Not sure of anything, Steve, but follow my logic along here, willya?

I'm roughly in the middle of the Western time zone. Lexington is right on
the western border of the Eastern time zone.

Therefore, sunrise is going to happen "later" for Lexington (with respect to
their time zone) than it is for me.

My local newspaper gives today's sunrise as 6:31. Since each time zone is
pretty nearly one hour in width, Lexington's sunrise is going to be about
half an hour "later" (in their time zone) than mine.

Adding half an hour to my time zone gives roughly 7 am as sunrise in
Lexington, just about what the rest of the gang is saying. My best guess is
that they began their departure about an hour before sunrise.

And, after sunrise, I doubt that the taped comment about the runway lights
being inop would have been made. Runway lights after sunrise don't
generally generate comments.

And, the paint stripes down the sides of the (according to Airnav) cracked
concrete runway in poor condition would have given them pause for thought,
as would the absence of ILS painting on the runway, as would the end of the
runway rushing up to meet them might have been a clue.

My best guess is that the poor *******s made it a "normal" departure with a
rotation at V1 as opposed to horsing that sucker off when it became apparent
that they had made a pretty bad error. The tape might bear me out on what I
think, is that they didn't know they had a minor problem until they took out
the boundary fence and a major problem until they hit the trees.

Jim



"Steven P. McNicoll" wrote in message
nk.net...

"Ron Lee" wrote in message
...

About one hour prior to sunrise.


Are you sure? The preliminary NTSB report gives the time as 6:07 EDT. An
online calculator gives the time of sunrise at KLEX on that date as
6:04:37 AM.