C-172 down at HPN - 2 fatalities

Andrew Gideon wrote:

It's possible that there was no contact with the tower if the pilot hadn't
been handed off yet (or if he never made contact with the tower after the
hand-off).

He's 1/4 mile from the runway and hasn't been handed off yet?

George Patterson
There's plenty of room for all of God's creatures. Right next to the
mashed potatoes.

George Patterson wrote:

Andrew Gideon wrote:

It's possible that there was no contact with the tower if the pilot
hadn't been handed off yet (or if he never made contact with the tower
after the hand-off).

He's 1/4 mile from the runway and hasn't been handed off yet?

Or he never completed the hand-off. TRACON might have switched him at 5
miles, but the aircraft never contacted the tower. I don't know.

Frankly, there's a lot about this that confuses me. No warnings about being
too low from ATC? I once has a TRACON controller contact me almost
breathlessly about my altitude (which was, fortunately, a transponder
problem). And this was in VMC.

Also, although I'm not sure how that's come out, people here are now
speaking of the student as a primary student. That makes the flight a lot
more odd.

But perhaps he wanted to see what IMC was like, for some reason, or...I just
don't know.

This does trigger a memory, though. During my primary training, my CFI
wanted to go up into a snowstorm. Not knowing any better, I questioned it
but didn't refuse. We were at the hold line just about to get onto the
runway when the tower talked some sense into the CFI (and the controllers
tone helped me push the matter).

What if that hadn't occurred? I don't recall the CFI carrying any extra
(ie. IFR) charts. And those weren't planes I'd take into IMC myself (from
my current perspective) anyway.

Scary.

- Andrew

The reports that I heard indicated that he received and acknowledged an
altitude alert at 800 feet, just before the accident. Was that not from
Tower?


Andrew Gideon wrote in
online.com:

snip

Or he never completed the hand-off. TRACON might have switched him at
5 miles, but the aircraft never contacted the tower. I don't know.

Frankly, there's a lot about this that confuses me. No warnings about
being too low from ATC? I once has a TRACON controller contact me
almost breathlessly about my altitude (which was, fortunately, a
transponder problem). And this was in VMC.


snip


This does trigger a memory, though. During my primary training, my
CFI wanted to go up into a snowstorm. Not knowing any better, I
questioned it but didn't refuse. We were at the hold line just about
to get onto the runway when the tower talked some sense into the CFI
(and the controllers tone helped me push the matter).

What if that hadn't occurred? I don't recall the CFI carrying any
extra (ie. IFR) charts. And those weren't planes I'd take into IMC
myself (from my current perspective) anyway.

Scary.




Indeed.