Four people, including a 15-year-old student pilot, were killed in the crash of a Piper Arrow 180 at Basin Harbour Airport, a grass strip in Ferrisburg, Vermont on Sunday. The aircraft crashed in a wooded area shortly after takeoff just after noon and the student, Delilah Van Ness, her mother Susan Van Ness, her high school flight instructor Paul Pelletier and passenger Frank Rodriguez were found dead at the scene about 12 hours after the crash. “No reports were received indicating an aircraft in distress or that a plane had crashed,” Vermont State Police noted in a news release.
Such a waste. History keeps repeating itself, and needlessly.
This accident will likely have a negative impact on the school’s aviation program and perhaps other school programs add well.
Not far from where I live a father (a pilot) watched his 3 sons (pilots) attempt a takeoff from a private strip (PA-28R). Sadly all 3 sons perished in front of him that day.
I can’t even imagine, and I just don’t get it. Even with CFI on board. My heart and thoughts are for sure with this family this morning. Regards the aircraft…the group flew to one place for brunch…so the only thing that could have changed was fuel loading, or lack of. Regardless, it’s just tragic for GA, the families and the school. I’m very sorry for the loss.
“CFI onboard”
What is a CFI but an individual who has sped through some significant learning in order to earn advanced ratings with no real world experience. See how many CFIs were on board for all kinds of accidents.
What a thoughtless response. You have no idea who this person was or their experience and qualifications. It takes less effort to not be a jerk, just don’t say anything.
What’s changed from when they arrived is the fact they were departing — a completely different experience. They were heavily loaded, inexperienced, and no doubt nervous. The assumption here is that they hit trees at the end of that narrow runway, but it’s just as likely they horsed it off too early and veered into trees along the side because they were airborne below VMC. In that situation you can get a control reversal where trying to stay away from the trees actually makes it worse. Imagine their realization. What would you do?
A long paved runway with no obstructions in the cool of the morning, yea, sure. A 2,990’ turf strip with trees at each end in the warm afternoon? Nope.
Whilst a “Doolittle” takeoff might just barely have succeeded, it’s not something you risk without extensive training and not something you even try from a normal GA safety aspect.
My grandmother used to repeat the old adage that “there are old pilots and bold pilots, but no old, bold pilots”. One of the most difficult yet imperative “skills” to have as an aviator is the ability to just say no, not today. A secondary skill is to avoid being a Monday morning quarterback. A tragic accident indeed.
Tragic and appears with info so far to be totally preventable accident. Looked up the CFI on FAA Airman Registry. Commercial - ASEL/AMEL Instrument, CFI ASEL/AMEL/Instrument, Ground Instructor Advanced/Instrument, A&P/IA. Not a newbie airman .
I’ve owned a PA-28-140 with the 30’ wing and a similar PA-28-180. Neither airplane is really a four place airplane even under normal conditions. The only thing those airplanes do good is come down out of the sky. An even worse airplane I owned was an AA-1A … THAT was a 1/2 person airplane.
I once took off in the 180hp PA-28 at the 9,000’ Grand Canyon airport with 2 aboard and had a heck of a time trying to climb out of ground effect. Recently, I had to decide whether to sell the 140 or a 172 I’ve owned a long time … I sold the 140 for this reason. I once took off with four adults on a hot summer day at Edwards AFB and the 172 performed just fine, by comparison. Problem is, ya gotta fight that airplane to stop flying, by comparison.
Can’t say if density altitude had a hand in this tragedy but I’d bet that it did? RIP.
I used to own an old Beech Sundowner with the 160 hp engine. While not the same, it was similar in performance and was definitely a 3 person (max) airplane. I took off from Farmington, New Mexico, one time on a hot summer day with just me (170 lbs.), full fuel and maybe 50 pounds of junk and the same thing happened. It would take off, but not climb out of ground effect. Fortunately, the Farmington airport sits on top of a mesa so there were no trees or hills in the way. When I flew off the end of the mesa, I dropped about 50 feet and the plane finally started climbing. I would never have even considered flying out of a short grass strip with any load on board. A tragic outcome in this case. My condolences to the families.
Quoted above comment: “Regards the aircraft…the group flew to one place for brunch…so the only thing that could have changed was fuel loading…”
Lotsa factors likely changed!! The changes were likely temperature (density Altitude), wind direction (headwind vs tailwind components (potentially a big deal!), field condition (grass - dry or wet/short or tall/dense or sparse/or smooth vs rough/paved vs grass), field elevation (higher vs lower), runway slope (level vs up hill or down hill), runway length (obstacles vs open fields) surrounding terrain, and etc. All were potentially big deals that could individually and collectively have a profound impact on performance compared to the airport the four departed from… Very sad event.
The hershey bar wing Pipers are not great performers at high density altitudes. That was not the case here. High temp today at BTV 71 degrees. Basin Harbor is near sea level. Takeoff distance for a PA28R 180 on standard day at gross is 1240’ to clear a 50’ obstacle. This was not a runway environment accident. No witnesses. Airplane reported overdue at home base. Aircraft not located until approximately 12 hours after departure. Some distance east of runway indicates they had likely already turned on course.
I helped dismantle a crashed PA28-235. Four heavy people and full fuel.They landed on the wrong side of a stone fence at the end of a private strip. One main tank hit a boulder that flattened the tank to the main spar. No fire, no injuries. These are very crashworthy airplanes. Way better than most comparable sheet metal airplanes . However one cannot expect to survive a spin into the ground.
Weight: Basin Harbor has no fuel so likely 100# plus down from full tanks. Standard useful load is 1120#, so even if this was a heavier than standard airplane they would have been below gross with four 170# people.
I take it you aren’t a CFI, based on that response. Yes, there are CFIs out there who speed through the ratings and manage to find lenient DPEs, but that’s true for pilots of all ratings.
There are some circumstances where if the CFI is a little less attentive than they should be (and sometimes the difference between “attentive enough” and “not attentive enough” is on the order of seconds), the situation can quickly devolve into one where there isn’t enough time to react.
Add in the pressure of having the student and parent on board and it’s understandable how it’s possible the instructor may have overlooked some preflight planning and let the situation go just a little too far before there was adequate time to correct. It also could have just been a “simple” case of poor airmanship, but again, this affects all pilots.
I was incorrect on the distance. Flight plan at 140 kts which is probably high, is one hour from Basin Harbor to Windham CT. So approx 40 gallons departing.
Once again this was not a runway environment accident.
Apples to Oranges but Max Conrad flew a Commanche 180 nonstop from Casablanca to El Paso, a world record at the time. The takeoff was an obscene number over gross.
This is far more likely to be an engine failure some distance from the airport possibly followed by a loss of control in an attempted return to the airport.
