What: US F-16 Fighter Falcon en route from Misawa Air Base in Aomori
Where: 200 miles northeast of Hokkaido in the Pacific Ocean off Japanese Coast
When: July 22, 2012
Who: pilot
Why: After a U.S. fighter jet splashed down in the Pacific Ocean 200 miles northeast of Hokkaido Japan, the pilot was retrieved from the water. THe rescue occurred six hours after the crash around 6 p.m. when the pilot was pulled aboard a U.S. container ship.
The name of the pilot has not been released.
What: Marion Flying Club Cirrus SR-20 en route from Marion Municipal Airport
Where: CRYSTAL LAKE, Ill
When: Nov 26, 2011 10:30am
Who: 4 fatalities
Why: The one-engine Cirrus SR-20 was flying in rainy, overcast conditions when it crashed in a soybean field on a farm unincorporated McHenry County, killing the four aboard the plane. Marion businessman Ray Harris and his daughters Ramie and Shey were killed in the crash, along with one of the girl’s boyfriends. On impact, the plane shattered into debris which was spread over 100 yards. The plane carries a parachute, which had been deployed but it was tangled in a tree, which may have contributed to the wreck.
The pilot, Harris, had been flying one of his daughters back to Wheaton College.
What: Grupo 10, Fuerza Aerea de Chile CASA 212 Aviocar en route from Santiago to isla Juan Fernandez
Where: near the Juan Fernandez islands
When: Sept 2, 2011 4:58 p.m.
Who: 21 aboard, 21 fatalities
Why: The Chilean air force plane on a relief flight attempted to land, but the landing was aborted twice as pilots fought hard winds. On the third attempt, the flight disappeared from radar, as witnesses saw it veer left.
The plane went down off the coast of the island. Four hours after takeoff, the flight lost contact with ATC.
No survivors have been found but some wreckage has been recovered.
This was TVN’s second flight in support of the Desafío Levantamos Chile (rebuilding project.)
Television personality 44 year old Felipe Camiroaga was aboard the plane to document reconstruction of Juan Fernandez island after the Feb. 27 magnitude-8.8 earthquake and tsunami. Business man Felipe Cubillos (brother-in-law of the defense minister ) was also aboard the plane.
Rescue teams found an intact door and several knapsacks in the water about 2,000 meters yards from the airport.
Those aboard the plane were:
Televisión Nacional de Chile: Felipe Camiroaga, Roberto Bruce, Sylvia Slier, Carolina Gatica y Rodrigo Cabezón.
From Desafío Levantemos Chile: Felipe Cubillos, Sebastian Correa, Joel Lizama, Catalina Vela Montero, Jorge Palma y Joaquín Arnold.
Consejo de Cultura: Galia Carolina Díaz Riffo y Romina Isabel Irarrázabal Faggiani.
Chilean air force: group commander from the Department of Communications, Rodrigo Fernández, and department journalist, José Cifuentes.
From the crew: Hero 26-year-old pilot Carolina Fernández Flavio Olivo, Juan Pablo Mallea, first sergeant Eduardo Jones, Eduardo Estrada and Erwin Núñez.
A navy frigate and a Hercules C-130 are among the search and rescue vehicles.
George’s Point of View
The Federal Aviation Administration had proposed a rule that would have barred bird-strike reports from public release, but in spite of some bumps in the road, the US is opening its “bird strike” database, and the public is going to have access to this database, except for a few personal (privacy) details which will be redacted. There was some initial fear that transparency of the database would deter reportage.
The NTSB made this announcement. Reports that the database will be available to the public as of friday are all over aviation websites.
After the notorious Hudson River bird strike, I wonder how passengers are going to respond to the disclosure of this database that has thousands of bird strike reports–
Pictured: A Piper PA-38-112 Tomahawk II
Click to view full size photo at Airliners.net
Contact photographer Andrés Contador
What: Aviation Pacific Flight School Piper PA-38-112 Tomahawk en route from Camarillo
Where: Ojai, California near the Krotona Institute
When: Dec 10, 2009
Who: Flight instructor and student (2 on board)
Why: An hour into a training flight, the plane crashed in a field.
The pilot was not in communication with ATC. It is presumed that there were engine troubles, that the pilot was struggling to keep the plane in the air. Witnesses report at least two incidents during the flight were the plane was observed to lose power.
A witness called 911 after seeing the plane fall right in front of him, right onto the roadway in front of his truck.”
What: Algerian Air Force CASA C-295M Cargo Plane en route from Paris to Algiers
Where: Saint-Germain-du-Teil, near Avignon, France
When: Nov 9 2012, 3:45 pm.
Who: 6 aboard, 6 fatalities
Why: The Algerian Cargo plane crashed in Southern France near the village of Trelans, killing two military personnel and four civilians.
Firefighters recovered the remains of four civilians and two soldiers from the burning wreckage.
14 vehicles from Lozere carried 25 firefighters; and from Aveyron six vehicles brought 25 firefighters. An Air Force helicopter also assisted.
The research departmemt of the Paris Air Police and the Criminal Research Institute of the National Gendarmerie de Rosny-sous-Bois were dispatched to determine the cause of the crash.
While we are waiting for news of where Air France Flight 447 disappeared to, somewhere in the ocean (and no one can really say with any great specificity anything more specific than somewhere between Rio de Janeiro and Paris France because everywhere they apparently believe it was, they looked, and it wasn’t) Air France is coming out with a report.
An Air France assessment initiated by Chairman Jean-Cyril Spinetta in 2009 and performed by an international panel of eight aviation experts dubbed the Independent Safety Review Team is due to be released Jan 24, 2011.
Its inception was timed, not too surprisingly, six months after the fatal crash, and although officially having nothing to do with the fatal event, its timing alone suggests an optimistic attempt on the part of Air France’s media team to counterbalance the lack of consumer confidence in the airline after they lost a whole plane and 228 lives.
The report will cover training, technical and flight-safety issues, though the not-too-hidden agenda may be to reflect changes made since the crash of Air France Flight 447, (whose wreckage we all know has still not been located.) The report is a beginning of the “New Transparancy” proposed by Air France. There are people who would like to see that transparency extend to some old news, such as what is going on with the search for the wreckage of the worst accident in French aviation history.
The last (02:10) ACARS transmission from Flight 477 contained a set of coordinates indicating the location as 2°59?N 30°35?W officially the last known position, (when the twelve warning messages with the same time code indicated autopilot and auto-thrust system had disengaged, TCAS was in fault mode, and flight mode changed from ‘normal law’ to ‘alternate law’) but one wonders if the instrumentation was already in disagreement at that point, i.e. if that location data could be as faulty as the frozen pitot tubes.
So the report will be out today. The Assessment of Air France training, technical and flight-safety issues is bound to be a big event, but as the media and airline waves these initiatives in the public face, there are a lot of people still staring out to sea, looking for that lost wreckage, who won’t be distracted by any (see-here-look-at-this-news-see-how-much-we-are-improving) sleight of hand.
