Anything Like This Ever Happen To You?
Hydrant
Posts: 7,773 ✭✭✭✭✭
So, yesterday I drove into town to pick up some deck screws at the hardware store. I only drive on the 91 Freeway between 12/1 o' clock because that's the only time of day when the traffic is not congested. Well, this is what happened ........The airplane was Eastbound. I was heading West. It happened right before I got to the Maple Street off-ramp. I saw the whole thing. Up close and personal. HOLY CHRIST!...... Corona, California. The Circle City. My home town.
No Injuries.
0
Comments
Never witnessed an airplane crash, but have seen the immediate aftermath of a few. Quite an event you witnessed!!
I was an Air Traffic Controller for 7 years, and pilots do dumb things from time to time, perhaps a bit too technical to explain here. One of the saddest and creepiest things we had to do monthly was listen to tape recordings of pilot/ATC communications...it wasn't easy to listen to pilots who knew they were doomed and facing imminent death for different reasons. The screaming was difficult to endure, but the purpose was to discuss what, if anything the controller could have done to help/save the pilot. Most were getting into IFR conditions, without having the proper license to do so, then spatial disortientation sets in and they can't tell up from down and lose total control, then the impact and everything just turned into a low hiss. Sad stuff!!
A job with responsibility. People's lives depend on you. Was it stressful?...Duh????
Also, I have a total fear of flying..... I took one ride in an airplane when I was around 8 years old. My cousin was the pilot. He put the plane into a stall(?)......turned off the engine. He said we were going to crash. What a dirty joke.......Thinking about it makes me sick to my stomach..... like right now.
When I was younger I flew a lot to Colorado to visit my uncle, and when I was 12 years old I flew to Paris France with my grandparents. I remember the flight to Paris was long and we flew over the ocean at night for hours and hours. I haven't flown in over 10 years and I never will again, over the years I started to realize that if something happens up there, you're trapped, there's no escape, it's really unnerving.
Your cousin was an idiot for doing that. I have a Commerical Pilot's license, and when I took friends for a ride, I explained everything, from maybe a bit bumpy to where we were going. If there was something cool to see along the way, I'd gently dip the wing (flying cessna 172s) and not scare anybody. Flying over New England in the Fall was especially exciting, seemed like never ending color, the air was calm and crisp, life was great.
As for ATC, like everything else in life, if you knew the rules and studied, it was pretty easy. ATC is often described as "unending moments of boredom, penetrated by brief moments of sheer terror". It was only stressful when you got really busy and pilots were either slow to acknowledge instructions, or didn't do what you told them to do. Great job, horrible management, thus the strike in 1981, which I took part in. Not my greatest moment in life, and one that I regret. I gave an oath not to do what I did...gotta live with that. When the whole football team walks off the field, its pretty hard to stand out there by yourself !!
I don't know if airlines still do this, but I remember back in the early 90s, airlines would serve alcohol on flights, little miniature bottles of Jim Beam whiskey and stuff like that, and I always thought that was really stupid. All you need is somebody getting drunk on a flight and going crazy thousands of feet in the air.
That's putting it mildly...... I have a question that has always bothered me since that incident.......If the pilot kills the engine in flight, what are the chances that the engine won't start back up?......I've always been haunted by that question....... From my truck driving days, every driver knows a few basic "Rules Of The Road."......... one rule is......Never shut down the engine before you get where you're going. It might not start back up!
I have never shut off an engine, I have slowed it down during training to get experience with stalls. I've never spun a plane, and would be scared to death. Why tempt fate when you don't have to? The glide ratio and altitude you're at would dictate how much air time you have left, better find a nice place to land, which in most cases are few and far between. Even if you land ok, there's always the chance that a hot engine would ignite a fuel leak, not the kinda death I even wanna think about.
Probably 50-50 on the engine, you might panic to get it restarted and flood the carburetor, then more panic sets in as the plane continues to descend...the outcome is obvious.
Man, that's scary! I suspected as much but I never really wanted to know the answer....Like you said, ....What an idiot.
Here's video of that plane crash.
https://www.reddit.com/r/CatastrophicFailure/comments/wlfnaa/plane_crash_on_california_freeway_yesterday_no/
A couple years ago a plane crashed here in Atlanta on i285 right outside of my brothers condo. Could see it from his place.