aircraft crashed into building in NY

[eticket109]

Re: aircraft crashed into building in NY

The plane was being flown by Cory Lidle who was a pitcher for the Yankees. Its understandable that a plane in that situation may have relaxed guidelines attached to it. No one knows really though. Then again, its not like the NYC airports are 50 miles away from town either.

http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=2621860 ; ;

its too bad. he seemed like an ok guy from everything I remember

[Vyuru]

Re: aircraft crashed into building in NY

Well, I am certainly curious about this. The building he crashed into was the highest building in the area, why couldn't/didn't he avoid it? He flew a Cirrus, they have a standard CAPS (CIRRUS Airframe Parachute System)

http://www.cirrusdesign.com/aircraft/safety/

Obviously there are airspeed limitations and there must be a minimal height to deploy the parachute to be effective, but you would think that this would just be the height that you don't fly under unless you are taking off or landing.

I can't find out if the plane he was flying was a fly-by-wire plane or if it was computer controlled. Fly by wire means that there are a system of wires and pulleys and things so that the control surfaces are connect to the stick. Computer controlled means that you move the stick how you want the plane to move, which sends signals to a computer to move the control surfaces. This is why at one of the big airshows, Airbus's plane went straight into a stand of trees, it thought that it was on landing approach instead of takeoff and ignored the pilots who were trying to get it to go higher.

But aside from that, NY is on an island right? Why didn't he try a water landing? The entire thing just seems odd.


And just a few things that kinda get my ire up:

"We were able to look at the propeller. We were able to see two of the three blades. One of the blades is bent the other has a tip broken off," Hersman said

No kidding the propeller of a plane that hit a building is bent and damaged Sherlock. Let me guess, you were one of the people who said that since the details were classified, you could only let us know that Boeing was working on some part of the B2's wing right now.

For those of you who don't know, the B2 is a flying wing design, the entire thing is one big wing. Here's a nice picture of one:

http://www.honles.com/thomas/usaf-b2/B2_Bomber.jpg

And why do we need to constantly watch his plane crash into a building? I find that offensive, it's like that one news station that played the last 2 minutes of the blackbox recording for a plane that crashed in the fog. I turned that channel off because I do NOT want to hear the poor people's last few seconds when they realised their mistake, I want news and not some damn drama show.

[Mog]

Re: aircraft crashed into building in NY

I guess the yankees won't be winning this year....

[kuu]

Re: aircraft crashed into building in NY

You have to be familar with NYC to know the situation.

Lots of small airplanes (with a lot of weathly indivuals) fly over manhattan area, a lot. Weither it's a hobby, show off to friends and family, or on a weekend trip to Marthra's vinard. (there are lots of those too) There's always small privately own planes doing it.

When you consider the distance it is to main Manhattan island, you'll see that there's really no way to stop a plane going down and hitting a very tall building in time. We don't have anti aircraft weaponary anywhere near that, or can target something fast enough in short notice.

Our Yankee pitcher still has a lot of things unknown yet. But appearently him and his instructor had a malfunction and the safety(parachute to slow down the plane) both didn't work while they were sightseeing near statue of liberty.

There was minimal damage in the grand scale of things. No appartments caving in, etc. And reports of a mayday called in before impact.

So it's likely not anything human's can do in this tragic case.

Ahh well yankee's needed to lower their salary cap anyway.

[Vyuru]

Re: aircraft crashed into building in NY

When you consider the distance it is to main Manhattan island, you'll see that there's really no way to stop a plane going down and hitting a very tall building in time.

The only thing though is that from the pictures that I have seen, that building is sticking out like a sore thumb all by itself, I could understand if a smaller building next to it got hit or something, it just seems odd to me that the biggest building in the immediate area got hit is all.

I've heard about the mayday, but I don't remember the details and in any case, right now talking about it would be just spreading rumors.


Still, while nothing is known about what caused this plane to crash, I would like to take this opportunity to correct a very common misconception that many pilots that I have met have about airplanes. The examples aren't that good, and I can't explain it so well since I am tired and sick, but just bear with me please.

The assumption:

Many pilots assume that planes have built in safety areas for the do not exceed limitations on the airplane, this is only partly true. The FAA does require engineers to build the airplane tougher than for what it is going to be used for. Just pulling some numbers out of the air, let's say a jetliner will never pull more than 1.0Gs, and let's just say that the FAA requires that jet liners be designed to be able to pull 1.5Gs, that does NOT mean that it is safe to pull 1.6Gs.

Engineers will design it to FAA specifications, however in most cases that is as far as they will go. Maybe the airplane can actually pull 1.8Gs just fine, or else maybe at 1.55Gs the wings fall off, YOU, the pilot, do not know why the do not exceed (DNE from now on) speeds and manuvers were selected, do NOT approach them or exceed them.

If the airplane passed the test, then the FAA requirement for passing that test is the DNE limit, there is no safety factor built into the DNE limit beyond what the FAA requires.



Why do I say do not approach them? Well the biggest problem I have had with pilots is that they think they can go faster than the DNE speed, or at least get close to it.

And just so you know where I get my information from, my father is a wing stress analysist, he's the guy who determines the maximum load the wing can take and a whole bunch of other things about the wing.

Anyway, you do not know what happens after the DNE speed, maybe you get flutter beyond that, maybe other worse things happen beyond that. The big problem that I mentioned earlier is that some pilots think that, "hey, the DNE speed is 160 knots, I'll just stay in the yellow range and fly at 150 knots and I'll be good"

Well buddy, you just got smacked by a 20 knot tailwind, you are now traveling at 170 knots, you are now 10 knots over the DNE speed and you are in a world of hurt.

You guys are NOT test pilots, do not risk your lives heedlessly.

To try and put this into perspective for you guys who still don't understand, whenever you exceed a DNE limit, it is just as dangerous as you playing roulette with a revolver with 5/6 of the chambers loaded, do you feel lucky?

[Aeni]

Re: aircraft crashed into building in NY

Obviously there are airspeed limitations and there must be a minimal height to deploy the parachute to be effective, but you would think that this would just be the height that you don't fly under unless you are taking off or landing.

I thought it struck the 20th floor. I don't know about you, but even airborne infantry do not deploy at that low of an altitude.

Also, not sure what your obsession with him striking the building. If it's the largest in the area and he was having problems (going down) I'm sure he can't just "jump" over the building or even command the building to move.

Cory: I commandeth thee to make way!

[Vyuru]

Re: aircraft crashed into building in NY

I thought it struck the 20th floor

Ah, I thought that it had struck higher.

There are two reasons for my obsession with him striking the building.

One is that it is the highest building, and I thought he had hit higher up, so it's more of what's the odds of that happening?

The other is that I want to be a pilot. I have a firm belief that I will never live to make the mistakes of others, so I had best learn from other's mistakes in order to live a better life for myself. To that end, since I want to be a pilot I have been reading up on airplane accident reports so that if I am ever in a similar situation, I might have an idea of what's going on or what the approbriate action to take might be.

I have been really surprised at how a small thing overlooked followed by a minor pilot error then snowballs into a big catastrophe. I have also been surprised at the number of times that a pilot got cocky or decided to show off a little bit. So to be honest when I hear the words "plane accident" I immedietly think, "ok, what did the pilot and or mechanics do?" Since it sounds like it was a relatively new airplane, and since it was a sightseeing tour in an area that according to Kuu's post, sounds like it has alot of rich people used to getting their way, I am immediatly highly suspicious of pilot error.

Also, there are two FAR rules that come to mind when I read about this:

FAR 91.119
A) ANYWHERE. An altitude allowing, if a power unit fails, an emergency landing without undue hazard to persons or property on the surface.

B) Over congested areas (cities). Over any congested area of a city, town, or settlement, or over any open air assembly of persons, an altitude of 1,000 feet above the highest obstacle within a horizontal radius of 2,000 feet of the aircraft.

Now because of this, and the fact that NY is surrounded by water, why didn't he try to make a water landing? Unless that plane was built under very specific conditions, even if the power went out he should have still been able to control it, it's glide ratio should be good enough to make a water landing (given enough height, but that was covered in part A and he should NOT have been below that height unless he was on landing or taking off) If the airplane was built so that it needed power to operate, then there should have been backups (something similar in concept to a RAT on 767s and 777s, just anything to provide backup power in case the engine gets knocked out)

Airplanes are very often built with multiple system backups in case something fails, as far as I know, these backups only fail when the proper maintanence for the airplane has not been followed.


I don't know really, maybe I'm just seeing things because I'm more inclined to be suspicious of the causes, this thing just seems odd to me and I am seeing some indications that he may have been doing something that he should not have been.

Now saying that I should say that I have never been to New York, maybe it is bigger than I think it is, maybe there isn't enough room, but then I think that he should have taken that into consideration, but maybe this is one of those things where a little overlooked thing with a little pilot error just snowballed into something big, I just don't know.

[Jarre]

Re: aircraft crashed into building in NY

The facts I have gained from an ex New York fire cheif as follows....

Plane hit building around the 40th floor, the incident went to 4 alarms and you can't imagine what was goign through the firefighters heads when the got the call. The building was teh Bel aire apaprtments where the first 20 flors are a hospital/medical centre and offices. The apartments are very posh. There was considerable fire dameg to the 40th and 41st floor with smoke damage to floors a few stories above and below. The plane after hitting the building fell onto some trees in front of the building. The only 2 fatalities was the pilot and passenger with only a few minor injuries reported to members of the public and a couple fo firefighters, nothing serious. within 1.5 hours the fire was contained and the building was deemed safe.

[kuu]

Re: aircraft crashed into building in NY

The only thing though is that from the pictures that I have seen, that building is sticking out like a sore thumb all by itself, I could understand if a smaller building next to it got hit or something, it just seems odd to me that the biggest building in the immediate area got hit is all.
I've heard about the mayday, but I don't remember the details and in any case, right now talking about it would be just spreading rumors.
Still, while nothing is known about what caused this plane to crash, I would like to take this opportunity to correct a very common misconception that many pilots that I have met have about airplanes. The examples aren't that good, and I can't explain it so well since I am tired and sick, but just bear with me please.
The assumption:
Many pilots assume that planes have built in safety areas for the do not exceed limitations on the airplane, this is only partly true. The FAA does require engineers to build the airplane tougher than for what it is going to be used for. Just pulling some numbers out of the air, let's say a jetliner will never pull more than 1.0Gs, and let's just say that the FAA requires that jet liners be designed to be able to pull 1.5Gs, that does NOT mean that it is safe to pull 1.6Gs.

There are many tall buildings(over 40 floors) in Manhattan, especially the upper east side, since mid town is a very premium place for high income individuals and it's over looking and easy access to central park.

You can say those are one of most expensive places to rent in the world. Hitting it may be something as simple as being around the statue of liberty where it was reported they were sight seeing.

On pliot error. While Liddle was a fairly newbie, the passenger was also reported to be his instructor. So you have 2 experianced pliots, even if one made a bad judgement, there should be another head to give advice.

It's hard to imagine that both licensed pliots would make such a big mistake, but then not the first time something like, "Let's see if we can find my house".

On the plane itself. It was a pretty good plane. It's fairly new, and the model has a 95% safety rate history on it. The parashute also should of kicked in, which it didn't. So until we get more detailed, it's just a very bad case of luck.

[Eohmer]

Re: aircraft crashed into building in NY

I found this...

"The plane issued a distress call before it came through a hazy, cloudy sky and struck the red-brick high-rise building, called The Belaire, with a loud bang."

"Port Authority officials said the plane took off from Teterboro Airport in New Jersey at 2:30 p.m. EDT and circled the Statue of Liberty before heading up the East River. Air traffic control lost contact with the aircraft when it was in the area of the 59th Street Bridge, according to New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg."

Fox News

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"Immediately prior to the crash, Lidle's aircraft was operating at 112 miles per hour at 700 feet in the East River VFR corridor, an area which some pilots and former NTSB official Peter Goelz consider challenging due to its narrowness and frequent congestion. For aircraft flying without a clearance to enter the controlled airspace surrounding nearby La Guardia airport, the corridor effectively ends abrubtly at the northern tip of Roosevelt Island, thereby forcing any pilots reaching this boundary to make a sharp U-turn. Lidle's plane flew north through the corridor before turning and hitting the north-facing side of the building along the river near the north end of the corridor."

"According to an interview given by Lidle one month prior to the accident, he had been a pilot for 7 months and had flown about 95 solo hours."

Wikipedia

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And here is an extra little tid bit... a very weird and coincidental one...

"The plane hit the apartment of Kathleen Caronna who coincidentally in 1997 made news when she was hit and badly injured by a light post as it toppled down on her at the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. Caronna was not in her apartment at the time the plane hit, although she was on her way to it."