NTSB final report on Hendrick crash

I will apologize if I offended you or some other commuter
pilot. But in my experience with commuter operations, and
pilots, the aircraft are usually only equipped with basic
avionics. Further, the operating profile doesn't
necessarily apply to corporate 1,000 mile trips in a King
Air.

But based on what you have said, it is even more of a puzzle
as to why and how did this accident happen.


"Beavis" wrote in message
...
| In article ,
| "Jim Macklin"
wrote:
|
| The NTSB said he did not properly fly the approach, that
| even though the aircraft was not approved to use the GPS
| IFR, the crew obviously was using the GPS to find the
LOM
| and used it to, in error do the hold...
|
| Oh, I wholeheartedly agree they screwed up and used the
GPS improperly.
| My issue was with this statement:
|
| | He had a GPS, but as a high time commuter pilot in a
| | BE1900, he didn't know how to use it.
|
| And I maintain that's a ridiculous statement, since I've
seen first-hand
| he knew very well how to use it, and *practiced* it during
his time as a
| 1900 commuter pilot.
|
| Why he didn't apply that knowledge properly that day,
we'll never know.
| But your suggestion that 1900 time somehow negates GPS
knowledge is a
| strange one.

The GPS is just not intuitive at all to use and takes way too much
set-up, cross-checking and effort in my opinion. It is amazing how
complicated they made these devices given how simple a typical ILS or
VOR approach is.


Agree 100%. Each vendor seems to have it's own way of doing things too,
making it hard to transition from one to the other. I suppose I'll get
used to them after a few years...


No disrespect intended.. but once you learn how to use one King.. you
can use em all.. the "switchology" is common across the entire product
line. Nav page 1 is the same across the entire line.. Nav page 5 is the
moving map.. Flight Plan 0 is the active flight plan, The VOR page,
Airport page, NDB pages.. they all have similar functions and data
across the entire product line.

Get the manual and sit there on the ground and play with it.. or "take
it home" with take home mode.. Once you have the skills and confidence
to use your box to its full potential you will be amazed at how "easy"
it seems.. or next time you go flying with another pilot.. let them
fly.. and you just mess with the box.. and get used to it.

Its not as pretty as a Garmin GNS or GNX box, but its still pretty capable.

Dave

Part of being professional is how you handle those
pressures. I don't know why the crew did what they did and
when they suspected they had a problem. But a climb and a
turn away from obstacles is always a good first step in
getting another chance.
Did the crew assume it was simple and skip the approach
briefing, what were they doing with the GPS? How much
experience did the crew have together and how much in THAT
airplane?

The RMI [ADF], DME and LOC should have been setup as primary
and the GPS was not approved for an approach mode and should
not have been programmed for an approach.

Not trying to slam any pilot, trying to understand why
pilots make mistakes so I don't make the same kind of error.


"Jay Beckman" wrote in message
...
| "Jim Macklin" wrote
in message
| ...
| PDF from NTSB
http://www.ntsb.gov/publictn/2006/AAB0601.pdf
|
| One potential "External Pressure" on this flight that many
people may not be
| aware of is that Ricky Henderson (the team owner's son who
died on that
| flight) was slated to work as a spotter for one of the
Hendrick cars. By
| rule, you can not grid your car if your spotter is not in
position on the
| roof of the grandstand.
|
| IIRC, the Cup race that day had a 1pm Green Flag so that
suggests to me they
| were running late. Even with a helo standing by at MTV to
ferry everyone
| from the airport to the track, they'd have been cutting it
close.
|
| Doesn't excuse the way in which the crew botched the
approach, but it might
| (IMO) suggest perhaps some "Get There-itis."
|
| Just $0.02 worth from someone who works on the NASCAR
tour.
|
| Jay Beckman
| PP-ASEL
| Chandler, AZ
| Technician, NASCAR on FOX / NBC / TNT
|
|

Dave S wrote:


The GPS is just not intuitive at all to use and takes way too much
set-up, cross-checking and effort in my opinion. It is amazing how
complicated they made these devices given how simple a typical ILS or
VOR approach is.



Agree 100%. Each vendor seems to have it's own way of doing things too,
making it hard to transition from one to the other. I suppose I'll get
used to them after a few years...


No disrespect intended.. but once you learn how to use one King.. you
can use em all.. the "switchology" is common across the entire product
line. Nav page 1 is the same across the entire line.. Nav page 5 is the
moving map.. Flight Plan 0 is the active flight plan, The VOR page,
Airport page, NDB pages.. they all have similar functions and data
across the entire product line.

That is why he said each vendor, not each model. Yes, all Kings are
much the same as are the few Garmin's I've used. I find the Garmin's a
little more intuitive than the King, but the King is certainly capable
as you say, just not as easy to learn.

As an example, conside the hold/OBS discussion. If I'm autosequencing
an approach and need to do a hold for approach entry, having a function
called "hold" seems intuitive to me. Or I can think of it as putting a
"hold" on the autosequence. However, calling that function OBS doesn't
make nearly as much intuitive sense. Small things like that separate
good human factors design from run-of-the-mill design as with King.

Yes, when I was flying the King a lot, I got pretty used to it. The
trouble is how fast you forget all of the nuances. 6 months and I'm
nearly back to ground zero trying to remember whether the outer or inner
ring is needed or when to hit cursor, etc. Whereas, I can go awar from
a VOR or ILS system for 6 months and come back and fly one approach and
I'm pretty comfortable again.

It is a matter of degree, but I think the GPS systems could have been
much better designed.


Matt

In article ,
Scott Skylane wrote:

Here's a cockpit shot of one of the 1900s he flew:
http://www.airliners.net/open.file/0585758/L/

On a completely unrelated note, I see there is a vacuum suction gage on
the instrument panel. What is this for? Apparently all of the "gyro"
instruments are electronic.

Correct. There are four remote gyroscopes (two attitude gyros, two
heading gyros), all powered by 115-Volt AC power. The really nice thing
about that kind of system is that if one gyro dies, you can route the
signal from the working gyro to both screens, so each pilot still has a
full set of instruments. Pretty neat.

There's also a standby attitude indicator, which has its own internal
battery backup. You can see it above and to the left of the GPS in the
picture linked above.

Is this strictly for the de-ice boots?

Deice boots, and the operation of the pressurization's outflow valve.
(Suction pulls it open; springs push it closed.) That works fairly well
for a plane that size; larger planes, like the 737, have an
electrically-operated outflow valve.

Jim Macklin wrote:
I will apologize if I offended you or some other commuter
pilot. But in my experience with commuter operations, and
pilots, the aircraft are usually only equipped with basic
avionics. Further, the operating profile doesn't
necessarily apply to corporate 1,000 mile trips in a King
Air.

But based on what you have said, it is even more of a puzzle
as to why and how did this accident happen.

One possibility is that the ship's DME was inoperative, thus confusion
ensued about how to get that particular GPS installation to pinch-hit as
a DME.

This is pure speculation on my part.

What is not speculation on my part is how poorly equipped this
particular King Air was considering the high-value use to which it was
put. The owners simply cannot escape some moral responsibility for the
accident by not having added perhaps a Garmin 530 (or 500 if their
conventional avionics were in good shape). And, with that kind of money
why not a TAWS?

Shortly after the NTSB released the flight track I ran the flight in
both MFSF 2004 with the Reality XP Sandel TAWS and then with my Garmin
296 in the simulator mode.

With any type of readily available terrain warning system, even "just" a
Garmin 296/396/496, these pilots would have received ample terrain warning.

When flight operations get to the sophisticated level of operating a
twin-engine turboprop, things are bound to fall through the cracks
without some competent form of flight operations management.

Beavis wrote:


Deice boots, and the operation of the pressurization's outflow valve.
(Suction pulls it open; springs push it closed.) That works fairly well
for a plane that size; larger planes, like the 737, have an
electrically-operated outflow valve.

And, hot wings, too.

Dave S wrote:

The KLN 90B gps has a small moving map in its panel display. The NTSB
report alluded to the standard practice was for a track up orientation.
Given that the moving map screen is fairly short vertically, maybe half
its width, in the track up presentation it may not have been as obvious
that they had overflown their waypoints...

Of course, from an armchair quarterbacking perspective, almost all of my
inflight GPS experience has been behind King products, the KLN 89B, -90B
and KLX-135, and didn't seem to have a problem with the display or
depictions. The display was also not on the center console between the
pilots, facing up (as opposed to on the main panel).

I work with this technology all the time, from the current air carrier
stuff down to the Garmin line. I find I am very comfortable with the
maps the Garmin 500 series have. I find less comfort level with the
Garmin 400 series (I prefer my handheld 296's map to the 400 series).

I have flown a few times in a Cessna with a King 89 and 90. I find
those moving maps to be virtually useless, and bad human factors, at
least for an occasional user of those devices.

I bet you one of those AI's is suction driven. That's all you'd have in
the event of an electrical failure.

Scott Skylane wrote:
Beavis wrote:
/snip/


Here's a cockpit shot of one of the 1900s he flew:
http://www.airliners.net/open.file/0585758/L/

/snip/

On a completely unrelated note, I see there is a vacuum suction gage on
the instrument panel. What is this for? Apparently all of the "gyro"
instruments are electronic. Is this strictly for the de-ice boots?

Happy Flying!
Scott Skylane

Jim Macklin wrote:

Part of being professional is how you handle those
pressures. I don't know why the crew did what they did and
when they suspected they had a problem. But a climb and a
turn away from obstacles is always a good first step in
getting another chance.
Did the crew assume it was simple and skip the approach
briefing, what were they doing with the GPS? How much
experience did the crew have together and how much in THAT
airplane?

The RMI [ADF], DME and LOC should have been setup as primary
and the GPS was not approved for an approach mode and should
not have been programmed for an approach.

Not trying to slam any pilot, trying to understand why
pilots make mistakes so I don't make the same kind of error.

When you really have to get there and the weather is like it was that
day, you select an airport with a precision approach and plan the ground
logistics accordingly. I recall someone familar with all the NASCAR
issues in play that day said KDAN would have been a good choice, with a
bit of planning when they were preparing to depart.