[TheForge] OT update to sometimes stuff just happens

[Andrew Vida]

Hooboy... sounds like a power off stall at low altitude.  That is one of 
the less promising positions in which to find oneself.  Without 
sufficient altitude it is nearly impossible to recover.  Was the pilot 
well experienced?  Not saying I would have done better, but the report 
reads as if to imply the pilot may have panicked and instead of trying 
to establish an optimum glide path, which is the first thing I was 
taught to do in emergency procedures, he was reflexively yanking on the 
yoke in an effort to keep the nose up.

I was once in the pattern in very high winds - way past the max rating 
for the 152 I was flying, but that day I had a hare up my ass to go 
flying - yet another one of my stoopid pilot trix.  I came around maybe 
a dozen times and for a while I was preparing my pants for a fill-up. 
That feeling of being on the ragged edge of minimal control can be very 
unnerving. On my last approach the crosswinds, which the FBO was 
clocking at 38 kts, suddenly died away for a very brief instant just as 
I was going to gun it for another go around.  I dropped the bitch hard 
on the tarmac and got tied down ASAP.

When I walked into the office everyone was laughing at me, even the 
one's who'd bet a considerable sum against my survival.  Yes, they had 
taken real money bets that I would make a smoking hole at Lincoln Park 
NJ.  I didn't give a damn because I was still alive to be laughed at.

On 4/11/2012 2:59 PM, terry l. ridder wrote:
> hello;
>
> below is the url to the preliminary ntsb report.
>
> http://strauss.blauedonau.com/prelim-ntsb-deland-publix-crash-plane-0409.pdf
>