the past seven years and flew with them just about every weekend. According to Holden, the VGT pilot community is a tight-knit group that often dined together and flew together.
He said it’s unique amongst airports, making Sunday’s accident all the more heartbreaking.
Holden leads a fly-out group every Saturday from VGT and said he’s flown in the Goldberg’s airplane and they’ve flown in his.
Holden said he had just left the airport on Sunday when he got the call about the collision. Minutes later, someone called and confirmed one of the aircraft involved was a Piper Malibu airplane. It was the larger and faster of the two planes involved.
Holden only knows of two Malibu planes at VGT, so he knew right away that his friends, the Goldbergs, had died. He said they were humorous people but serious pilots.
“Sadness, grief, tragedy,” he said. “There’s just not enough—strong enough words to say it.”
It’s too early for specifics, but Holden said he plans to memorialize and honor the Goldbergs inside the North Las Vegas Airport terminal in some form or another.
The Clark County coroner hasn’t released the names of the two victims in the other aircraft yet, but according to social media posts and a GoFundMe from friends and family, one victim is identified as Zach Rainey, who leaves behind two young boys.
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) will release their preliminary investigation in the next few weeks.
Competing in a four-day, women-only transcontinental air race, Carol Scanlon-Goldberg, MS '83, follows a path plied by some of history's greatest aviatrixes.
Carol Scanlon-Goldberg, MS '83, has more than 60 books about flying.
There's Flight of Passage and Sagittarius Rising, Flying South: A Pilot's Journey and Wind, Sand and Stars. And then there's Daughter of the Air. Published in 1999, it's a biography of Cornelia Fort, a pilot during World War II in the Women's Auxiliary Ferrying Squadron and likely the first American pilot to see Japanese Zeros on their way to Pearl Harbor. In 1943 at age 24, Ms. Fort became the first U.S. female pilot killed on active duty.
Ms. Scanlon-Goldberg is a pilot, too, ever since she paid $27 in June 1994 to pass an off-day in Lubbock, Texas, sitting left seat in a prop plane 1,500 feet above the cradle of Buddy Holly.
She says she struggles to describe the transcendentalism of being a flyer—"I'm not a poet. There are so many people that have such gorgeous quotes, but I'm not one of them"—but, really, she's not so bereft of poetry.
"It's like," Ms. Scanlon-Goldberg says, "you're flying in the hands of God."
Still, she prefers the words of Cornelia Fort.
"I loved the sky and the planes, and yet, best of all, I loved flying," Ms. Scanlon-Goldberg reads from Daugher of the Air. "I loved it best perhaps because it taught me utter self-sufficiency, the ability to remove oneself beyond the keep of anyone at all, and in doing so, it taught me what was of value and what was not."
This past June, nearly 21 years from her first flying lesson, Ms. Scanlon-Goldberg competed in the Air Race Classic, a women-only, 2,400-mile transcontinental prop plane derby founded in 1929 by women like Ms. Fort, those first, beatified aviatrixes—Pancho Barnes, Louise Thaden and Amelia Earhart.
"They were out to inspire other women and to prove that not only men could do challenges, but women could do challenges, too—and survive," Ms. Scanlon-Goldberg says. "To be part of that history was just amazing." Ms. Scanlon-Goldberg and her friend and teammate, Tamra Sheffman, finished 40th out of 54 teams, flying a Cessna 182P. The race started in Fredericksburg, Va., and finished in Fairhope, Ala.
For the slight, 70-year-old Ms. Scanlon- Goldberg, a cross-country air race was just something that you do.
Born at an Army airfield in Michigan, she grew up in North Jersey, the daughter of a World War II bomber pilot, reading adventure novels and riding horses while her classmates went to Friday night football games.
Since retiring in 2005 to Fort Lauderdale, Fla., with her husband and fellow pilot, Donald Goldberg, after a 22-year career as a nursing home administrator in southern California, Ms. Scanlon-Goldberg has traveled to Cambodia, India, Norway, Russia, Sweden and all over Europe. She bussed the Blarney Stone in Ireland and rode an elephant in Sri Lanka. ("An elephant is an amazing creature," she says. "Have you ridden one lately?")
A lifelong equestrian and former barrel racer, Ms. Scanlon-Goldberg once faced down a Brahman bull, as Hemingway might a male lion, while retrieving a lost earring in a rodeo arena. Then there was the time she snorkeled (accidentally) with a bull shark in the Bahamas.
"I was over a reef, and everyone else swam back to the boat, and I didn't pay attention until I looked up and no one else was there except for myself and this gentleman swimming underneath," Ms. Scanlon-Goldberg says. "That was a little too close for comfort. I guess he wasn't hungry."
As a female pilot, her chemistry all molecules of zest and idealism, she has eyed the ARC for two decades.
That first Women's Air Derby, also known as the Powder Puff Derby, was a seminal moment for female aviators. The inaugural race, run from Santa Monica, Calif., to Cleveland, had a 20-woman field and featured a pantheon of firstgeneration female flyers. Ms. Earhart was the first woman to fly solo over the Atlantic Ocean. Ms. Barnes was the first female Hollywood stunt pilot. Ms. Thaden won the 1936 Bendix Transcontinental Air Race in its first-ever co-ed running.
"Men were playing an important role in aviation at the time, setting records and coming up with new aircraft, and the women weren't really allowed to race with the men," says Dianna Stanger, director of the Air Race Classic, two-time ARC winner and fighter jet owner. (Her Aero L-39 Albatros still has the missile-fire switch but, for legal reasons, is unarmed). "Some of the earlier racers that you'll see from the 1929 Powder Puff are pretty aggressive women, and they decided if they weren't allowed to play with the men, they'd make their own race. And that's what they did."
The purpose of the race—held on and off since its inception and every year since 1977, when it was renamed the Air Race Classic— is the same as 1929: advocate, encourage and promote women in aviation.
Modern racers, Ms. Stanger says, know the history and what the first derbies meant to their forebears—one of whom, 29-year-old Marvel Crosson, died in the 1929 race when her plane crashed in the Arizona desert—and what it still means to the latter-day aviatrixes, especially when, according to 2013 Federal Aviation Administration data (the most recent available), only 6.6 percent of the 599,086 licensed U.S. pilots are female.
Last summer, Carol Scanlon-Goldberg, MS '83, completed a 2,400-mile air race, of which Amelia Earhart is an alum.
Carol Scanlon-Goldberg
"When I was young, there were things I couldn't do," Ms. Scanlon-Goldberg says. "When I was doing my bachelor's program, I remember, I always liked to volunteer for things, and I ended up being in charge of the advertising committee at Fairleigh Dickinson [University]—or the club. But because I was a female in the '60s, I wasn't allowed to go to the conventions because women weren't allowed. And then you see these young women [in the ARC]. I mean, the whole world has opened up."
The Air Race Classic, handicapped by plane and skill level so everyone has a chance to win, is open to all female pilots. Racers supply their own planes, the fastest of which go about 200 mph. It costs about $10,000 for the 10-day event, but teams can get sponsors. Four days are for racing. The other six are for safety courses, briefings and debriefings.
The teams plan their own routes and use modern avionics, unlike the early racers who consulted charts in lieu of iPads. The race is designed to make competitors navigate all terrains and altitudes, going as low as 200 feet and as high 18,000, the maximum allowed by the Federal Aviation Administration. Any higher and racers would have to file flight plans and worry about oxygen, pressurizing cabins and colliding with jet airliners.
Most importantly, the race just helps women fly.
"I think the early participants would be happy with what it's become," says Ms. Stanger.
Ms. Scanlon-Goldberg thinks so, too, but she, always careful of language, stops at calling herself an aviatrix. To her, it's an old word, aged by honor and akin to saint.
"I think of an aviatrix as Amelia Earhart, as Pancho Barnes, as the amazing women during World War II that ferried pilots to airplanes," Ms. Scanlon-Goldberg says. "To me, they are the aviatrixes. They're the ones that had set out and done so many wonderful things that the rest of us only dream of. So I just think of myself as normal, everyday pilot who's a female, who loves to fly."
A daughter of the air.
LAS VEGAS, Nevada — Two victims who died in Sunday’s collision between two small planes at the North Las Vegas airport have been identified by the Clark County Coroner’s office.
Donald Stuart Goldberg, 82, of Las Vegas, and Carol Ann Scanlon, 76, also from Las Vegas both died from blunt trauma, according to the coroner. Goldberg was the pilot and Scanlon was a passenger aboard the Piper PA-46.
Four people were killed in Sunday’s crash when the Piper-PA 46 collided with a Cessna 172 as both single-engine airplanes were preparing to land.
Two other people were killed in the Cessna. Family members identified Zach Rainey, 47, as one of the victims. He was flying with his flight instructor at the time of the crash. The coroner has yet to release the flight instructor’s information.
The crash is being investigated by the Federal Aviation Administration and National Transportation Safety Board.
LAS VEGAS, Nevada — Family and friends are remembering 47-year-old Zachary Rainey who was one of the four who died in a plane crash at North Las Vegas Airport.
Friends identified him as one of the victims. Carter Sing says Rainey was a best friend.
He says Rainey was a local real estate agent who leaves behind two boys. He also says Rainey was learning to become a pilot and he was using a flight training plane involved in the crash.
He tells us that Rainey was a few flights away from getting his license.
National Transportation Safety Board investigators arrived to Las Vegas Monday afternoon. An official from the agency says they will be looking for crash witnesses and video of the moments leading up to the incident.
They say the preliminary report could take 2-3 days, and the cause of the investigation won’t be known for up to a year or two.
Clark County has not released the names of the other three victims.
Piper PA-46-350P Malibu Mirage, N97CX
Cessna 172N Skyhawk, N160RA
Cessna 172N Skyhawk, N160RA: Incident occurred October 12, 2020 at North Las Vegas Airport (KVGT), Clark County, Nevada
Federal Aviation Administration / Flight Standards District Office; Las Vegas, Nevada
October 12, 2020: Aircraft landed and struck a taxiway light.
Binner Enterprises LLC
Date: 12-OCT-20
Time: 17:10:00Z
Regis#: N160RA
Aircraft Make: CESSNA
Aircraft Model: 172
Event Type: INCIDENT
Highest Injury: NONE
Aircraft Missing: No
Damage: MINOR
Activity: PERSONAL
Flight Phase: LANDING (LDG)
Operation: 91
City: LAS VEGAS
State: NEVADA
https://archive.liveatc.net/kvgt/KVGT2-Jul-17-2022-1900Z.mp3?fbclid=IwAR2hm1RfJI7866ppfbI140WmCEAol2xI9yj6ESWKv_7aRHeAG7UUPgkjoJE live atc recording
ReplyDeleteThe Skyhawk was instructed to land on 30R and the Jetprop on 30L, Jetprop's flightradar shows him approaching 30R instead, where the collision occurred.
97CXs circling midfield steep 260 degree left turning bank onto very short final obscured left seat PICs view. Just my opinion, ATC should be faulted for approving such an approach.
DeleteHere is the ADS-B track of both planes: https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=ad8194,a0f326&lat=36.201&lon=-115.184&zoom=17.3&showTrace=2022-07-17&trackLabels×tamp=1658084567
DeleteThe Malibu Mirage is definitely at fault here. It looks like they lined up on 30R instead of 30L and hit the Skyhawk from behind and from the left, and were slightly higher, pretty much impossible for the Skyhawk to see.
The controller could have told the Malibu to continue on a SW heading and he would call his turn, as soon as the 172 was safely near the numbers...He could have seen that that mixing in a fast Malibu with a 172, even on different runways was going to be a risk.....
DeleteThanks for the links. You can hear the controller remind 7CX to land on 30L just 48 seconds before the collision, 15 seconds after first clearing 7CX to land. Very sad, very preventable, but I think there will be a lot of lessons for the LAS TRACON and GA traffic.
DeleteThe ADS-B paths show the story. 7CX was too fast and turned on downwind and then base/final way too early. Un-stabilized approach. Tried to rush it in there, overshot 30L, or got confused, and tragedy. Controller could have called/extended the base turn, but also wouldn't have expected speed to be as high and turns to be as tight. Just look at the patterns by the 172 vs. the path 7CX took, and in a faster plane no less. Condolences to the families.
Delete7CX wasn't a Jetprop as stated above, it's a piston Lycoming 540.
DeleteJetprop. https://www.aircraft.com/aircraft/1193693/n97cx-1997-piper-jetprop
Delete"AnonymousSunday, July 17, 2022 at 8:41:00 PM EDT
Delete97CXs circling midfield steep 260 degree left turning bank onto very short final obscured left seat PICs view. Just my opinion, ATC should be faulted for approving such an approach."
Completely disagree! Pilot decides when and where the downwind is. They could have made a 5 mile downwind turn and 5 mile base leg if that's what the plane/pilot needed. On radar it looks like a perfect 260° turn to the wrong runway. Controller is not the pilot. Pilot is at fault. Hopefully NTSB can figure out why it happened so we can all be a little safer...
>97CXs circling midfield steep 260 degree left turning bank onto very
Delete>short final obscured left seat PICs view. Just my opinion, ATC should
>be faulted for approving such an approach.
Your 'opinion' is completely unfounded as others have noted. The PIC is responsible for knowing what they and their aircraft can and can not do. ATC granted the approach, it is not up to them to magically know the entire range of airplane and pilot capabilities.
If you are not in a position to do an approach or can not do it, say UNABLE.
This is 97CX negligence, pure and simple, based on the data that is provided so far. Expect many lawsuits against their estate.
Ah no, it’s a turboprop,
DeleteNot a piston.
FAA website says Lycoming TIO-540, that's a recip, not a turbine.
Delete"This is 97CX negligence, pure and simple, based on the data that is provided so far. Expect many lawsuits against their estate."
DeleteThat's jumping to conclusions.. easy! For all you know pilot may have been in the middle of a medical emergency. Although I see you're point, "negligence" without proof is quite unfounded. Pilot error? Yes. But negligence? That remains to be seen. I've known many pilots in over a decade of flying. I've never met a negligent pilot. To err is human, but pilots always have the safe outcome of the flight at heart. The pilot of the Malibu was not in her tragic pattern. The real questions is "why?"
You have to learn to ignore the people who say it can only be one thing before the wreckage has cooled.
DeleteFAA website is wrong. You can clearly see the exhaust stacks in multiple photos including the crash images. It’s a turbine.
Delete“Completely disagree! Pilot decides when and where the downwind is.”
DeleteNot in a class D they don’t. ATC approved this nonsense in busy airspace likely because they knew the pilot from listening to the non-aviation related discussions they had (you can find it on YouTube). If I asked for an overhead breaking 270-degree entry with several other planes in the pattern at the Delta I am based out of, I would have gotten “vectors for spacing” to be last in line, guaranteed. Yes, ATC *can* approve this, but they sure as heck don’t have to. And approving it with traffic landing on parallel runways is just absurd. As we can see from the outcome.
VFR traffic is always responsible for separation. Blaming ATC 100% isn't right. Did the advise "traffic for the parallel?"
DeleteThis is not on ATC in my opinion. They approved the jetprop to do a short approach. The Pilot in Command (PIC) decided to do an ultrashort approach basically just doing one continuous turn on to the wrong runway even though the person on the radio (who may not have been PIC) read back the runway they were cleared to land on. If you look at the track log, ATC only had AT MOST 5 seconds from when it was obvious they were lining up for the wrong runway until impact. The tower controller is not just looking at one plane, they are monitoring a lot of different activities. Things went wrong in just a few seconds because of pilot error on the part of the jet prop. Tragic accident, and even more tragic for the innocent Cessna pilot and instructor who were following their clearances exactly and did not deserve this to happen to them. The pilot was also way too fast coming over the runway at midfield. I've flown this type plane (well a Meridian but similar) and there was no need to be coming in so hot and doing such a tight turn to final with no margin for error especially with other traffic landing on a parallel runway. Bordering on reckless in my opinion.
DeleteWow, seems like an unstabilized and reckless approach from the Malibu. Even if the Skyhawk was checking the opposing base before turning final, that would have been tough to see.
ReplyDeleteThis has hallmarks of the Centennial mid-air: a pilot coming in fast and overshooting the turn.
I disagree. Looks like a perfect approach to the wrong runway
DeleteThere is no such thing as a perfect approach to the wrong runway.
Delete"Perfect approach" wow. Where in the AIM does it describe a circling pattern like this? I'm curious, here I've been teaching my students to fly a pattern and stuff, and the importance of using the base leg to verify your stability and look for potential traffic entering the pattern in a non-standard manner. I teach high-performance transitions, BTW, not primary students.
DeleteThis airport has a history of problems . Way too many aircraft in the pattern. That's about the only similarity with Centennial. I would not focus on unstabilized approach at all. He stabilized directly into another plane.
ReplyDeleteRight - This is landing surface misidentification and lapse in situational awareness in a dense traffic pattern, not an unstabilized approach.
DeleteFirst impressions of this tragic crash: Cessna 0RA was minding its own business, doing pattern work, about to land or perhaps fly the option. Piper 7CX is cleared to land on 30L, but because of the angle of the Piper's tight turn to final from the overhead entry, the pilot didn't see the Cessna under her (assuming she was PF) right wing. I'm not familiar with this cockpit, but photos show there are enough obstructions to lead me to suspect that 7CX leveled the wings 10 seconds early. That put 30R directly in front, with 0RA ahead (at 7CX's one o'clock) and slightly below (visually behind the panel or pillar)... Unfortunately, that sounds like a common case of "tunnel vision" from a very experienced pilot, after flying to Vegas from Spokane, WA, cruising for hours at 23,000 ft, probably tired and anxious to get on the ground... You can finish the thought.
It's a recipe for disaster, even before you consider the Controller's apparent failure to provide useful traffic advisories in the period from 1900 to 1903Z (collision was approximately at 19:02:50 UTC, around noon here). 0RA never had a chance. Never saw it coming and had plenty of fuel in the tank to do training maneuvers. 7CX didn't explode because most of the fuel would have been spent on the trip. It looked survivable in the fuselage but apparently not in the cockpit. Deeply tragic and preventable, and a very clear reminder that VGT has a safety issue.
Text explicitly states HE was the pilot. "Donald Stuart Goldberg, 82, of Las Vegas, and Carol Ann Scanlon, 76, ... Goldberg was the pilot and Scanlon was a passenger aboard the Piper PA-46"
DeleteMy comment was written before that information was released.
DeleteI wouldn’t go by the text. At this point they have no way of knowing who was at the controls during the approach and/or who was acting PIC. They may only know where each was sitting, but as both were rated pilots, the sole manipulator could go either way. That may not come out until the NTSB report.
DeleteVegasKing, you provided the most cogent early analysis here and you still haven’t been proven wrong. I can’t think of a way that even the NTSB will be able to work out in two years which of the CX pilots made that aerobatic entry to final on the wrong runway.
DeleteThank you, but I was merely putting together the most coherent explanation I could given the information others sourced or provided. I also used the LiveATC and ADS-B data.
DeleteUltimately, it may not be that important in this particular incident which individual was PF or PM. Both were considerably experienced and familiar with the Vegas TCA. Regardless of who had the controls, if our information is correct, it appears either pilot on board 7CX could and should have been able to prevent it. It's not like a situation in which there is a significant experience gap between the PF and PM, such as a student and instructor.
I see occasional references to accidents by older pilots who may have cognitive decline. This will always be a problem because such pilots are not aware of their decline. As a group, older pilots are often referred to as possibly having a medical emergency, etc. The medical exam does not include evaluation of these types of problems, when it should be the primary consideration for older pilots.
DeleteCurious to know if ATC gave a parallel traffic warning to either aircraft and to report them in sight? Should be common practice right?
ReplyDeleteYes, and at VGT they usually do. But that's really inconsequential as the pilot of the Malibu would have heard there were other aircrafts cleared for other runways. ATC does not levitate pilot's responsibility for situational awareness. Overfly midfield above pattern and enter downwind is a very common practice at both controlled and uncontrolled airports. It's up to the pilot to begin the turn to downwind, base, and final. Yet she lined up for the wrong runway! Not sure if she purposely lined up for 30R, or speed was too high on the turn to make 30L, but the Malibu is at fault. ATC did everything right, here...
DeleteThere are so many things wrong with your comment I don’t know where to begin but, I’ll do my best. First off you can’t assume the Malibu pilot was even paying attention to what other aircraft were doing or where they were on final approach to any runway they were cleared to land on or how many were cleared to land. Controllers can issue multiple clearances to land on the same runway as long as they are separated. It is not only crucial, it is required for controllers to issue traffic alerts when in their judgment aircraft in close proximity to each other may pose a hazard. A pilot may not have total situational awareness without traffic advisories from a controller even with adsb in the cockpit. It’s true overflying midfied into a downwind is a common practice (I do it quite often) and it’s true that it’s up to the pilot to decide when to turn to final AFTER being cleared to land. But, it’s good controller judgement as to when to issue that clearance. And that would be after ensuring no conflicts with other traffic. The Malibu pilot may be at fault for making a wide base turn to 30L or even lining up on 30R, but could have a simple traffic advisory make him more aware?
DeleteThe number one responsibility of an air traffic controller is to prevent the collision between aircraft. At towered airports it’s the controllers that control the traffic not the pilots. Controllers don’t just let the pilots do what they want without their approval. I was a controller for over 33 years and I have been fortunate to never have witnessed an event like this or up in Denver. I ha be seen situation that would have developed into a scenario like this if it weren’t for the controller making that one crucial transmission that gave the the pilot that ‘oh shit’ wake-up.
We’ll let the NTSB do their investigation, analyze their findings and write their reports. I’ve seen many comments blaming the controller or the pilot. This looks to me like one of those ‘break the chain’ of errors that anyone could have prevented. But from my initial observations from what is known it looks like both the Malibu pilot and controller share in this accident.
The pics of the 172 are just awful. There are 2 people in there somewhere.
ReplyDeleteLooks like a pretty hot and aggressive pattern entry for a tower controlled airport.
ReplyDeleteInitial Observations fwiw High Wing Low Wing Overhead Entry ATC Situational Awareness. It appears to have occurred approx. at 1900UTC. Was there a Local Control Position Relief Briefing going on at the time??? 33 years ago I was taught Overhead Entries can KILL. imho.
ReplyDeleteThey can, when you're entering a pattern on top of someone. But these are opposite patterns! The Malibu's pattern was clear! The question is, why was the Malibu not in it? Malibu was on final for 30R, not 30L...
Deleteoverhead entries are very common in vgt on the 30's. they don't have a lot of room south of the field to maneuver traffic
Delete1st comment sums it up. Terrible tragedy. A very experienced Piper PA-46 pilot attempted to land on the wrong runway.
ReplyDeleteWatch the FAA safety video from 9 months ago... It warns about the two most likely factors of this tragedy: landing surface misidentification and loss of traffic awareness in a dense pattern. I was considering whether to do my flying out of VGT or HND. I think I'll be staying in Henderson.
ReplyDeleteCactus Aviation is definitely the best place to train in the valley.
DeleteThanks! I've heard great things about Cactus, but I'm planning on joining Desert Flying Club at HND. They specialize in LSA, and I'm not going for a PPL (please don't be one of those people who immediately assumes I didn't consider it as the first option haha).
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
DeleteWhen you rush to fly, people die. This is going to be a case of carelessness, and it will be a good one for the aviation psychologists and an AOPA video.
ReplyDeleteWe operated a beech C23 Sundowner out of Midway KMDW for 4 years. I have also given a lot of dual from that busy airport. It is one of the busiest SWA operations in the country. Parallel runways. We get lots of "Over the top"- then a downwind to the runways in use. The controllers there keep a close eye on the mix of 75kt vs. 142Kt arrivals. We never had a problem, however the airline guys were always turning 7-8 mile finals to follow the localizer, and there was little chance of them drifting into our runway, and we were sequenced so that if we even looked like were drifting over to their runway....there was time to correct the situation. They never allowed us to turn from base to final with a 737 next to us...this terrible accident may be a mix of poor pilot technique and poor controlling.....RIP
ReplyDeleteI don't understand how the controller could possibly sequence them together to turn them into each other more perfectly, tho
DeleteI fly into KMDW once a week in my TTx, tower cleared me countless times next to 737s on final parallel runway.
DeleteAbsolutely. 7CX sounds confident. Overconfident. Confidence -> Complacency. It's easy to forget you're in the most critical phase of flight for See and Avoid, and also to rely too much on the tower to protect you, especially at a Delta with tight spaces. The controller isn't the one moving through space at 100mph hundreds of feet above the ground.
ReplyDeleteAlso, if you listen to the Youtube ATC recording, you'll hear a random person on tower frequency start unprofessionally chatting with the 7CX pilot and asking a non-essential personal question, in blatant violation of the sterile cockpit rule. When an aircraft is on a challenging approach to parallel runways at a busy airport, you should not be chatting them up about non-flight related topics on the tower frequency. This happens way too often.
DeleteI only listened to 3 minutes around the crash. If true, that's going to be really bad for the Controller and Facility, even though we know it's all too common everywhere.
Delete7CX female voice does not have a pilot rating
DeleteA lot of people disagreeing with you on that
DeleteI first researched this incident and listened to ATC recording of conversation . I heard someone making conversations outside the task at hand, this would make for a distraction.
DeleteSince the man and woman in 97CX were personal friends of mine, I can say with almost 100 % certainty that the man was in the left seat and the pilot flying. The female usually does the talking on the radio. The airplane was based there and they were familiar with the airport. While she does not usually fly the airplane, she does hold a private certificate with ASEL, ASES, and AMEL and Instrument ratings. Both her and her husband went to recurrent training on the airplane every year.
DeleteThe male held Comm ASMEL and Instrument ratings and also a current CFI for Single and Multiengine and Instrument instructor.
I flew with him in that airplane several times and he was a thoughtful and prudent pilot who usually was well prepared. Of course I cannot account for why he did end up lined up on 30R.
I am sorry for your loss. His mistake or not, which we can only guess at now, that will do nothing to diminish the pain. Experienced pilots make mistakes (all pilots make mistakes), and there have been many times that disaster was averted by a matter of luck, and there are times when the luck isn't there. There will certainly be lessons to learn, but even an experienced pilot can make a mistake rushing to get down after a long high-altitude trip. Heck, experience can lead to complacency, which can lead to fatal errors.
DeleteMy condolences again.
My initial thought was that this had to be the controller's fault because this is a towered airport, but the controller cleared CX correctly to provide separation, and the pilot deviated from the clearance. CX called back the 30L clearance multiple times, including when the controller repeated it when he probably saw CX deviating. Unfortunately, controllers can't prevent pilot error.
ReplyDeleteAfter listening to the LiveATC recording, does anyone else think that CX made a radio call after impact?
Remember, for VFR aircraft in Class D an ATC tower is only required to provide runway separation (the pavement, not the finals). The controller should be providing traffic advisories and safety alerts however.
DeleteA previous comment about the TRACON doesn’t fit the situation here (going into Class D). At best, the TRACON controller can provide a traffic call before shipping the plane to the Class D TWR.
Keep that head on a swivel!
https://www.faa.gov/air_traffic/publications/atpubs/aim_html/chap3_section_2.html
I didn't hear anything at the time of the crash - 1902Z around 50 or 52 seconds. Controller is going to be torn up about this, because this is a cascading failures incident. Yes, it looks like 7CX made the pivotal error, but it was preventable by Tower. From 1700 to 1703Z, I didn't hear any traffic advisories or parallel approach advisory. It's not required, but we don't protect lives by striving for the bare minimum. In fact, I hear an astonishing amount of dead air for what is typically a very busy pattern on a Sunday at noon. Controller clearly saw a deviation but didn't recognize the urgency... and things happen fast. Instinct matters.
DeleteTruly sad that 0RA never had a chance to recover - just the wrong place at the wrong time. I anticipate my own mistakes, but it's scarier that I can't participate others' (even experienced pilots like 7CX).
After impact a female voice (presumably) in the tower appears to ask CX to say souls on board, consistent with them declaring an emergency.
DeleteThat's also consistent with someone in the tower asking the Controller how many bodies or victims to look out for.
DeleteIf you listen to the recording in real time without silence removed, you'll hear the "souls on board" transmission for 7CX was broadcast about 8-10 minutes after the accident. I assume it was wishful thinking?
DeleteI heard the controller’s radio call too and it sounded like the controller was responding to a call rather than initiating one. That made me think that one of the occupants of CX may have survived long enough to make an emergency call, but the explanations we have had here about what happens to the body after blunt force trauma show that any call would have been in vain.
DeleteLiving people on aircraft are called "souls." Aircraft often transport the deceased so this is to clarify how many living people are on board. It is the total number of living passengers, pilots, and crew onboard. In an accident, it is the number of living people to be searched for, rescued, triaged or recovered.
DeleteThe voice you hear on the ATC broadcast is the pilot’s wife, I do not believe she was a pilot, and is not listed as one in the FAA database. Her husband had something like 30 years experience in various PA46 models. To add to the irony, the PA-46 was returning to VGT from a weekend Malibu/Meridian safety seminar held in Coeur d’Alene. We also attended, and last saw them at our group dinner on Saturday night. This weekend was the first and now last time I ever met them and while it certainly looks like the PA46 was at fault here the fact that they even bothered to attend a safety seminar says a lot about their approach to flying. Unfortunately good people make bad mistakes.
ReplyDeleteI believe she was a pilot and even had magazine articles published about her as such.
DeleteThe wife was a pilot also and even had her own airplane also based at VGT.
DeleteThat's truly sad. Every one of these incidents is a sobering reminder that it can happen to anyone, even the smartest and most experienced pilots. Like experienced drivers who, in a moment of distraction, assume someone hasn't merged into their blind spot and forget to check. That one little glance... One little peek over the dashboard...
DeleteFirst of all you don't know who the "Pilot In Command" was at the time. Both husband and wife are pilots. The wife has been flying since 1994. Her Pilot's License is in her maiden name. She is
DeletePRIVATE PILOT
AIRPLANE SINGLE ENGINE LAND
AIRPLANE SINGLE ENGINE SEA
AIRPLANE MULTIENGINE LAND
INSTRUMENT AIRPLANE
Appreciate the correction as to her qualifications. My spouse, who is also a pilot, talked with her during dinner where she made the remark [which in retrospect was probably in modesty] that “I just work the radios”.
DeleteBetween that and being unable to find her in the database led to an incorrect assumption
Yes, the text clearly states who was PIC on this flight: "Donald Stuart Goldberg, 82, of Las Vegas, and Carol Ann Scanlon, 76, ... Goldberg was the pilot and Scanlon was a passenger aboard the Piper PA-46
DeleteI am curious the PA 46 fuselage seems pretty intact, why would they have died? head injuries? not wearing seat belts?
ReplyDeleteKinetic energy: Energy possessed by an object due to its motion. Function of the object's mass (M) and its velocity (V) thus KE = 1/2 MV2
DeleteChronology of the impact: Slow, gradual forces cause a progressive compression and the energy can be slowly absorbed, resulting in minor damage
Rapid or sudden forces result in a rapid transfer of energy to the body, frequently exceeding tissue resistance and producing more severe injuries
Energy transfer: injuries can develop in body areas far from the point of impact due to the transfer of energy within the body (e.g. ring fracture of the skull in a subject who falls from a height and hits the ground with the sacrum)
https://www.pathologyoutlines.com/topic/forensicsbluntforce.html
Any sort of rapid deceleration will cause traumatic aortic rupture, basically your aorta (biggest artery in your body) rips and tears apart causing massive internal hemorrhaging. Victims are often conscious and talking for several minutes after the accident, but will soon succumb to the fatal effects of the massive internal bleeding.
Deletethank you, much better than the previous E=MC2 post
DeleteSure, that's all true, thanks. But it all applies to the fuselage, as well as the occupants. The kinetic energy, and forces resulting from deceleration, that is.
DeleteI was also curious about the two deaths occurring in such an intact fuselage. It is not bizarre or unbelievable, just a case of "hmm..look at that. Minimal passenger/crew compartment intrusion, and they still died...odd"
I think no seat belts is a possibility. Some people don't think they do much. Silly! I would guess that, given equal impact speed, that pa46 is much less crash worthy than a cheap car. For example: no fuel whatsoever in automotive passenger compartments, but it is common in aircraft. And while the speed can certainly be higher with the Piper, it isn't necessarily so. And, if it were...the fuselage would probably be worse.
While a 135 (charter) pilot, I was told that my seat belt instructions to passengers should be minimal, or zero (the seat belt light is enough, right?) because we wouldn't want to imply any lack of safety. They were often dangling the whole flight.
In a ground impact with high vertical velocity, the roof can actually "cave in," hitting the occupants and then spring back to something approximating its original shape. That may or may not have happened here. Learned that in accident investigation school.
DeleteI only hope the poster kind of dismissing the kinetic energy formula is not a pilot. The formula for dynamic pressure is almost the same, you know, the stuff that makes wings create lift. And drag. And show IAS.
DeleteIt's always a mass m of something (body, air molecules expressed as density...) hitting a surface with speed v creating a pressure at that surface to do something to it (crush, lift, slow...): m * 1/2 * v^2
Also, it doesn't take much height to fall from to be really fast enough to damage tissues as the above poster already mentioned and die, every second adds 9.81 m/s (22 MPH). You do the math. For that reason even jumping from more than 60 to 90 feet into water will lead to serious injury and death or drowning, think Titanic or some cliffs.
Wouldn't ADS-B be going nuts and calling out the traffic? And wouldn't ATC have said something like let me know when you have the Cessna in sight? If no contact, then extend downwind before turning base?
ReplyDeleteor 7CX, make a right 360 for spacing
DeletePA46 wrong runway. That's the primary issue. Compounding the already bad situation, 7CX low wing, left base-to-final for the [wrong] 30R means right wing up in turn. 0RA high wing, right base to final 30R. Limited line of sight by 7CX? If PA46 sl higher than C172, low wing above high wing, neither may have been able to observe the other. Tower should have cautioned each about parallel landing traffic on parallel runway and asked each if the other in sight? Tower should have caught the over shoot by 7CX or cautioned both about centerline encroachment given both planes were cleared to land about the same time on parallel runways.
ReplyDeletehe killed 4 people (including self), very sad. I feel the same way on the giant left bank into final.,i would of extended downwind and tried a normal pattern (base / final) if possible. and will also say the tower should have sequenced them better and made sure the piper and Cessna saw each other in the pattern,
ReplyDeleteunderstand ATCs request you see specific aircraft, yet it takes your attention, fleeting and uncertain of others intentions. Seperation is key, flying by the written rules we all should know before hand, complinace with ATC, as we're ultimatly responsibility for our safe flight.
DeleteIt is hard to believe that either of these pilots were utilizing ADS-B in to monitor all aircraft in the pattern. At least it doesn’t look like it.
ReplyDeleteYes it would be hard to believe because when you are on a short approach or in tight circle to land, that's the worst possible time to be heads down staring at an ADS-B traffic display. You need to have your eyes out looking all around for other traffic. If both pilots had kept up a diligent traffic scan with their eyes, no doubt one of them would have seen the other.
DeleteAgree that pilots should not be “heads down” staring at ADS-B in the pattern, but I always look at ADS-B traffic on my display on approach to the airport to get a better picture of the other aircraft are in the vicinity. It’s a great resource for traffic awareness. However, though ADS-B “Out” is now required in controlled airspace, there is no FAA requirement for ADS-B “In”. Perhaps the PA-46 only had ADS-B “Out”. I think both should be required.
DeleteI am really interested in what kind of ADS-B each airplane had also. I have Garmin ADS-B in for my Skyhawk and get audible alerts when another airplane comes close (that happens mostly on the ground when you have an airplane flying overhead). There is so much advantage to having in as well as out. I have altered my flight path when airplanes have appeared behind me and as a Skyhawk I am usually the slowest. Ignorance was bliss before I got it.
DeleteI wonder what the winds were. The Malibu’s circle looks compressed to the northwest indicating that the winds were probably fairly strong from that direction. The westerly wind component would also push the Malibu to the east and when he rolled out he was probably lined up for 30R instead of the intended 30L. Seems silly to fly such a tight pattern, KLAS class B starts at the freeway to the south but it looks to me like he had plenty of room. I used to fly in to KVGT every night from Reno in a 402C, if the winds favored 30L I’d fly a nice normal left downwind remaining outside KLAS class B. I don’t understand why he crossed midfield from the north, with that tight circle he had no time to see what the winds were doing. And they can be rather unpredictable thanks to Mt Charleston.
ReplyDelete17 18:53 N 7 10.00 Fair CLR 108 50 14% NA 105 29.75 1005.6
DeletePer NOAA observed history (WEATHER.GOV) the winds at the time of the accident at KVGT were NW 5 (mph). Extremely mild and straight down the runway. A complete non-issue.
DeleteHere is the exact METAR:
DeleteKVGT 171853Z 32004KT 10SM CLR 38/12 A2991 RMK AO2 SLP112 T03830117
That is winds from 320 degrees at 4 knots. Basically nothing for any airplane.
A bit more longitudinal clearance would of been nice. Just extend the down wind of the faster aircraft given it's position at that moment regardless of the parallel runway. Just stagger them a bit.
ReplyDeletePrevious flights: 5/24 used mid field right circling cross over to short final. Standard departure / returns on 6/4, 7/5.
ReplyDeleteobtained from a review of ads-b data.
DeleteIf he was PIC, his basic med only allows up to but not including 18,000 feet and under 250 knots. Did someone mention they were at FL230? We’re they flying on her medical (if she has one?)
ReplyDeleteGood point. Her 3rd Class Medical expired in June 2022. She completed a Basic Medical at that time. Neither was legal to fly above 18,000 ft.
DeletePhoto 11: Is the long red thing on the Skyhawk's left wing a pitot tube cover? And if not, what is it?
ReplyDeleteBlood-soaked clothing.
DeletePREVENTABLE. extend dowbwind, traffic advisories, controlled approached.
ReplyDeleteEXACTLY. It's not one side of the other. Many aviation accidents are ultimately a result of multiple, contributing causes. It's the pilots responsibility to maintain safe approaches and land on the correct runway, its the controllers responsibility to manage air traffic - including separation, and advisories. Both could have done better.
DeleteA circle is not a downwind. Had he flown the standard downwind, base, and final, it probably would have avoided this tragedy.
ReplyDeletecircling approach turns into a downwind when tower instructs him to do so.
DeleteTower never clears CX to downwind or any pattern position, just to land, which is normal. Pilot is responsible for own separation in VFR flight. There’s a lot of talk about what more the controller should have done, but CX could have been warned of the parallel traffic (as happened in Centennial) and still overshot their assigned runway (as happened in Centennial). Air Traffic Controllers are called controllers really only to generate respect from pilots. In practice they are Air Traffic Recommenders. What’s that thing we say out loud in the cockpit (proudly, smugly, but rarely as humbly as we should) during positive exchange? I have……..
DeleteI expect the FAA may be making some procedural rule changes for controllers soon, after the Centennial accident (same story--parallel GA runways) and this accident. I recall a few years back when ground controllers began requiring a verbal read-back from all pilots whenever they were told to "hold short" of an active runway when their taxi route took them past it. Maybe parallel runway landing traffic callouts from controllers will become mandatory, and a verbal pilot readback of parallel landing traffic callouts will become mandatory. It sure gets your attention when taxiing, and you are required to make a verbal confirmation of "hold short runway XX".
ReplyDeleteA few months ago, I was flying into Grand Canyon airport (KGCN), making a right-base to final approach, and my ADS-B (Lynx) kept yelling at me to turn right due to converging traffic on final. A tourist helicopter was flying a very close parallel approach and landed on its pad underneath me to the left, just a few hundred feet from the end of the runway. The controller generally mentioned traffic when I was five miles away from the airport, but I had no idea he had cleared us to land so close, on a parallel track. During the approach I watched the helicopter as we continued to converge, as though we were landing on the same runway, but the controller did not even bother to call out the traffic to me and explain he was landing on a pad nearby; very irritating.
A couple of years ago I was finishing a 600-mile cross country into DuPage airport in Chicago, coming in with a very fast descent and a wide sweeping right downwind-base-to-final, when the controller warned me that there was parallel landing traffic, a trainer C172. My ADS-B was yelling at me to turn, but I never saw the parallel traffic and my hands were full just getting slowed down to land on the correct runway. Controller and pilot communications during parallel landing procedures at GA airports likely need some work.
I like the idea of calling back clearances, but the CX pilot did that here. On this day I’m not sure which clearance the CX pilot would have complied with. Maybe the solution is a rule on the size of pattern a pilot has to fly linked to the final approach speed of the aircraft. That way a slower aircraft would always be between the runway and a faster aircraft on downwind, base, and final, except for straight in approaches which already provide good pattern visibility. In the pattern a faster aircraft could only collide on final with a slower aircraft directly ahead of it in the pilot’s line of sight. That way pilots of fast aircraft would only make approaches like CX made if they are drunk or homicidal.
DeleteI'm a PA46 pilot with near 1300 hours in PA46 and 3000 total time. I have flown this type of approach more than once over the years. Making a left turn to 30L would have always been clearly in view for the left seat during the entire turn. I looked at the 3D view in Foreflight and if the left seat pilot had been flying he would have never lost sight of the runway and confused 30R for 30L. I suspect the wife may have been flying, but what was he doing? He would not have been able to see the traffic on final for 30R. The right wing would have blocked his view of the traffic. The PA46 has a long wing that blocks the view right when in a left turn. I've been based in San Antonio (KSAT) and for VFR traffic there is the "tower approach" from the south. You fly to the tower midfield cross over the field and enter the downwind for 31R or 13L. Sometimes it can end up as a turning short approach. SAT has parallel runways in basically the same configuration. It certainly is NOT an unstable approach to do a turning approach, but not as safe as a squared downwind to base to final. His airspeed on final was slowed to near the proper airspeeds as well, so nothing wrong on his speed. 100 to 110kts downwind, slowed to 100 on base, 90 on final and 80 across the numbers full flaps is normal procedure. There are way too many novice or nonpilots on this blog who have no clue with the opinions.
ReplyDeleteThe ADBS report I saw was registering the Piper at 118 on final pretty close to the threshold of wrong runway when (s)he collided, seems way too fast, unstable and dangerous. Is it possible (s)he further worsened visibility by slipping the Piper to land so it can get a final speed to more reasonable amount close to a normal final speed to prevent floating off this shorter runway?
DeleteAlways nice to hear from the experts who know more than the FAA, after 45 years of (mostly professional) flying experience I still defer to the FAA. I’m sure that makes me an amateur…
DeleteFrom the AIM 4-3-3:
Key to traffic pattern operations
Enter pattern in level flight, abeam the midpoint of the runway, at pattern altitude.
Maintain pattern altitude until abeam approach end of the landing runway on downwind leg.
Complete turn to final at least 1/4 mile from the runway.
Nothing in there about a “turning short approach” and I think that my current employer would have a HUGE problem with this sort of thing…
I think I’ll do it the FAAs way rather than the expert’s way.
That needed to be said. Thank you.
Deletefully accept ur PA46 flight experience. My read of ads-b data is they crossed midfield at 147kts, had to bleed that off to a very short final, as there was no downwind or base. Recall, the first thing we're instructed is the radius of a turn is a function of the rate of turn and airspeed, rate of turn is also a function of bank angle and airspeed.
DeleteFor layman's purposes, the PA46s turning momentum slid, faded or however into the C172s flight path.
This guy's attitude is exactly why this accident happened. A non-standard pattern entry going way too fast with clearly no consideration for anybody but themselves. "I have a fancy expensive airplane" therefor the world should rotate about you. The rest of us are inexperienced "novices". Slef-absorbed, arrogant nonsense. And two completely innocent people are dead because of it.
DeleteIf this accident and the one in Centennial show that the PF was in the right seat here (left hand traffic) and the left seat in Centennial (right hand traffic) then you might probably argue that the CX pilot “would have never lost sight of the runway” seated in the left seat. I’m reluctant to agree though because you’re basically arguing that a left seat pilot making right traffic and cleared to land on a right runway is necessarily at risk of overshooting, and a right seat pilot making left traffic and cleared to land a left runway is similarly at risk. I don’t think that’s true.
ReplyDeleteHe wasn't making "right traffic"...he was flying left traffic to 30L. I don't know what your point is about this accident. You bit there is more a risk if in the turn your wing obscures the parallel runway in the turn or traffic on a parallel runway. I've made many approaches with another airplane on approach to the the parallel runway and I always make sure I don't drift off center line or I keep myself in a position I don't lose sight of the aircraft.
Deletejust take a moment to think before you start to talk . crossed midfield, made left 260 to enter downwind. please don't talk about stuff that's way beyond your very limited aviation experience.
DeleteThe point is that you may have made all your parallel landings so far, but it is inaccurate to say that the pilot flying left seat “would have never missed the runway”. Wrong surface landings occur at a rate of every other day in the US, and 75% involve parallel runways. That means the stats are against us all keeping our record of landing on the correct surface, and being in the left seat making left traffic isn’t going to save us.
DeleteAnd take a moment to look at the referenced Centennial accident to understand the comment before you reply.
DeleteYou are probably correct / onto something. Carol was actually the PF on the accident flight.
Delete"just take a moment to think before you start to talk . crossed midfield, made left 260 to enter downwind. please don't talk about stuff that's way beyond your very limited aviation experience."
DeleteClearly "Mr. Malibi Superpilot" again. They crossed midfield and made a continuous sweeping left turn to the wrong runway and killed two innocent people. Hopefully none of us "experience" pilots like you who endanger the rest of us with no regard for anyone else. Take some remedial training and learn how to fly standard traffic patterns before you kill someone else like these people did. You clearly have no inclination to actually learn anything from what happened here.
135 knots in the pattern and doing a dog ear approach overshooting final to 30L and wound up in the path of 30R is what it sounds like to me. that is why there is square turns in the traffic pattern especially if there is parallel runways
ReplyDeleteThat isn't necessarily the airspeed on the indicator...it is ground speed. Even though the METAR stated 4kts at the surface, I've seen a major difference in winds 500 feet off the ground. So, think about it.
ReplyDeleteYour comment is like the pot calling the kettle black as far as "Pontificating". Your following sentence is opinion not fact. It's a stereotype and overly broad comment. As a previous commander of a senior pilot CAP squadron, I had the privilege of knowing men and women over 70 who were FAR better pilots than the low time wet behind the ears pilots in the squadron. Go get a life!
ReplyDeleteThis is not an ATC issue. Parallel approaches require precision and skill. Many pilots flying fast airplanes get lazy when it comes to slowing the airplane down in the terminal area. Importantly, however, if you are fast and turning onto final, and you are not skilled or proficient, you will slide onto a parallel runway unless you are on speed. You can be careful and still easily misjudge your turn and slide over. It's much easier to do than it might seem. RIP to all involved.
ReplyDeleteThe lawyers for the 172 victims WILL make this an ATC issue in their lawsuits, you can count on that.
DeleteI noticed in several of the photos that CX looks to have slid sideways before coming to a stop. No way to tell without a zoom out how far it slid after impacting the ground but certainly stopped right of 30R.
DeleteI am going with CX slid into the Cessna while making a way to hot base turn.
DeleteIf you’re correct, what exactly could the controller have done about that?
DeleteI don't want to be in traffic with an 82 year old at the wheel, much less in the pattern with one. My dad is 81 and in perfect health, spry and lucid, but he does have lapses and he recognizes them. I get everyone is different, but above a certain age, the checkrides need to be 2x year, at minimum.
ReplyDeleteI am 76 years old and a 50 year CFI. I totally agree with the above comment. This and other recent accidents has convinced me to get ready to stop flying before I reach a point I don’t know how dangerous I am. RIP to these pilots and condolences to their friends and families.
DeleteI think there should be an age limit for BasicMed. If you want to fly after X age you have to be examined by a doctor every 2 or 1 or 0.5 years and obtain at least a 3rd class medical. Operating an aircraft requires more from the same person operating a motor car. Note too that air traffic controllers cannot work after age 56.
DeleteIt’s not age discrimination, its the acknowledgment that aging diminishes capabilities—like it or not. Aging also results in death, which incidentally does not discriminate.
DeleteFAA controller age limit is 56 and can be extended by waivers. FAA Contract Towers can and do employ controllers beyond the age of 56. You just have to pass the Class II Physical annually and remain proficient.
DeleteI'm 64, just restarted my instrument training, again, and I know for a fact that I don't have the reflexes, memory, etc that I did 20-30 years ago. The training is going well and I'm happy to be working on the rating but I know the gradual decline in skills is part of life. At some point I'll have to stop flying. If I hit the lottery tomorrow I wouldn't buy or fly a fast turboprop. The C182RG is probably about as high performance as I would consider flying. Maybe. RIP to all involved and condolences to their families. The C172 pilot left behind a family and small children. His life was cut short for no good reason...
DeleteIt is not helpful to try and assign blame or to make conclusions about the factors involved in this accident. There are a few lessons however that may be helpful for pilots reading these comments, however.
ReplyDeleteATC is responsible for traffic separation in Class D Airspace and accomplishes this through maintaining visual contact or awareness of aircraft position and then issuing instructions to pilots which result in safe passage to and from the runways/surface and in some cases, just transition of the area. At the same time pilots have the responsibility to see and avoid other traffic along with compliance with ATC unless it is unsafe to do so.
ATC is responsible for issuing traffic advisories to ensure that pilots are aware of nearby aircraft and in some cases pilots are required to report other aircraft in sight. Particularly if the controller cannot assure separation based on visual observation or position report. Controllers are allowed to anticipate separation based on their awareness of aircraft speed and direction. This is frequently used to reduce frequency congestion and maintain acceptable workload.
When using parallel runways in Class D Airspace, ATC almost always points out traffic for the parallel runway. Based on the ATC tape, that did not happen in this incident and that will need to be thoroughly investigated. It is not adequate to assume a pilots awareness of close in traffic simply by hoping they hear radio calls. I’m not saying that is the cause of this accident, but it is significant. I would have expected the controller when issuing landing clearance to the Piper to advise “Traffic is a 172 on final for the parallel runway”. I didn’t hear that.
When a controller clears an aircraft to land, the actual track and descent path is at pilot discretion and the clearance indicates the controller has determined it is a safe instruction. There is nothing improper with using an overhead transition with entry to the downwind. In fact it is helpful for ATC to get higher performance aircraft in and out as expeditiously as possible. It reduces the potential for traffic conflicts most of the time.
This accident involves an approach to the wrong landing surface which has been identified as a serious hazard in the National Airspace System. Pilots should take note that the FAA has determined that closely spaced parallel runways, such as at VGT can trick a pilot particularly if they are offset and one is more prominent. This occurs frequently in tight base turns or in poor visibility. A recommended mitigation is to always visually verify the assigned runway. Assume you might make a mistake and check yourself. This procedure is SOP in the airline industry and can save lives.
This is the right take.
DeleteI want to add that it is very difficult for controllers to visually determine an aircraft alignment with a runway that is offset from the tower. In this case, it appears the controller was concerned about the Piper’s position based on the late reminder of assigned runway. But the advisory came too late. Some towers have radar including repeaters from TRACON facilities, but I’m not sure if VGT is equipped. Pilots need to know this and don’t rely on ATC to catch errors. As a CFI, I teach my students to note the assigned runway and read it back to ATC. “Cleared to land 39L”. Then on final, verify you are lined up correctly. If you are assigned 30L you should see a parallel runway, for example. If you don’t see it, there may be a problem. Assuming you may make a mistake alerts you to verify.
DeleteTotally incorrect conjecture. ALL Class D towers are equipped with Radar, ADS-B, Predictive Collision avoidance software, Visual tools, (direct eyesight, binoculars, Etc.), input from Center Sector controller, TRACON, Etc.
DeleteATC 101, NEVER EVER clear two aircraft to land on a direct converging course on a CLOSE IN opposing base leg to parallel runways, especially if one or both is a high-performance aircraft.
"Some towers have radar including repeaters from TRACON facilities,
Pilots need to know this and don’t rely on ATC to catch errors" It is not the responsibility of the pilot to know what type of equipment the tower has at their disposal.
As mentioned in an earlier post, this was an illegal flight form the onset. The pilot had a basic Medical, which restricts the operation of the aircraft to flights within the U.S. and U.S. territories, as well as the Bahamas. You must fly below and not including 18,000 MSL. You must fly at 250 KIAS or less and, have no more than 6 seats.
This aircraft had a cruising altitude on this trip of FL 230, well above the 18,000 ft restriction.
Your students need to find a more knowledgeable instructor.
To the original commenter, you have the right take (I agree) and there are "lessons" to be learned here as you encourage and point out. I fly a single-pilot Citation jet into a controlled air field with two parallel runways underneath a Class Bravo. Ops into both runways are constant and significant with student pilot 172s. When cleared to land on the longer runway I personally always have the Traffic Display portion of one of the two GTN 750s on my panel and am paying close attention to both that display and outside visual cues. Tower always calls out converging traffic onto the other runway. I also have the "extended runway" line (feature) that comes off the end of the runways, a feature on a GTN 750, activated so I can visually see that I'm intercepting the correct runway line (despite what I'm seeing outside). I've not had to break off an approach (yet) over the years due to not seeing an aircraft on the other parallel approach (not "see" them either on screen or visually) but I often have wondered, while on approach, if such an occurence occured which way I'd break to (up, right, left, continue straight ahead and call loss of sight contact)? This accident has a lot of hidden lessons in it and personally appreciate everyone's commentary (good and bad) to learn from. Been flying since 1986 myself, and this experienced accident pilot in NV clearly fell prey to some basic mistakes. We all need reminding (unfortunately I wish it was not this way). Prayers for them both.
DeleteTotally incorrect conjecture. NOT ALL Class D towers are equipped with Radar, ADS-B, Predictive Collision avoidance software and other "fanciful" tools. I work in a VFR tower, Class D airspace, that has NONE of that. It's comments like this which lead to a shocked exclamation by pilots when I patiently explain to them that this tower doesn't have radar or ADS-B and that I can't "see" their transponder. I know my tower is not the only one using binoculars and brains to see and separate airplanes.
DeleteI’m glad another ATC stepped in to clarify this. Also of note, even IF the Class D TWR has a radar feed, the Class D controller is not a RADAR controller. The radar in this case is “an extension of the controller’s eyes.” The main job of a Class D controller is to ensure runway separation. They can use many techniques and tools to accomplish that, and they should be giving traffic/safety alerts, but beyond that, the only official “loss of separation” a Class D controller can have, is on the runway.
DeleteWho said about Carol I would love to meet you in a dark ally if you have the guts you coward and an a—hole she was my customer at EGA and a wonderful lady maybe you should die
ReplyDeleteAnd pilots wonder why insurance is difficult to obtain after 70 ? If the Pic was flying under basic med and above fl180 a total disregard for the regs. I’m 70, retired airline pilot and active cfi for over 50 years. I’m aware of my age related changes and modify my flying minimums to reflect this.
ReplyDeleteBased on all contemporaneous data (reliable source) Carol was actually the PF/PIC on the accident flight.
ReplyDeleteThat's funny - On Beechtalk Crashtalk they say "Word on the streets from others in attendance at the safety event is that the guy was in the left seat on departure." Regardless left seat or right, the wife may have been the PF/PIC on the flight. You may be right.
DeleteIn this case it does not matter who was PIC, both had only a Basic Medical Course, and neither would be allowed to fly above Fl 180.
ReplyDeleteBasic Med requirements/restrictions here:
https://www.faa.gov/documentlibrary/media/advisory_circular/ac_68-1a.pdf
The PF discussion is about the view of the pattern environment and runways from each cockpit seat of the aircraft based on the pattern entry. BasicMed is irrelevant to that PF discussion because based on the information in this discussion board at the time of this post, both pilots were legal for the accident phase of the flight. The only causal link I see between the maximum flight altitude and the accident phase of the flight is if the altitude triggered a performance deficiency in the crew, or created a health crisis for one pilot which became a medical emergency for the other pilot.
DeleteIncorrect, read the rules and Reg's in the link posted above.
Delete5.2.5 Flight Limitation Applicability. A “flight, including each portion of the flight,” means
that all of the flight limitations for the operation described above, set forth in
§ 61.113(i)(2)(i) (iv), apply to the entire flight. Accordingly, if BasicMed is being
exercised in any flight, it must be applied for the entire flight (takeoff to full-stop
landing) and all the operational restrictions apply for the entire flight.
Once they busted through Fl 180, it made the WHOLE flight an illegal operation.
The relevancy is that they had no regard for the rules, regulations, and restrictions imposed when flying under Basic Med. It also shows a lack of knowledge, situational awareness, and basic standard operating procedures when operating in a busy Class D environment
Runways only look to be 550-650' centerline to centerline.
ReplyDeleteas noted above, ads-b recorded three flights in and out of VGT since 5/24, that one used a mid field right circling cross over to short final. Standard pattern departure / returns on 6/4 and 7/5 prior to 7/17.
ReplyDeletePF lined up on wrong runway. Unstable approach. Entering a busy control zone at over 150kt. Behind the airplane. Overshot final and still continued. Maybe they were going to initiate a missed approach, maybe not. I’m note sure how much a warning from atc regarding the 172 on final would have stopped this from happening considering the multiple reminders to land on 30L. Pilots need to be ahead of the airplane, fly a proper pattern and be on your numbers during the whole approach.
ReplyDeleteOne great options of the new Garmin navigators such as my GTN650 is a feature where it pops a button when you are within 5 miles of the destination airport to offer guidance for a visual approach. You simply press "Visual" and the runway you are landing on. It gives you a faux glideslope and localizer so you can be nearly 100% sure of your approach course. I'll ALWAYS use it, especially at airports with parallel runways. Also keeps you from mistaking large taxiways for runways at night. If a Boeing Dreamlifter can land at the wrong airport, it is possible anyone can.
ReplyDeleteAbsolutely correct. I always plug in the pink line even on the clearest of the day for the correct Runway I intend to land on. That Garmin unit is great
DeleteAgreed, nice feature indeed with anything close to a "standard" approach but, with the approach and pattern flown so close in, it would have made that feature useless.
DeleteMy read of ads-b data is they crossed midfield at 147kts, had to bleed that off to a very short final, as there was no downwind or base. Recall, the first thing we're instructed is the radius of a turn is a function of the rate of turn and airspeed, rate of turn is also a function of bank angle and airspeed.
ReplyDeleteFor layman's purposes, the PA46s turning momentum slid, faded or however into the C172s flight path.
Whoever (and there are many here) keeps perpetuating that their medicals weren't valid knows nothing about how the FAA pilot registry works. Her Third Class was expiring 6/22 and also her BasicMed (look it up). She took the BasicMed course in 6/22 (but she could've also had her Third Class Medical exam taken and re-issued!!). If so, it take about 2-3 months for it to appear updated in the FAA on-line pilot registry (due to back logs). This was proven in all the Kathryn Report comments in the Cessna 500 Citation accident in Tennesse when all commenters made the same comment about the pilot and then a couple of months later it was determined the pilot's info (the Tarzan acotr) was finally updated and current. The same is probably likely here (these people are wealthy and smart and know their insurance won't pay off if they were illegal -- a condition of the policy). So you really need to get off that -- and focus on what the errors were in the final approach. That's what's important (regardless of the paper bureacracy). You're wasting comment space here not knowing if this was a bureaucratic latency or not. Focus on what went wrong so folks can learn.
ReplyDeleteI am curious if you all are flying pa46 and suddenly 172 in sight, what will you do? Full power to go around? Can't be turn left. Must be stall
DeleteProbably just do an Immelmann Turn with as much energy as she foolishly carried into the pattern. The Immelmann Turn is where you pull straight back. Once upside down and headed the other direction then level out with a snap roll. The Blue Angels do that all the time.
DeleteThe PA-46 is a low wing aircraft, as they merged onto the incorrect runway traffic (cleared for 30L but approaching 30R, where the C-172 was) they likely would not have seen the Cessna as it was lower and beneath hence obscured by their right wing.
DeleteU.S. DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION
ReplyDeleteFEDERAL AVIATION ADMINISTRATION
N JO 7110.730
Air Traffic Organization Policy Effective Date:
March 30, 2017
Cancellation Date:
October 12, 2017
SUBJ: Visual Approaches to Multiple Runways
1. Parallel runways separated by less than 2,500 feet.
(a) Unless approved separation is provided by ATC, an aircraft must report sighting a preceding
aircraft making an approach (instrument or visual) to the adjacent parallel runway.
(b) When an aircraft reports another aircraft in sight on the adjacent final approach course and
visual separation is applied, controllers must advise the succeeding aircraft to maintain visual separation.
(c) Tower-applied visual separation in accordance with para 7-2-1 a.1. may be applied when
aircraft are established on the centerline of the runway of intended landing.
Questions to be answered: Did the PA-46 report sighting the Cessna on the adjacent parallel runway? Did the controllers advise the PA-46 to maintain visual separation?
DeleteThe section mentioned above only applies to Visual Approaches(an IFR procedure).
DeleteAs mentioned above, the quoted section applies to separation between IFR aircraft. I believe VFR aircraft are required to "See and Avoid" other aircraft.
DeleteAgree. Some controllers do it all the time, but telling a VFR aircraft to “maintain visual separation” from another VFR in other than Class B is incorrect, a waste of airtime, AND sets false ATC expectations. Once traffic is spotted, VFR aircraft are ALWAYS required to keep pertinent traffic in sight (and not hit it). If a certain ATCer is habitually (and incorrectly) applying “visual separation” when they shouldn’t, it can impress on some pilots that they don’t have to keep traffic in sight unless they’re told to “maintain visual”. This is a dangerous precedent IMO.
DeleteI was a CFI of EFATO, aerobatics, Bush Pilots, windy 500 agl GRM and other things. Noticed many faster airplane pilots were mediocre doing Flyover GRM, and precision turns, like Turnbacks to a Fly over spot.
ReplyDeleteThey overshooted many alignments on GRM flyovers i tested them. And also on base to final. GRM is taught very lightly in USA during pre solo. And not windy or low at all. This guy was a mediocre pilot on GRM that overshoot the final and bet is not the first time. This is a basic GRM Flyover error. The flyover target was overshot due basid student pilot error on GRM on Approach. Yes, turning approaches are GRM. GRM Approach Errors can be a turning approach stall (Many happen, MANY), or in this case, overshot on it.
Practice very windy GRM Flyovers at 600 agl on the sim first. Aligning to flyover a spot wit a strong tailwind, then do it with a tailwind on base a 20 knots. You will see your errors. Too many stalls or overshoots doing Approach GRM errors.
Hello Jay,
DeleteWhat is "GRM"?
Thank you!
Not Jay, but GRM=Ground Reference Maneuver
DeleteSorry, but please define GRM explicitly. Thanks.
DeleteThis link is a good place to start:
Deletehttps://www.cfinotebook.net/notebook/maneuvers-and-procedures/ground/ground-reference-maneuvers
Thanks for the link. I posted before refreshing the page (and the definition was given before I refreshed)
DeleteAnother good link:
Deletehttps://www.gleimaviation.com/2020/04/17/basics-of-ground-reference-maneuvers/
Thank you for the links!!
Deletefailure of 'sterile cockpit' was a diversion from critical decisions, and age does impact attention to details.
ReplyDeletefrom the audio clip at the top it doesn't sound like the conversation was anything other than responding to directions from ATC (but the audio quality is pretty bad).
ReplyDeletediscussion https://aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/88282/does-atc-hear-the-same-poor-audio-i-hear-on-liveatc
Deletethat was useful, thanks for that. Still enough of the conversation was audible to be able to tell there doesn't seem to be talk about anything other than directions from atc and confirmation back from the pilot about landing on 30L
DeleteADS-B replay* doesn't show a busy pattern at the time. The aircraft that the controller had as #2 for 30L (Extra E300 N466MD) is far enough out that acommodating its spacing doesn't appear to be a reason for 97CX to expedite a spiraling drop-in.
ReplyDeleteSee the replay starting from 12 minutes before the crash by using this link (immediately hit pause at lower left and reduce 30X play speed after opening, setting the blue slider to 2.5x speed is good. Hovering over aircraft symbols at low play speed works to see data for moving aircraft. Blue time sliders are easy to figure out and play again without reloading the page):
https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?replay=2022-07-17-18:50&lat=36.199&lon=-115.203&zoom=12.9
Here are the combined tracks of the following #2 aircraft N466MD and N97CX together:
https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=a5b0fc,ad8194&lat=36.205&lon=-115.206&zoom=14.2&showTrace=2022-07-17&leg=2,2&trackLabels
*The replay capability is easy to apply to other locations and times by editing content of "replay=2022-07-17-18:50&lat=36.199&lon=-115.203&zoom=12.9" to incorporate date, UTC start time, lat, lon, zoom directly from any Adsbexchange track plot you generate.
Thanks for the ADS-B replay tips and analysis.
DeleteYou are welcome. Posted with expectation that KR readers who look at ADS-B would find replay capability useful. :-)
DeleteIMHO (ATP, CFI) the Malibu should have continued straight ahead from overhead for at least 20 seconds before turning left because the speed at which they crossed overhead meant that the radius of the turn would not be tight enough to roll out on final for 30L. They were overhead at :47 and started turning left at :55 that's only 8 seconds. Looking at the ADS-B exchange picture there was no downwind segment, it was a continuous turn onto final for the wrong runway.
ReplyDeleteAgreed, seems like a certainty that 97CX simply overshot the turn, given that 97CX pilot is heard reading back 30L in the approach instruction readback before the clear to land, again at the clear to land and again after the clear to land, when the controller re-affirms 30L stating 30L twice, at which point the 97CX pilot again reads back 30L.
DeleteTwitter user benyaffe on july17 provided a link to a comm audio file with gaps removed, easy to hear all three readbacks:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1f4uxiFuhGuTrAIxG7x6VbX5mCOuCtzG0/view?usp=sharing
Does the instrument panel show what runway number the pilot is lined up with?
DeleteLooking out the front window was what was important for properly executing the spiral, making an approach display on the panel something that wouldn't be utilized. This was N97CX's home airport, a place where the pilot was very familiar with what the visual appearence of correct 30L alignment would be.
DeleteThis is the equipment that was fitted to the aircraft (goto the link at the end). If they operated it correctly they could have seen their position with respect to the airfield including both runways. https://www.garmin.com/en-US/p/63598
ReplyDeleteAccepting there is no one cause, I conclude 97CX had excessive momentum, (the quantity of motion of a moving body, measured as a product of its mass and velocity,) to bleed off in its hot entry 140Kts plus tight left circle approach.
ReplyDeleteTen minutes prior, with the C-172 in the patterned conducting T&G on 30L, a Pilatus PC-24 performed a midfield crossover full circle landing to 30R. https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?replay=2022-07-17-18:52&lat=36.198&lon=-115.198&zoom=13.9
correction, the Cessna was T&G on 30R. amd PC-24 landing on 30L.
DeleteThere was no problem ten minutes earlier with the PC-24 because the PC-24 landed on the CORRECT RUNWAY.
DeleteCompare the Pilatus's track to the Malibu at same zoom level view and you will immediately recognize the much tighter turn by the accident aircraft, excessive momentum confirmed.
DeletePilatus N955PS:
https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=ad8194&lat=36.193&lon=-115.207&zoom=13.3&showTrace=2022-07-17&trackLabels
Malibu N97CX:
https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=ad4890&lat=36.193&lon=-115.207&zoom=13.3&showTrace=2022-07-17&trackLabels
Here's both Pilatus N955PS & Malibu N97CX on one display:
Deletehttps://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=ad4890,ad8194&lat=36.193&lon=-115.207&zoom=13.3&showTrace=2022-07-17&trackLabels
That's super analysis you've put together. Appreciate that link you've provided.
DeleteThe Pilatus approach has double or triple the radius of the PropJet. The Pilatus flew a normal, reasonable, responsible pattern. Easy to see how the Pilatus managed to fly to the correct runway.
97CX mid-field right circle approach https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=ad8194&lat=36.211&lon=-115.205&zoom=13.9&showTrace=2022-05-14&leg=2&trackLabels
DeletePA46 JetProp 100% responsible for collision. That is what all evidence shows. Such a needless tragedy. May all involved RIP and the rest of us learn from other's mistakes because non of us has the luck or time to make them all ourselves.
ReplyDeleteThe PA46 JetProp is 100% responsible for the collision. There was nothing the 172 could have done and ATC did their job correctly. Such a tragedy. May all involved RIP and the rest of us learn from other's mistakes because non of us has the luck or time to make them all ourselves.
ReplyDeleteDid ATC advise both aircraft of the proximity or each other ? Seems like ATC should have called out the 172 traffic to Malibu and made sure Malibu confirmed visual contact with 172. What good is ADS-B if it can’t prevent collisions.
ReplyDeleteif 97CX was monitoring ATC, it was aware of instructional 172 T&Gs. plus VGT was its home base.
DeleteN97CX would have been expected to fly an approach more like the Pilatus (N955PS) arrival seen 10 minutes before the accident.
DeleteHere is the track plot of the Pilatus AND the C172 shown together. Notice that the responsibly flown approach track of the Pilatus crossed mid-field and stayed out of the C172's orbit, producing excellent see & avoid visual capability for the Pilatus pilot by not doing a hotshot drop-in:
https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=a0f326,ad4890&lat=36.204&lon=-115.203&zoom=13.3&showTrace=2022-07-17&trackLabels
the pc24 is a bigger faster jet so would it need to naturally have a larger radius turning approach just based on its size and speed than the smaller/slower Malibu?
DeleteYes, jet is different class, but the N955PS approach circuit as flown demonstrates zero risk of overshooting the turn, hence the "expected to fly an approach more like the Pilatus" statement. No reason for the Malibu to spiral drop-in so tight unless the 3+ hour flight duration had the pilot at the limits for an urgent bathroom visit.
DeleteTo warn readers that may not know better, some of the above comments (particularly Anonymous Wednesday, July 20, 2022 at 12:09:00 AM EDT) are spewing complete misinformation while saying the students need to 'find a better instructor.'
ReplyDeleteClass D airports do NOT all have radar. He is totally incorrect saying they do.
Class D airports does NOT separate traffic. If you think they do, you may pay an ultimate price.
Do your own research and do not believe some of the 'motivated thinkers' posting above.
discussion: https://aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/57141/is-the-tower-local-controller-responsible-for-separating-vfr-traffic-in-the
DeleteOne of the best tips I ever received was to keep a lookout for converging shadows. Find your own shadow and task your passengers to notify you "when and if". Doesn't work with clouds or at night, but in this case, where there was bright sunshine, it might have saved the day.
ReplyDeleteI have not seen the name of the instructor in the Cessna. Am I just missing it or has their name not been published yet?
ReplyDeleteI did not see it here either but multiple news outlets have reported him to be Anthony Chiaramonti, age 40.
Delete