Unlatched Door Suspected In RV10 Fatal Accident

[system]

The National Transportation Safety Board Preliminary Report (posted below) on the January 2 crash of a Vans RV10 in Fullerton, California, confirms earlier reports that multiple witnesses observed the pilot’s side clamshell door swinging open on takeoff. The report further reveals that Vans sent the builder-owner a retrofit kit for a secondary door latch in January 2010, but the latch was never installed.

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This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://www.avweb.com/aviation-news/rv10-accident-aircraft-lacked-recommended-safety-latch

[yakdriver (Donald Chapton)]

Tragic when all he had to do was fly the airplane.

[Bruce_S]

Agreed, but it’s difficult to say if other problems may have developed after the door opened (and perhaps separated). An open door in a 172 is noisy and perhaps startling, but not usually a major flight control issue. A clam shell door is (again perhaps) a different story. One of the aircraft I instruct in is an LSA with large clam-shell doors. Should one of those open in flight I have a real concern that it might separate and strike the horizontal stabilizer. That could be a very bad day for all concerned. The flight school mechanic installed a secondary sliding latch on the doors to help keep them closed during flight.

[jethro442]

Decades ago I was flying Japanese tourists in Hawaii using a Piper Aztec. The door popped open shortly after takeoff. The buffeting was quite severe. Noisy. Circled back to land to close and relock the door. There are now five Japanese that no longer have slanted eyes. Theirs were as round as saucers. I am sure they all thought they were going to die.

[Karrpilot]

I remember the first time i didn’t get the secondary latch locked on the warrior. I never made that mistake again.

[dbier]

So very sad and infuriating that his decisions to not install the secondary latch AND to modify the latch warning system also killed his daughter - who trusted him with her life.

[rpstrong]

Same here - it was on my solo, in a Piper Worrier (not a typo - you never saw me fly). The secondary popped loose on climb-out, cranking the wind noise to 11 - or so it seemed. I’m happy to say that my first reaction was to keep flying - my survival instinct had me tune out the noise and search for anything that felt wrong with the controls. I don’t think it took me more than a few seconds to sort things out, determine that the plane was doing fine (in spite of the pilot) and see that the door was indeed cracked open.

I was scheduled for two touch and goes followed by a full stop; I cut straight to the full stop and taxied to the instructors’ bench, door still ajar. Told the instructor what happened; that I didn’t want to deal with it in flight (especially since I fly on one wing - paralyzed my left arm crashing my BSA); that I had not double checked the latch; and that I didn’t know if anything had to be checked on the mechanism after an inflight opening (there wasn’t).

He said I’d handled it well and sent me out to complete the sequence.

[AlwaysLearning (Mark)]

I’ll make no comment on exactly what happened here, but I can relate a personal experience that was one of those learning moments.

I was alone, taking off from a field in Arizona in the middle of nowhere. I had landed at the field with a friend who did a very expedited runup, and not wanting to get left too far behind, I expedited my runup and takeoff checklist as well (yes…I know).

I taxied out, applied power, and had a very normal takeoff roll and takeoff, until I hit about 400’, when the door opened…it had been latched, but not locked.

Without panicking, I reached over and tried to secure the door…one, twice, three times. I failed. I turned my head away from the door to make a call that I was returning to the field, when I realized that I was now looking at the desert floor.

After reestablishing a climb altitude, I returned and landed, secured the door, and left uneventfully.

The response to my radio announcement that I was returning to land was embarrassing. “I didn’t think that was going to end well. I don’t know what you were doing inside that plane for a couple of seconds, but your instructor definitely taught you better than that. Fly the airplane.”

I replied with “Door issue I should have ignored. I’m sorry you had to watch that.”

Update: I should point out that the lesson stuck. On another flight, in another plane, a broken latch on a baggage door resulted in the door opening, again on takeoff… making a racket. On that day, the instructor jumped a little, and started saying what is making that noise. I responded with a quick radio call and then told him the plane was flying great and we’d sort it out. Took another couple of seconds to realize it was the baggage door. Fly. Live. Learn.

[Samuel_Drake]

On an early solo flight in a 172, I had the pilot window suddenly open just after take off. In my paying attention to the window, I did pull the nose up but not enough to come close to a power on stall. But, still, it was a learning experience. Fly the airplane.

Later on a flight with an instructor in the same not so well maintained 172, we had a door hinge fracture and fail on the right hand door. Fortunately this occurred on the ground as we were putting the plane away.

[Jonathon_Payne]

Non including mine, there are 8 comments to this article so far. Only Bruce S has correctly stated that the RV-10 has gull wing (or clam shell) doors. This is wildly different from most other aircraft we fly. If a door pops open in a Warrior or 172 it is, to quote Shakespeare, full of sound and fury signifying nothing. You just land the airplane and close the door. I’ve had this happen to me, as well. If the gull wing door on an RV-10 comes open in flight it causes a massive trim change that could cause the airplane to buck wildly before the door gets ripped off. There’s a strong possibility that the door will damage or destroy the elevator, rudder, or both on its way out, potentially rendering the aircraft uncontrollable. Apples and oranges.