[TheForge] OT - sometimes stuff just happens

[Andrew Vida]

On 4/9/2012 11:29 AM, terry l. ridder wrote:
> hello ron;
>
> the plane was purchased from the original builder in minnesota.
> i do not know which of the two people onboard actually owned the plane.
> the plane was a seawind 3000. there was no flight recorder and no black
> box in the plane.

Private aircraft are not required to have one, nor are they really needed.

> ...had full fuel onboard when it crashed.

I should go after that business opportunity.  I would not advocate 
requiring a deluge valve for dumping fuel, but I think having such a 
system available for smaller craft might see a market.  Had the pilot 
been able to dump the fuel load prior to impact the result to those on 
board may have been substantially different for the better.  It is 
impossible to guarantee anything, but I was always taught that any 
landing from which one can walk away is good enough.

> fire. no one is sure who was piloting the plane when it crashed. both
> people onboard when it crashed have 3rd degree burns over 60 percent
> of their body. the last i had heard was that they were both in coma.

MAy be induced coma.  When you are cooked to that degree the stress of 
the agony is often enough to make the difference between life and death.
>
> the plane took off from an airport with no air traffic control tower, no
> flight plan was logged.

So they were flying VFR and the weather must have been pretty good.

If the plane lost power, a pilot should be able to find a place to set 
it down, even if on an interstate, a field, etc.  That this did not 
happen suggests either incapacitation of the pilot with a passenger 
incapable of taking over, catastrophic structural failure of the 
aircraft, or an intentional act.

For years I wanted to build a plane, but doing so is nothing to take 
lightly.  They don't fly so well with only one wing or without an empenage.