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Tragedy Strikes At Butler Airport
The SkyDive KC jump plane, with 12 occupants on board, crashed shortly after taking off around 11:30 Sunday morning There were no survivors; altitude and time were insufficient for parachuting to safety. Following normal protocol, the National Transportation Safety Board will investigate the accident and will issue its findings after examining the scene and wreckage. It’s far too soon to speculate on the cause and circumstances involved. Our heartfelt condolences go out the families of the deceased.
If you like roller coasters, you loved last week’s flying weather. Up and down, in and out, changes daily, sometimes twice a day. There were many opportunities to get up, just perhaps not reliable trip-taking weather. As far as visitors went, the only traffic observed was a couple of Piper Warrior/Archer types. Local flyers were Gerald Bauer and Randy Miller, both flying missions in the Cessna Skyhawk, and I hopped around in the Aeronca Champion. It’s a busy time for agplane operators; BCS has had its AirTractor airborne almost daiiy, and LowFlyer Sam Styron was flying out of Harrisonville while Dusty’s Flying Service was running out of Nevada.
As expected, general aviation is being affected by “World Cup Fever” in the Kansas City area. In addition to the expected Temporary Flight Restrictions over the match locations, the FAA has pllans to impose Prior Permission Required and time-slot reservations for operating in and out of MCI, MKC, OJC, IXD and Lee’s Summit and Mosby airports, from June 16 to July 11. In other words, it’ll be a mess to fly there, so avoid using the airports for the next month. For more information, visit faa/gov/air_traffic/publications/domesticnotices/dom26021 ; good luck making sense out of it all.
In other aviation news reported this week, much was being made of a now-retired Air Canada captain who was discovered to have flown his last 17 years without possessing an Airline Transport Pilot certificate. Despite his exemplary service record flying Boeing 767, 777 and 787’s, including the required recurrent training in simulators, he held only a multi-engine commercial pilot license, which qualified him to be in the copilot’s seat but not the left-side captain’s position. Why he was never given the written and flight tests for the ATP, which he certainly could have passed, is unknown; somebody in supervision should have caught the discrepancy. We hope he doesn’t lose his pension over it.
Airbus has test flown an A350-1000 ultra-long-range airliner, ordered by Quantas for planned non-stops from Sydney to London. The flight time is expected to be 22 hours; that’s a long time to be in very-low-earth orbit. I guess it beats going through multiple layovers. Service is to begin in May, 2027.
Drifting along with the high-altitude wind, an intrepid trio of balloon pilots spent 70 hours and 11 minutes crossing the Atlantic in a basket under their hydrogen balloon last week, launching from Maine on Thursday and landing in Luxembourg on Sunday. Talk about your no-frills accommodations.
Continental Aerospace, builder of American piston-engine airplane powerplants for 100 years, has been sold to private-equity firm Arcline, after being owned for the past 15 years by AVIC, an arm of the Communist Chinese government. Like Cirrus Aircraft, also owned by AVIC, Continental Motors has been under scrutiny for its hostile foreign ownership. It’s good to have the Mobile, Alabama engine maker back in non-Chinese hands.
Our last-week question asked why jets don’t use reverse thrust instead of brakes for ground operations. It’s because the debris thrown by up reserve at slow speed gets ingested into the engines. For next week, tell us if there any instrument approach procedures for seaplane-only bases? You can send your answers to kochhaus1@gmail.com.
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