Bad landing or takeoff in a Seaplane

[mpenguin1]

Not sure what the hell happened!

http://www.dumpalink.com/media/1136021845/Nice_Take_Off

[Grabo172]

Yikes!

[Callous]

Wow. I'm surprised the people on the beach did not move a little quicker.

[SteveC]

Originally Posted by mpenguin1

Not sure what the hell happened!

http://www.dumpalink.com/media/1136021845/Nice_Take_Off

Here is some third-hand information, can't verify it's authenticity, so take it for what it's worth:

Rather long account of what happened to cause the accident and it's outcome.

WILD GOOSE
Back in the “olden days”, when Tamarindo was a small village and everyone knew everyone else, filmmaker Bruce Brown chose the town to shoot a segment for his new movie "Endless Summer II". The sequel to the famous surfing movie "Endless Summer" came a generation later than the original, and, of course, featured new stars: Wingnut and Pat O'Connor, together with one of the originals, Robert August.

Living in Flamingo at that time was a pilot, "Hoot" Gibson, who had spent several years obtaining his commercial license in Costa Rica. Hoot owned a vintage Grumman Goose seaplane, relic of World War II, and intended to charter it for tours. Given the state of the roads then - and not much improved since - a seaplane seemed the way to go to explore a country surrounded by sea.

Robert August had a fine idea: To charter the Goose to fly the film crew and its surfers around the coasts of Costa Rica, Nicaragua and Panama, looking for unknown or little-known surf spots to shoot their sequences. Apart from being much faster to cover more area, the aircraft was highly superior to a boat, which could only examine the waves from the "back", or ocean, side whereas a 'plane could approach from the landward side, too. "Endless Summer II" was Hoot's first charter in Costa Rica, and was to last two weeks.

On the first day, the Goose took off from the airport. The plan was to fly out to Cabo Velas, return along Playa Grande and land in the bay near Tamarindo estuary, where the crew would board, then to take off on their adventures.

The camera crew set up on Tamarindo Beach, ready to shoot the approach and landing for the movie. But instead of flying from Cabo Velas, approaching Tamarindo from the west along the Playa Grande coastline, the big Grumman twin came roaring down the river from the north, putting on a show for the camera. On board were the pilot, "Hoot" Gibson, and local resident and California board shaper, the late Mike "Doc" Diffenderfer.

Approaching Tamarindo, the pilot started a right turn to follow the estuary, but his height was insufficient. Presumably he suddenly became aware of the power lines which cross the river at that point, and was forced to fly below them. The right pontoon caught the water, and jerked the aircraft to the right. Overcorrecting, the pilot put the left float into the water, and the aircraft swerved to that side.

Gibson applied full take-off power to get the aircraft back into the air, but it careered from the river onto the beach, where it ground-looped and came to a stop. The whole incident was filmed, and eventually became part of the movie.

"At this point," said August, "we saw fuel spraying from the aircraft onto the sand, and there was a distinct danger of a fire or explosion. As we approached the 'plane, the doors opened and Hoot and Doc jumped out, fortunately both unhurt. From a nearby beach house, a resident came running, carrying a big club and shouting at the pilot that he was in a national park, and polluting the beach. We managed to calm him down, and the incident ended at that point."

Eyewitness Dean Butterfield adds: “I was up the hill looking over the estuary, watching Hoot Gibson fly the plane through it. He was doing touch and go’s in the estuary, I was wondering why he felt he had to do that in there. As he came out to the mouth I think he saw the cable stretched across at the last minute and tried to duck under it. He caught the wing tip and stuffed it into the sand.

By the time I got down to it, there were a lot of people around. I took pictures and made a T-shirt from one.”

Officials of Minae also attended the site very shortly after the accident, and charged the pilot with flying in a protected zone (Parque Marina las Baulas). As a result, Gibson's license, obtained over several years, was withdrawn after one brief flight.

"As it happened, the club-bearing resident did quite well out of the crash." August continues. "The plane suffered damage to a wing and one of the propellers, and parts for a vintage seaplane are not procured at your local NAPA store, so the aircraft had to sit for a year or so while repairs were made. During this time the aircraft was parked in the resident's back garden, he and his family being paid for caretaker duty against theft or vandalism. I believe someone of the family slept in their garden ornament every night."

The day after the accident, filming continued with a scene where supposed crash passengers August, Wingnut and Pat O'Connor climb cheerfully from the Goose, carrying their boards, and run off to the surf.

Seriously concerned that accident investigators or other officials might confiscate the film shot up to that point, Director Bruce Brown hired a friend to hop a Sansa flight to San José, thence to Los Angeles for processing. Fortunately, the film escaped customs examination but, arriving in Los Angeles, it was delayed a couple of days en route for the processing studio by the Rodney King riots, which occurred in the vicinity of the studio.

The Goose was eventually repaired and flown out of Tamarindo.

[Ophir]

Ahhh, and Endless Summer II clip. That was an amazing movie. They built up the pilot as a risk taker madman. I guess he proved them right.

[SteveC]

A little additional info:

I traced the story as far back as a Supercub forum: Link Here. About a dozen posts down.

Also, these guys claim it is not the Hoot Gibson of astronaut fame. Apparently there are a fair number of Gibson's with the nickname of "Hoot", after an old-time Hollywood movie cowboy. Hoot Gibson.

[/trivia mode]

[flyover]

Originally Posted by SteveC

A little additional info:

I traced the story as far back as a Supercub forum: Link Here. About a dozen posts down.

Also, these guys claim it is not the Hoot Gibson of astronaut fame. Apparently there are a fair number of Gibson's with the nickname of "Hoot", after an old-time Hollywood movie cowboy. Hoot Gibson.

[/trivia mode]

The most famous Hoot Gibson from my era was this one:

http://aviation-safety.net/database/...?id=19790404-0

[SteveC]

Originally Posted by flyover

The most famous Hoot Gibson from my era was this one:

http://aviation-safety.net/database/...?id=19790404-0

I'd heard of that one before, but Hollee-Cow what a ride. FL390 to 5000 feet in 63 seconds!

[SteveC]

(This probably belongs in a new thread, but we've already started here and it's been a quiet thread otherwise....)


flyover, I dug up some more information on your Hoot Gibson *incident*. Sheds a little more light on *things*. Here is the narrative from your link:

TWA Flight 841 entered an uncontrolled maneuver at FL390. The aircraft descended to about 5,000 feet in about 63 seconds before the flightcrew regained control. About 22:31, the flightcrew made an emergency landing at Detroit.
The flight was cruising in visual flight conditions at night at FL390 when the uncontrolled maneuver began; there was no turbulence. There was a cloud layer near FL200 and, at 21:55, the reported weather at Saginaw was 500-foot overcast with 3 miles visibility in light snow; small breaks were reported in the overcast. Analysis of the evidence indicated that the uncontrolled maneuver began about 2147:47 with isolation of the aircraft's No. 7 leading edge slat (on its right wing) in the extended or partially extended position. During the preceding 14 seconds, the aircraft had rolled slowly to the right to about 35 of right bank and was returned to near wings level flight. Thereafter, the aircraft rolled again to about 35 of right bank in about 4 seconds. About 2147:51, the right roll was stopped near 35 of bank for a few seconds. At that time, the aircraft reached a condition wherein mach number, angle of attack, and sideslip combined to reduce the aircraft's lateral control margin to zero or less, and the aircraft continued to roll to the right in a descending spiral. During the following 33 seconds, the aircraft completed 360 of roll while descending to about 21,000 feet. The aircraft entered a second roll to the right during which the No. 7 slat was torn from the aircraft. Control of the aircraft was regained about 21:48:58 at an altitude of about 8,000 feet.
PROBABLE CAUSE: "The isolation of the No. 7 leading edge slat in the fully or partially extended position after an extension of the Nos. 2, 3, 6, and 7 leading edge slats and the subsequent retraction of the Nos. 2, 3, and 6 slats, and the captain's untimely flight control inputs,to counter the roll resulting from the slat asymmetry. Contributing to the cause was a preexisting misalignment of the No. 7 slat which, when combined with the cruise condition airloads, precluded retraction of that slat. After eliminating all probable individual or combined mechanical failures or malfunctions which could lead to slat extension, the Safety Board determined that the extension of the slats was the result of the flightcrew's manipulation of the flap/slat controls. Contributing to the captain's untimely use of the flight controls was distraction due probably to his efforts to rectify the source of the control problem."
A.o. the ALPA did not agree with the NTSB findings. A complex interaction that involved the tightly coupled response of lateral and directional flight controls on the B727-100 aircraft was claimed to have caused the crash.

There were some other old-timers on another board, and this was the result of their reminiscing:

Hmm, well I guess I'll tell it the way I "heered" it.

Seems "Hoot" decided to extend a little trailing edge flap to improve his comfort level at FL390. To do this without getting Leading Edge Devices number 2,3,6 and 7 out, one must use the Electric Alternate flap extention switches over head. But first, one must pull a circuit breaker for the emergency LED electric hydraulic pump. If you don't, all the LEDs come out at once, almost instantly, when the overhead flap switches are actuated. He did this, as the story goes, whilst the engineer was in the main cabin.

When the engineer returned to his seat he noticed the circuit breaker out and promptly reset it. Whamo!

The only real injury was the engineer receiving a black eye after getting on the ground and with the parking brake set. Hoot then erased the Cockpit Voice Recorder. He said it was habit, he always erased the CVR after the brakes were set.

Or so the story went.

(apologies to the original author for plagarism - couldn't resist )

disclaimer: unverified third-hand information!!!



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