Iced up Cirrus crashes

In article ,
"C J Campbell" wrote:

"Dan Luke" wrote in message
...
The more of these Cirrus accidents I read about, the more I'm convinced
that Cirrus has a serious marketing/training problem:

Actually, this is not just Cirrus, but any high performance aircraft.

Actually, it's not even just aircraft. Studies have shown that antilock
breaks don't decrease the accident rate in cars because drivers drive
faster in worse conditions thinking that the ABS will keep them out of
trouble.

"the most chicken pilot wins." I like that rule.

Well, you have to draw the line somewhere and decide what is an
acceptable risk, otherwise you'll never get out of your house, let alone
off the ground. After all, you can get killed by a Tsunami just sitting
on the beach. Sometimes **** happens, and the whole point of spending
money on fancy avionics and getting your instrument ticket is so you
don't have to wait for CAVU conditions to fly.

This is not to say that launching into known icing in the mountains at
night is a good idea under any circumstances, but "the most chicken
pilot wins" is, I think, going a little too far towards the opposite
extreme.

I tell my passengers that flying is as safe as one cares to make it,
that most people who die in planes die because the pilot did something
stupid, like run out of fuel, or fly beyond his or her capabilities, and
that I am very, very careful to avoid the stupid things. And yes,
there's the parachute (I fly a Cirrus). But none of these things are
absolute guarantees. Still, statistically the drive to the airport is
the most dangerous part of any flight (particularly given the way I
drive). The number of people killed in planes is nothing compared to
the continual carnage on the roads. But for some reason very few people
ever give that a second thought.

rg

Still, statistically the drive to the airport is
the most dangerous part of any flight

Actually I think that's a myth. There are more car accidents, but there
are more car trips, car miles, and car hours too. By the time you
divide it out (and it can be argued exactly what to divide out), spam
can flying probably does not turn out to be more safe than driving yourself.

Jose

In article ,
Jose wrote:

Still, statistically the drive to the airport is
the most dangerous part of any flight

Actually I think that's a myth. There are more car accidents, but there
are more car trips, car miles, and car hours too. By the time you
divide it out (and it can be argued exactly what to divide out), spam
can flying probably does not turn out to be more safe than driving yourself.

As you say, it depends on how you count. Do you count total accidents?
Accidents per participant? Accidents per hour? Per mile? Per
passenger mile? But the more significant factor is, I think: do you
count the accidents that were caused by circumstances that you never
place yourself in? Do you count Vmc accidents in twins if you never fly
a twin? Do you count fuel exhaustion and inadvertent VFR into IMC if
you are absolutely religious about checking your fuel, having plenty of
margin, have an instrument rating, stay current, and always file IFR if
there's a cloud within 500 nm? Do you count stall-spin accidents in
Tomahawks if you fly a Cirrus? Do you count icing accidents in the
mountains at night if...?

It's probably true that if you fly and drive with the same mindset that
flying more dangerous. But the way *I* fly and the way *I* drive,
getting to the airport is definitely the scary part. And I'm pretty
sure that I'm far from unique.

rg

Ron Garret wrote:




As you say, it depends on how you count. Do you count total accidents?
Accidents per participant? Accidents per hour? Per mile? Per
passenger mile?

It doesn't matter what or how you count as long as both forms of
transportation are counted the same. And when you do that you will see
flying is many times more dangerous than driving. It's much more
dangerous than riding a motorcycle.

As you say, it depends on how you count. Do you count total accidents?
Accidents per participant? Accidents per hour? Per mile? Per
passenger mile?


You could do any of these, but you have to do the same thing on the top
and bottom, and with cars as well as planes. Include busses if you
include non-spamcans.


But the more significant factor is, I think: do you
count the accidents that were caused by circumstances that you never
place yourself in?


You discount accidents that don't apply (such as helicopters and jumbo
jets, perhaps). But you don't discount accidents that result from
errors "you'd never make".

Do you count Vmc accidents in twins if you never fly a twin?

Don't count twin accidents at all. Don't divide by the number of twin
hours (miles, whatever) either.


Do you count fuel exhaustion and inadvertent VFR into IMC if
you are absolutely religious about checking your fuel, having plenty of
margin, have an instrument rating, stay current, and always file IFR if
there's a cloud within 500 nm?


Yep. That's a case of "it will never happen to me" wherein it just
might happen to you. That's the definition of "accident".

Do you count stall-spin accidents in Tomahawks if you fly a Cirrus?

Probably. You can stall-spin a cirrus. It obeys the same laws of
aerodynamics.

Do you count icing accidents in the mountains at night if...?

It depends on what lie you want to promulgate. If you want to
figure out the truth of the matter, it is important to ask the right
questions. You need enough data to be meaningful, and you need to pare
it enough to be relevant.

Jose

"Ron Garret" wrote in message
...
In article ,
"C J Campbell" wrote:

"Dan Luke" wrote in message
...
The more of these Cirrus accidents I read about, the more I'm convinced
that Cirrus has a serious marketing/training problem:

Actually, this is not just Cirrus, but any high performance aircraft.

Actually, it's not even just aircraft. Studies have shown that antilock
breaks don't decrease the accident rate in cars because drivers drive

I've never had my antilock brakes break.


Still, statistically the drive to the airport is
the most dangerous part of any flight (particularly given the way I
drive). The number of people killed in planes is nothing compared to
the continual carnage on the roads. But for some reason very few people
ever give that a second thought.

No. Flying a light airplane is MANY times more dangerous than driving to the
airport.

Karl

In article , "kage"
wrote:

No. Flying a light airplane is MANY times more dangerous than driving to the
airport.

unless I ride my motorcycle...

--
Bob Noel
looking for a sig the lawyers will like

Ron Garret wrote:

Still, statistically the drive to the airport is
the most dangerous part of any flight

No, not for private flying. Not even close. The fatal accident rate for
flying is several times (as much as 700%) higher.

You may be thinking of the comparison between driving and scheduled
airline travel.

The number of people killed in planes is nothing compared to
the continual carnage on the roads. But for some reason very few
people
ever give that a second thought.

That is because an individual's statistical risk of dying in an auto
crash is quite small. You are confusing accident rates with accident
totals.
--
Dan
C172RG at BFM

("Ron Garret" wrote)
Actually, this is not just Cirrus, but any high performance aircraft.

Actually, it's not even just aircraft. Studies have shown that antilock
breaks don't decrease the accident rate in cars because drivers drive
faster in worse conditions thinking that the ABS will keep them out of
trouble.


Car and Driver Magazine -The Steering Column:

The greatest advance in safety since seatbelts.
BY CSABA CSERE
February 2005

http://www.caranddriver.com/idealbb/...?topicID=60884

(From the linked article)
Two recent traffic-safety studies have thrown all of us in the auto whirl
for a loop. Last September, the National Highway Traffic Safety
Administration and the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety released
independent studies showing that electronic stability-control (ESC) systems,
which help drivers maintain control when their vehicles start to slide, have
a profoundly positive effect on the frequency and severity of single-vehicle
accidents.

The NHTSA study found that vehicles fitted with ESC had 42 percent fewer
single-vehicle crashes and 40 percent fewer fatalities in those crashes. The
IIHS study results were even more positive, with single-vehicle crashes
declining by 41 percent and fatalities in such crashes plunging by 56
percent.

With more than 15,000 fatalities in single-vehicle crashes annually, these
results suggest that if every vehicle in America were equipped with ESC,
annual fatalities would be reduced by more than 7000. That's huge—more than
three times the number of lives saved each year by airbags.


Montblack

In article ,
"Montblack" wrote:

("Ron Garret" wrote)
Actually, this is not just Cirrus, but any high performance aircraft.

Actually, it's not even just aircraft. Studies have shown that antilock
breaks don't decrease the accident rate in cars because drivers drive
faster in worse conditions thinking that the ABS will keep them out of
trouble.


Car and Driver Magazine -The Steering Column:

The greatest advance in safety since seatbelts.
BY CSABA CSERE
February 2005

http://www.caranddriver.com/idealbb/...?topicID=60884

(From the linked article)
Two recent traffic-safety studies have thrown all of us in the auto whirl
for a loop. Last September, the National Highway Traffic Safety
Administration and the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety released
independent studies showing that electronic stability-control (ESC) systems,
which help drivers maintain control when their vehicles start to slide, have
a profoundly positive effect on the frequency and severity of single-vehicle
accidents.


Interesting. This prompted me to look into this more, and I found this:

http://www.geocities.com/Athens/1944/#ABS

So it seems that it's not clear cut even for ABS.

As for overall accident rates for GA vs driving, it's true that looking
at the raw numbers GA is more dangerous (~1 fatality per 100,000 flight
hours (http://www.aopa.org/whatsnew/newsite.../04-1-144.html) vs 1
fatality per 100 million passenger miles
(http://www.lightrailnow.org/facts/fa_00015.htm)). It's a little tricky
converting from flight hours to passenger miles because you have to
assume a lot about occupancy rates and vehicle speeds, but no matter how
you slice it there are no reasonable assumptions that lead to GA being
safer overall than driving. (But you can slice the numbers in lots of
really bizarre ways, e.g.
http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1084316012962)

I still have to wonder, though, if this would still be the case if you
ignored accidents that were caused by the pilot doing something stupid,
like launching into hideous weather without adequate preparation or
enough fuel. Unfortunately, the NTSB reports don't break the statistics
down into stupid and non-stupid.

rg