Sad Accident over Deland

OtisWinslow wrote:

I can't think of any excuse for a jump plane to be below his jumpers, no
matter how much other jump pilots justify it. The jumpers have the right
of way. It's careless/reckless operation and most likely negligent homicide.


Actually jumpers DO NOT have the right of way. And I fail to see why
the jump plane getting down before the jumpers is in itself reckless.
Jumpers under canopy have a lousy descent rate and the jump plane has
good reasons not to just circle around waiting for these guys to come
down.

I fly in that environment. There's a very active jump club at our
airport. I deal with it every nice day I fly and have for a long time.
If it's safe why in the world did he fly into the jumper? Keep the
jumpers below the airplane and you don't have an issue. They don't
always land or approach where you think they will. Anything within 1/2
mile of the drop target should be suspect.

Deland is unlike any jump operation I've seen (and, admittedly, I haven't
seen more than a handful), in that there are literally no gaps between
jumps. They have so many jumpers that want to skydive that they are able to
keep two (and possibly more) Twin Otters running continually. They never
shut their engines down -- they simply taxi back to load, load as many as
will safely fit, and blast off again.

In fact, the only time we saw them stop was to refuel. It's an amazing
operation -- but one that doesn't allow a sensible suggestion like yours to
be implemented. There will ALWAYS be planes beneath jumpers in a
continuous operation like this one.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

On 2005-04-28 16:23, Jay Honeck wrote:
I fly in that environment. There's a very active jump club at our
airport. I deal with it every nice day I fly and have for a long time.
If it's safe why in the world did he fly into the jumper? Keep the
jumpers below the airplane and you don't have an issue. They don't
always land or approach where you think they will. Anything within 1/2
mile of the drop target should be suspect.


Deland is unlike any jump operation I've seen (and, admittedly, I haven't
seen more than a handful), in that there are literally no gaps between
jumps. They have so many jumpers that want to skydive that they are able to
keep two (and possibly more) Twin Otters running continually. They never
shut their engines down -- they simply taxi back to load, load as many as
will safely fit, and blast off again.

In fact, the only time we saw them stop was to refuel. It's an amazing
operation -- but one that doesn't allow a sensible suggestion like yours to
be implemented. There will ALWAYS be planes beneath jumpers in a
continuous operation like this one.

There was a jumper club at ESCN a few years ago, and they never shut
down their plane either; something about the turboprop engine start/stop
cycles being counted towards maintenance intervals instead of just
running time, but I'm not sure about how it worked exactly.

/Rolf

Rolf Blom wrote:

There was a jumper club at ESCN a few years ago, and they never shut
down their plane either; something about the turboprop engine start/stop
cycles being counted towards maintenance intervals instead of just
running time, but I'm not sure about how it worked exactly.

/Rolf


That is EXACTLY what its all about. Thermal stresses are caused by
temperature changes. Major temp changes are caused by startup/shutdown.
So, keep the turbines turning and burning and you reduce the maintenance
cycles incurred. That was one of the reasons that helicopter EMS guys
used to "hot load" (they still do in some places, particularly if its
the "second bird in, and can grab the patient and go")

Most turbines have to run for a few minutes after landing before
shutting down.. and then on startup have to run a few minutes again to
stabilize the temps to minimize the thermal stresses.

What I do NOT know for a fact is if total time, or total cycles, or a
combination of both is used for determining TBO (or I believe for
defining when periodic inspections - Hot Sections I think they call em)

Dave

On Thu, 28 Apr 2005 14:23:11 GMT, "Jay Honeck"
wrote:

I fly in that environment. There's a very active jump club at our
airport. I deal with it every nice day I fly and have for a long time.
If it's safe why in the world did he fly into the jumper? Keep the
jumpers below the airplane and you don't have an issue. They don't
always land or approach where you think they will. Anything within 1/2
mile of the drop target should be suspect.

Deland is unlike any jump operation I've seen (and, admittedly, I haven't
seen more than a handful), in that there are literally no gaps between
jumps. They have so many jumpers that want to skydive that they are able to
keep two (and possibly more) Twin Otters running continually. They never
shut their engines down -- they simply taxi back to load, load as many as
will safely fit, and blast off again.

Zypher Hills was keeping 2 turboprop twins and a DC-3 running
virtually all the time. The turboprops would beat most of the jumpers
down. The DC-3 had an engine failure on take off a few years back and
they parked it in an orange grove. I think the worst injury was a
broken ankle.

the jumpers come down on the SE segment of the field while the planes
use 18/36. There is *usually* plenty of room, I've made 4 or 5 trips
in and out of there in one day when they were really busy.

Roger Halstead (K8RI & ARRL life member)
(N833R, S# CD-2 Worlds oldest Debonair)
www.rogerhalstead.com

In fact, the only time we saw them stop was to refuel. It's an amazing
operation -- but one that doesn't allow a sensible suggestion like yours to
be implemented. There will ALWAYS be planes beneath jumpers in a
continuous operation like this one.