Good heavens! Another apparent case of hypoxia has brought one more aircraft down!

 

Larry Glazer, a very well-known and highly respected real estate developer from Rochester, New York and his wife took off from Rochester earlier this morning enroute to spend the weekend in Naples, Florida.

 

 

 

The aircraft took off from New York’s Greater Rochester International Airport (ROC) at 8:45 a.m. ET Friday morning with a flight plan to Naples, Florida.

 

“Federal Aviation Administration Air Traffic Controllers tracked a Socata TBM700 aircraft through U.S. airspace as the pilot stopped responding to radio calls at about 10 am EDT,” according to a statement from the FAA.

 

North American Aerospace Defence Command (NORAD) fighter jets had just returned to base for refueling after they scrambled to escort the “unresponsive” small aircraft over the Atlantic Ocean.

 

NORAD said the occupants of the aircraft had been unresponsive to attempts to communicate; the FAA had not confirmed the number of people on board.

http://globalnews.ca/news/1546434/norad-fighter-jets-escorting-small-aircraft-over-atlantic/

CNN has played the audio  from the F-15 pilot. Could see pilots chest rising, windows frosted, slumped over controls.   Even if he was somehow still breathing he was likely a vegetable by that point.  Sad state of affairs. 

Here is the ATC Traffic from the beginning of the incident...

 

http://archive-server.liveatc.net/kgso/ZTL-GSO-Sep-05-2014-1400Z.mp3

 

(Starts at approx. Time Index 4:13, about a ¼ of the way along the slider)

 

A very tragic and unfortunate end... my thoughts go out to the families.

 

:(

Yeah, does sound like they had a sudden lost of cabin pressure, similar to what happen in Oct 1999 to Payne Stewart, and three others in a Learjet 35 that suddenly lost cabin pressure and finally crashed in South Dakota, very sad!

Great video that shows just quickly you go from competent person to completely incapable of doing basic tasks and math.  By the time the pilot realized something was happening he was likely already incapable of making proper decisions to save himself.

 

This is not TBM700, this is the latest TBM900 delivered to the owner in March 2014, hence it's cute registration N900KN

This is not TBM700, this is the latest TBM900 delivered to the owner in March 2014, hence it's cute registration N900KN

I could only go by what the news was reporting. I've corrected the thread title accordingly. Since this was a practically new build aircraft, I have to wonder what really went wrong with the pressurization system.

 

Was it a slow cabin leak perhaps? In any case, when he requested lower altitude why on earth did he not use the magic word?

I could only go by what the news was reporting.

 

Yeah... I think the confusion is because the registration lists it as a TBM 700.  But if you look at the TCDS (Type Certificate) the 900s serial numbers (basically) begin with "1000", and this serial no. was #1003 (all part of the same type certificate under the 700).

 

 

 

Was it a slow cabin leak perhaps?

 

Frosted windows... kind of sounds that way.

 

 

 

I've corrected the thread title accordingly.

 

 

This was the first American delivery of the newly released TBM900. The ink on the sales contract barely had time to dry... :blush:

 

http://www.flyingmag.com/aircraft/turboprops/new-tbm-900-features-improved-performance-comfort

I could only go by what the news was reporting. I've corrected the thread title accordingly. Since this was a practically new build aircraft, I have to wonder what really went wrong with the pressurization system.

 

Was it a slow cabin leak perhaps? In any case, when he requested lower altitude why on earth did he not use the magic word?

 

Could be he was already experiencing the affects of Hypoxia by the time he called in the request to lower altitude... Only going by the ATC communication. It's obvious he saw "an indication that is not correct in the plane". Being that's all he said it's purely a guess what that indication actually was. Could've been a gauge, or could have been he saw frost on the windows.  Again, all guess work at that point but I'd definitely be willing to hedge a bet he was already very loopy by the time he made that ATC request and incapable of making the decision to go to oxygen or declare an emergency. 

 

 

Was it a slow cabin leak perhaps?

 

Here's a link from AOPA regarding that.

 

http://www.aopa.org/News-and-Video/All-News/2014/September/05/TBM-pilot-unresponsive?WT.mc_id=140907special&WT.mc_sect=sap

 

Also, a link in there for a just issued AOPA Air Safety Institute 'Safety Alert' on Hypoxia... fwiw.

Could be he was already experiencing the affects of Hypoxia by the time he called in the request to lower altitude... Only going by the ATC communication. It's obvious he saw "an indication that is not correct in the plane". Being that's all he said it's purely a guess what that indication actually was.

I wonder why he requested only 18,000' instead of 10,000'. Descending to only 18,000' wouldn't really have helped all that much.

He probably underestimated the danger or wasn't aware of it, he was torn between continuing the mission and responding to the emergency. Indecision, 1/2 way reaction.

He probably underestimated the danger or wasn't aware of it, he was torn between continuing the mission and responding to the emergency. Indecision, 1/2 way reaction.

Half way reactions in aviation will get you killed this is the second plane in a week that has crashed into the sea with an unconscious pilot

I just posted a screen shot of FlightAware's tracking of the flight of N900KN in the Screen Shot Forum.  It clearly shows the flight path taken.

 

Wilson