Jim Davis
SOUTH AFRICAN CIVIL AVIATION AUTHORITY
This discussion is to promote safety and not to establish liability.
CAA’s report contains padding and repetition, so in the interest of clarity, I have paraphrased extensively.
Aircraft registration: ZS-IFK
Date and time of accident: 15 September 2014 1808Z
Type of aircraft: Cessna 172
Type of operation: Private
Operator AFOS Flight School
PIC license type: PPL
License valid: Yes
PIC age: 24
PIC total hours: Unknown
PIC hours on type Unknown
Last point of departure: Newcastle (FANC) Natal
Next point of intended landing: Rand (FAGM)
Location of accident site: 8 nm NW of Newcastle. 4445’ AMSL
Meteorological information: Mid-level cloud. T 32˚C. DP: 3˚C
POB: 1 + 1
People killed: 1 + 1
Synopsis:
The pilot refuelled at Newcastle after working hours. He paid R800.00 cash for 41 litres of Avgas LL100.
He took off at about 1755Z. Ten minutes later ATC at OR Tambo spotted him at 5000 ft. He entered a right turn during which his rate of descent and airspeed increased before he disappeared from radar.
The wreckage was located at 4445’, 8.3 nautical miles NW of Newcastle. Both occupants were killed and the aircraft was destroyed by impact and fire.
The investigation blamed spatial disorientation due to limited visual references.
The pilot obtained his SPL on 29 May 2013 and on 23 September 2013 he passed his PPL flight test after flying 43 hours dual and 15 solo.
He also obtained his night rating in September after doing 10 hrs of IF training.
His logbook was not found, so his total hours, and hours during the past 90 days are unknown.
Aids to Navigation:
The pilot had a portable Garmin GPS on board. No evidence of any aeronautical maps was found at the scene of the accident.
Wreckage and Impact Information:
The aircraft was under power in a nose-down attitude when it hit the ground. It flipped over and the safety harnesses failed from overload. Both occupants were flung out and were found 73 m from the first point of impact.
The engine detached from the airframe and was found next to the bodies.
The aircraft was intact prior to hitting the ground. The wreckage was consistent with a high energy impact.
The accident site showed a high risk of the pilot developing spatial disorientation due to limited visual references and low terrestrial lighting. The pilot may have experienced somatogravic illusion during the climb. This would have caused a loss of control and a dive into the ground.
Probable cause:
Spatial disorientation.
Contributory factor: Lack of experience.
Jim’s comments:
Many experienced pilots are reluctant to fly a single engine aircraft on a black night. We are all members of the famous Live Cowards’ club. We are wary of:
- Electrical failures
- Vacuum failures
- Engine failures
- Unplanned instrument flying
You can handle the first two if you are on the ball. Engine failure – hmmm – skill is not enough – you need plenty of luck.
But it’s the last one – unplanned instrument flying that’s the killer.
If you did your night rating training at, or near a big city – it’s simply worthless. You and your pax are going to die the first time you fly in a black hole – where there are no lights and no horizon.
Reasonable terrestrial lighting and/or a decent moon – more than half – may give you a horizon, provided there’s no haze. It’s when you don’t have a horizon that things go desperately wrong.
To stay alive you need go from being a weekend pilot, to being a current and proficient instrument pilot in milliseconds.
The investigator missed the most vital contributary factor – there was NO BLOODY MOON. I checked – it was in its last quarter and only rose above the horizon three hours after they were both dead.
The pilot didn’t stand a chance. I’m amazed he lasted for 8.3 miles. Most non instrument rated pilots who attempt a black hole takeoff die before they complete their crosswind turn. Let me explain.
The somatogravic (acceleration) illusion mentioned in the report works like this. As the aircraft accelerates during and after takeoff, your body feels this in two main ways:
- You get pushed into the back of your seat.
- Your inner ear senses that the peas get pushed to the back of the bowl. Don’t panic – look at the diagram. Your inner ear has what amounts to a bowl with peas in it. G stands for gravity, or apparent gravity. Note that in diagrams D and E you can’t differentiate between acceleration and climbing. So as you accelerate after takeoff, or in a go-around, you believe the nose is pitching up and your natural reaction is to push it down.
If you manage to overcome this illusion you are still likely to enter a standard graveyard spiral, which is what this guy did.
In the early ’80s I was based at Rundu, defending our country against naughty communists. I was also teaching a bunch of medical doctors to fly. After they got their PPLs most of them wanted to do night ratings. I told them they would need to do ten hours of instrument flying as well as five hours at night.
The legal requirement was for only five hours of IF, but I felt this wasn’t enough, so I doubled it.
They were all happy, except one guy who said his mate in Johannesburg would do his rating much cheaper. He disappeared on the Flossie (the C130 shuttle from Waterkloof) and came back a few days later with a brand new night rating.
Shortly after this, I was called away from a dinner party to help identify bodies.
It was indeed the Johannesburg night-rating doctor, his wife and her sister. The stench of burned flesh caused me to deposit my dinner in the sand.
If this was an isolated case I wouldn’t bother you with it. Unfortunately it’s an all too common way of killing yourself at night – you lose control before turning crosswind.
And it’s not only rookie pilots – the following three crashes were published by SKYbray.aero.
On 12 May 2010, an Afriqiyah Airways Airbus A330 was making a daylight go around at Tripoli, after visual reference was not obtained at MDA. It did not sustain the IMC climb but descended rapidly into the ground with a high vertical and forward speed. The aircraft was destroyed and all but one of the 104 occupants were killed. Crew control inputs were attributed to the effects of somatogravic illusion and poor CRM.
On 5 March 2008, an Air Transat A310-300 was mishandled by the crew during departure from Quebec. Control of the aircraft was temporarily lost. The inappropriate steep descent that followed was attributed to the effect of somatogravic illusion.
On 23 August 2000, a Gulf Air Airbus A320 flew at speed into the sea during a dark night go around at Bahrain and all 143 occupants were killed. It was concluded that the most plausible explanation for both the descent and the failure to recover was the focus on the airspeed at the expense of the ADI. The effect of somatogravic illusion on the recently-promoted Captain went unchallenged by his low-experience First Officer.
If it can happen to airline pilots then us little Pappa Charlie pilots should sit up and take note.
One of CAA’s top flying inspectors told me how he lost control of an Aero Commander 680 just after takeoff. He was using house lights as a horizon and going into an ever steepening bank. Eventually his co-pilot grabbed the stick and levelled the wings. His horizon was a housing estate on a hillside.
My own night rating training was done by Diamond Dick Haremse, in Kimberly, in a 235 Cherokee. We did three circuits on runway 20 – away from the town lights. The horizon was a faint red glow over the desert.
Then we had a cup of coffee the terminal building, after which Dick foolishly sent me off to do an hour of solo – without any form of briefing.
By the time I taxied out the night was inky black.
Soon after liftoff the last of the flare path lights disappeared and I started looking for a horizon. Then I heard the revs and airspeed increasing – so I eased back on the stick. But it didn’t help, so I pulled back harder.
I had never heard the term ‘graveyard spiral’ and my instrument flying was extremely wobbly.
I was banked and pulling the aircraft into an ever tighter turn while searching for a horizon and losing height. Suddenly, in my peripheral vision, I saw a flash of red go past my left wingtip. It was a bush lit up by my port light.
I cannot describe the panic that surged through me as I picked up that wing. I knew that I would die within seconds if I didn’t go on to instruments immediately. Needless to say, I glued my eyes to the artificial horizon and lived through it. But it nearly caused me to give up flying for ever.
Take home stuff:
The most dangerous thing you can do in your whole flying career is a black hole night takeoff, or go-around. Consider spending your night rating money on a tailwheel conversion, or some gliding, or aerobatics.