Scottsdale Crash

[azpilot]

What appears to be a Piper Aerostar crashed on departure from Scottsdale airport last night. Taking off to the NE it crashed into the hills to the east and exploded on impact.

It looks like it missed clearing the top of the hills by only several hundred feet. How does something like this happen? It was a clear night and I find it hard to believe that the pilot was unaware of the terrain. At least two people were killed. I know a few years ago someone crashed into the same hills when they were illegally flying in IMC conditions.

This has been a bad week for General Aviation. I just get frustrated when what appears to be such an easily preventable accident occurs.

My condolences go out to the families involved.

 

[Flic1]

It's been a rough week...

JACKSONVILLE, Florida (CNN) -- The U.S. Coast Guard found the wreckage of a twin-engine Cessna floating in the Atlantic Ocean off Fernandina Beach, Florida, and retrieved the body of one of four people on the plane, Petty Officer Dana Warr said Monday.

The National Marine Fisheries Service plane, which was on a whale watch mission, had been missing off the northeast Florida coast near Jacksonville. Two men and two women were onboard, Warr said.

"We don't know the cause of the accident right now," said Warr, who added that darkness had hampered search efforts.

The routine patrol for Atlantic right whales began at St. Simons Island, Georgia, and was to end at Fernandina Beach, north of Jacksonville near the Georgia-Florida border.

The plane was reported overdue at 6:30 p.m. Sunday, and the Coast Guard found the plane's monitoring beacon a few hours later, about 8 miles east of Fernandina Beach.

"The aircraft have an emergency locator transmitter onboard," Warr said. "We started receiving that signal, and that's what we based our search off of and were able to locate the signal and the site by that device."

Warr said a backpack, life jackets and papers were found at the scene.




DELAWARE CITY, Delaware (CNN) -- A small plane crashed on a small, rocky island in the Delaware River on Sunday afternoon, officials said, catching fire and killing both people on board.

The crash happened at 5:36 p.m. on Pea Patch Island, a rocky outcrop in the river about 20 miles south of Wilmington, said a dispatcher for the New Castle County Fire Department.

The single-engine Beech Bonanza took off from Wings Field Airport near Philadelphia and was headed to Columbia, South Carolina, said Jim Peters, a spokesman for the Federal Aviation Administration. It was on an instrument flight plan.

Ten miles south of Wilmington, he said, the pilot reported vibration in the aircraft. Air traffic controllers advised the pilot to fly into Wilmington, but the plane crashed before he got there, Peters said.

Dave Carpenter of the Delaware City Fire Company said the pilot reported to the tower at the New Castle County Airport that it was losing power and going down along the Delaware River. The last call they received was that the plane had crashed onto the island and was on fire, Carpenter said.

A man and a woman on board the plane were killed in the crash, said Lt. Tim Winstead of the Delaware State Police. Their identities were not immediately available.

Because of ice on the Delaware River, firefighters had to access the mile-long island by air, Carpenter said.

"The Delaware State Police helicopter made access with Delaware City firefighters and the aircraft fire was extinguished at approximately 6:30 p.m.," he said.

Eventually, with the help of a tugboat from a nearby pier, a fireboat from the Wilmington Fire Department and rescue boats from two area fire companies managed to reach the island and remove the victims' bodies.

The state police plan to investigate the crash further Monday, Carpenter said

 

[azpilot]

Update

From AZFamily.com

A Utah couple en route to Santa Fe, N.M., who only stopped at Scottsdale Airpark to refuel are the apparent victims of Sunday's fiery plane crash in the McDowell Mountains.

Scottsdale police have identified the victims as Duane and Joanne Shrontz of Alta, Utah. Shortly after refueling, the plane crashed just three miles east of the airport. The couple were in their 50s.

The twin-engine Piper crashed about three-quarters up the mountain at an elevation of 3,750 feet above sea level. According to Scott Bowerbank in NewsChopper 3, the plane only missed the top of the peak by between 100 and 150 feet.



Sounds like someone who was using a GPS and no charts! Coming from the west they wouldn't run into any hills. Going east is another matter. Sad and totally preventable. You would think the pilot would have known about the terrain considering enroute to Sante Fe there are lots of hills.