16 July, 1999 – John F. Kennedy, Jr., his wife Carolyn, and sister-in-law Lauren are killed in a plane crash on the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Martha’s Vineyard. The Piper Saratoga aircraft was piloted by Kennedy. Being a Kennedy and all that means a whole lot of laws don’t apply to you. Sadly the laws of physics aren’t among them.
Does not seem possible that it was ten years ago!

Just cause you can buy it, don't mean you can fly it. in the words of John Wayne or Clint Eastwood( or insert name of famous movie cowboy star here) " A man's got to know his limitations"

The tragic thing (or one of them, as there are quite a few) is that right or wrong, is you know that plane had an autopilot and that in a worst-case scenario such as IMC over the ocean when VFR it could be activated with a flip of a switch and at least keep you in one piece until you could figure everything out.

More like an Auto-Decider was needed:


Injured-
Cast Removed Previous day
Instructed Not To Walk Without Crutches
--AND Not to Fly By Orthopedist.

Apparently Still Taking Vicodin

History of ADD (Attention Deficit Disorder) -Taking Ritalin
(also on Thyroid Replacement Meds)

Drove 90 Minutes through Rush Hour Traffic

Reportedly Rushed departure Due to Approaching Nightfall

No flight plan

No weather briefing
(Supposedly checked Weather by computer about 5:00PM)

Declined Offer by Instructor to Fly with Him

Was Told By Arriving Pilot of Thick Dark Haze and was Advised to Wait --Replied "I'm already Late."

Appeared to be Carrying an Open Bottle of White Wine According to Witness

Non-IFR Rated

Minimal Night Hrs

Total Time in Type- Under 40hrs

Total Time -Under 300hrs

(Unverified Reports of up to 700hrs since age 17)

Over-Water Flight near Nightfall

Departed 8:38PM

Declined Flight following when offered

Apparently Radio Turned Off 8:40 PM

According to Instructor: " Had Needed Seven tries to Master Radio communications. "
(Perhaps further evidence of -ADD)

8:49 Attempt To contact Due to Intersecting Flight Path with Airliner

Near-Miss with American Airlines Flight 1484 8:53PM

As to the Final Portion:

Radar Track became Erratic @ 9:29PM

Initial descent 400 to 500 fpm,from 5500 to 2400.

Sudden Climb to 2600.

Then new Descent @ 900fpm.

Crash Apparently due to Right Hand Stall/Spin Abrupt Departure from 1500 ft ---9:41PM

Apparent Impact Speed >200mph

Soooo, Not only not engaging the AutoPilot.

Maybe just turn Loose of the Yoke and reduce Power?

OR-- any of the above bad choices re-thought---

TAPS

(Terminal Arrogant Pilot Syndrome)

quote:

Originally posted by mousegun1:
Just cause you can buy it, don't mean you can fly it. in the words of John Wayne " A man's got to know his limitations"

That was Clint Eastwood IIRC.

quote:

Originally posted by Duckear:

quote:

Originally posted by mousegun1:
Just cause you can buy it, don't mean you can fly it. in the words of(insert name of famous hollywood cowboy here) "Whatsa Matta you"

That was Clint Eastwood IIRC.

close enough for goverment work, evidently none of the Kennedys are good at over water stuff

quote:

off the coast of Martha’s Vineyard.

The plane went in near a place called Gay Head. I enjoyed a quiet snicker when hearing the liberal newsies repeat this name over and over on the news...

quote:

Originally posted by mousegun1:
Just cause you can buy it, don't mean you can fly it. in the words of John Wayne " A man's got to know his limitations"

Clint Eastwood

Just had a guy plant himself in his T-6 out here. I flew with him for about 8 hours and gave him his tailwheel endorsement. He was an ok pilot but had the same rich boy rules don't apply to me attitude. When he bought his T-6 he asked me to check him out in it. Even though I have about 500 hours in a -6 I told him I wasn't able to do it. I figured that this was probably going to happen.

I'm sure that the Kennedy kid was not used to taking no for an answer. That does not work out well in airplanes.

quote:

Originally posted by surestrike:
Just had a guy plant himself in his T-6 out here. I flew with him for about 8 hours and gave him his tailwheel endorsement. He was an ok pilot but had the same rich boy rules don't apply to me attitude. When he bought his T-6 he asked me to check him out in it. Even though I have about 500 hours in a -6 I told him I wasn't able to do it. I figured that this was probably going to happen.

I'm sure that the Kennedy kid was not used to taking no for an answer. That does not work out well in airplanes.

TAPS again,and another T-6 gone

There's a saying that there are Old pilots and Bold pilots and very few Old & Bold pilots, and almost no drunken pilots at all....

That all being said, and considering their history no Kennedy should get within 500yards of an airplane
without screaming and kicking trying to get further
away from it...

AD

Air planes, boats and Oldsmobiles don't work near water when a Kennedy is at the controls.

That's quite a list, DuggaBoye. Thanks for posting that. I had heard almost none of that before now.

The guy killed himself for whatever reason. I think arrogance was the primary cause. No non-instrument rated non-current pilot had any reason to be where he was. Stupid and arrogant. Damned shame.

I used the List as part of an Air Explorer and CAP lecture I used to do- "A Series of Mistakes."

This list and others were used to show how bad decision making builds upon itself to bad endpoints.

That sounds like an excellent lesson plan. And a very good idea.

I've flown VFR over the bay when the fog got down to minimums ... the water/air interface simply disappeared! Was everything I could do to keep at the instrument part. Wife (also a pilot) in the right seat did the navigation. The two pilots in the back checked her. Situation had everyone's absolute and complete attention.

Had never heard all of the list as given in a previous post. No damned wonder he went down!

Jetdrvr

The tragedy as I see it was that he took two innocent folks with him.

Otherwise he proved that certain elements of natural selection and/or pilot development are true.

quote:

Originally posted by jetdrvr:

The guy killed himself for whatever reason. I think arrogance was the primary cause. No non-instrument rated non-current pilot had any reason to be where he was. Stupid and arrogant. Damned shame.

Was it really that big of a loss?

quote:

Originally posted by JBrown:

quote:

Originally posted by jetdrvr:

The guy killed himself for whatever reason. I think arrogance was the primary cause. No non-instrument rated non-current pilot had any reason to be where he was. Stupid and arrogant. Damned shame.

Was it really that big of a loss?

Yeah, it was a complete waste of a perfectly good airplane!

AD

You just can't teach Common Sense.

Sort of reminds me of Bud Holland wasting the B-52.

The Saratoga is my favourite single engine aircraft to fly.

quote:

Originally posted by TCLouis:
Jetdrvr

The tragedy as I see it was that he took two innocent folks with him.

Otherwise he proved that certain elements of natural selection and/or pilot development are true.

Yeah, he did, and that just adds to the tragedy.

I've known guys like him. Used to work for a guy in Mobile when I was a kid learning to fly. Ludger Lapyrouse. Made millions in he Baldwin county (AL) soybean business. Wouldn't listen to anyone. Ended up trying to penetrate a line squall up around Evergreen AL at night in an Aztec. I saw the remains of the aircraft on a flatbed truck. The only recognizible part of the scrambled mess was the airspeed indicator.

The miraculous thing about it is his young son, who had climbed back into the luggage compartment and went to sleep on the floor, lived and was barely injured. His companion, an upper crust society guy from Mobile, was killed along with Ludger.

TAPS, or The Doctor Syndrome.

Hang around a general aviation airport for any amount of time and you will hear of and know people who do themselves in.

At the local airport, in the space of about a year, an attorney acquaitance, who was pretty full of himself, flying a fast single with RG, killed himself and his wife. And an MD friend, flying a.....Bonanza...(surprise).....who was really a great guy, went down in icing conditions.

Several more come to mind.

When it comes to flying, humble and cautious are good.

Once upon a time my ophthalmologist was an Air Force Flight surgeon and pilot.
He took his brother in-law for a spin after Thanksgiving dinner about 25 years ago. A Texas cold front came through and he flew into the ground. It took a while find the remains.

My uncle leased a plane to a bozo that landed it in a mesquite tree. He survived both the landing and the climb down out of the tree.

quote:

Originally posted by mstarling:
I've flown VFR over the bay when the fog got down to minimums ... the water/air interface simply disappeared! Was everything I could do to keep at the instrument part. Wife (also a pilot) in the right seat did the navigation. The two pilots in the back checked her. Situation had everyone's absolute and complete attention.

Had never heard all of the list as given in a previous post. No damned wonder he went down!

Yeah, when you're over a body of water and that temperature/dewpoint spread intersects, you are suddenly IFR. I had it happen to me in my power boat many years ago on Mobile bay. One minute we were cruising down the ship channel in clear weather and the next minute we had about thirty feet vis. Luckily, I was doing a mental DR plot and we made the channel exit and the river inlet on compass and watch.

Weather is a killer if you aren't prepared for it, and sometimes, even if you are.

Several years ago I was on a long visual approach behind another aircraft into Gunnison, Colorado. The weather was perfectly clear, wind was dead calm and the temperature was around -10 F.
As soon as the airplane ahead of us touched down the field went solid IFR. Evidently the moment the plane that landed quit producing lift the change in ambient air pressure created a phenomena I can't quite explain. Strangest thing I have seen in 41 years of flying. It was like somebody shook a bottle of mud that had settled. It took all I had in me to get my head around the attitude indicator and fly it out of there between the hills.

It is sometimes very difficult to say the hell with it and take the missed approach. During the desert war, we were in a Herc coming in from the Azores to McGuire AFB. It had been a long trip and we were exhausted. Headwinds and fatigue from flying several trans-Atlantics over the previous couple of weeks had taken their toll. We were really tired.

We were well aware that the weather at McGuire was pure crap with layers and fog. The approach controller called it 200 and a half and handed us off to the tower a couple miles outside the outer marker. The tower also said 200 & 1/2, but we knew they were lying and were just giving us a shot at it. We were low on fuel, so we shot the approach. Only once before had I wanted to see a runway that badly. We hit minimums at the middle marker and saw nothing and took it down another hundred feet and still saw nothing. Pushing them up was one of the hardest things I ever did, but it was definitely impossible, so we called the alternate and went to Dover AFB. I just wanted to go to bed.

When we got to Dover, there wasn't a hotel room within a hundred miles. Luckily, a UPS 747 crew that had just come in heard me talking to crew sked about no rooms. They were taking the van up to Philly to catch a commercial out to wherever and the Captain offered us two rooms UPS had on reserve in Dover. Man, I could have kissed that guy. We called UPS crew sked and they authorized it and the engineer and the FO doubled up and I got a single. UPS told us not to worry about paying for it. They'd take care of it. We slept well that night.

A week later, I wrote a letter to the UPS VP Ops and thanked him for his company's generosity. That was a fond moment to look back on.

Sometimes, you just have to grit your teeth and go to the alternate, no matter how tired you are.

Bonanza - my flight instructor called it the "fork-tailed doctor killer". Arrogance is a big risk factor. Back in the mid 70's when I was in flight training, a professional airline pilot bought a beautiful red and white Bonanza from a retired farmer. The plane had been meticulously cared for and hangar-kept. It was flown off a grass strip at the farm. The day the pilot showed up to get the plane he was accompanied by his wife and another couple. It had rained heavily the previous 2 days. The old farmer told him he'd never make it with the weight and field conditions. The pilot said: "don't worry, I'm an airline pilot". Then he proceeded to drive it into the woods at the end of the runway. It was a total loss. Thankfully, no one was seriously hurt and the farmer had the cash.

quote:

Originally posted by DuggaBoye:
I used the List as part of an Air Explorer and CAP lecture I used to do- "A Series of Mistakes."

This list and others were used to show how bad decision making builds upon itself to bad endpoints.

I just recalled a recurrent class I went through at United's FTC in Denver, where we used to train. I don't know how they did it, but the instructors had obtained a copy of the CVR recording from the American Airlines Cali, Colombia crash. It was chilling. I don't recall very many specifics all these years since, but here these guys are, going into one of the five most dangerous airports in the world, smack in the middle of the Andes, and they were descending at night into a valley and talking about their retirement accounts. They had almost no situational awareness. I bring this up because JFK, Jr. was also obviously quite complacent and put himself into a dangerous environment.

When talking to younger pilots, I always stress the extreme importance of situational awareness. Lose it and it may cost you your life. JFK Jr. never had any in the first place.

quote:

Originally posted by Saeed:
The Saratoga is my favourite single engine aircraft to fly.

Yeah, it's a great little airplane. Really a slicked up Cherokee Six, which is one of the best airplanes Piper ever built, particularly the 260 HP version. The 300 was a dog. The Saratoga is a little Cadillac.