On Monday, August 27, 2012 4:08:49 PM UTC-4, Brian wrote:
So I am seeing the why do we still thermal low comment, but no one is says how low. I suspect these accidents may not be a low as some of us think. But have no data to back it up. With so many of us using flight recorders it should be pretty easy to look a few of these accidents and see, but somehow this data never seems to reach us. I can understand some liability issues but it seems like it would be pretty easy to reproduce the data into a generic format that didn't give away the location or ID of what happened but would still allow us to review the flight path of an actual flight that led to the accident. Brian

I'll jump in and define low as that altitude from which you are not likely to recover from a spin and save your life.
From what I heard about the observed departure from controlled flight to impact was a portion of a turn.
After the FAA seizes the recorder, if there is one, it seems to be very hard to ever get it back. Also, sometimes the last few seconds before impact may be missing based on a few accidents I've seen the logs of. No idea why this might be.
Again FWIW
UH