FL PC-12 Accident Kills Family of 6

Well, it certainly looks as though it hit the ground pretty flat, but one sort of imagines that the stall/spin/whatever might have occurred subsequent to the pieces coming off the airframe for four miles, if indeed that information is accurate.

Yeah that's why I hate assuming. We actually just discussed the very topic in class of getting an airplane on the ground in one piece but still hitting with enough force that it'll kill you. Just sucks to see.

Wouldn't it make sense that the wife, or one of the kids was in the front seat with him? I'm sure this wasn't his first airplane, and I'd assume she sat in the front on the Bonanza/Baron/Mooney, etc. he owned prior to the Platypus. And for the kids... I'm sure it was a thrill to sit up front with dad. Wouldn't we all have liked to have been that kid?

Very sad. That's going to be a report worth reading.

Sad. I only hope that poor kid didn't suffer.

As retarded as it may sound, at least they all went together. I can't imagine how people feel when their whole fmaily is wiped out yet they survive...what do you have to live for at that point?

Where are you guys reading anything about stall/spin?

I think that was my inference from the witness description of 'twirling around'.

Sounds like every witness account to every accident that has ever happened. Witnesses in plane crashes have proved to be very unreliable.

Looks like they found the boy...a half mile from the wreckage site.

http://www.baynews9.com/content/new...ticles/bn9/2012/6/8/ntsb_begins_their_in.html

I can't remember which accident but I think it was UA 585, anyway, I was watching the news coverage immediately after and they interviewed a person who said they had made eye contact with the copilot, and that is when the crew turned the plane to miss him, all the while the captain was waving something red, what he thought were flags, in the cockpit window.

It is pretty amazing what people see when processing something highly unusual to them while simultaneously dealing with the stress of witnessing a disaster.

Having a hard time imagining what would cause a PC-12 to do an inflight breakup. Sad...

Not to sound macabre, but in the incidents where people have been sucked (UAL811 AAH 243) or thrown out of a compromised airframe, are those people alive in the fall, or are there forces acting on the body which causes them to go unconscious? I cannot even imagine what that poor kid endured.

I didnt see that either. Its probably an assumption because the airplane has had issues in the past with some nasty stall characteristics due to ice and weight.

Geez. The flight data from FlightAware.com tells a bit of a story. Everything leading up to the first two rows shown here seems fine, then they are down to 60kts... then suddenly up to 255. Criminy... http://flightaware.com/live/flight/N950KA/history/20120607/1530Z/KFPR/3JC/tracklog

TIME....Course KTS MPH Altitude Rate
11:32....291°..147.169 24,700.. 480
11:33.... 87°..147.169 25,200.. 600
11:34.... 57°.. 68. 78 26,000.. 360
11:35.... 43°.. 60. 69 26,000..
11:36.... 43°..255.293 26,000..
11:37.... 43°..255.293 26,000..
11:38....309°..255.293 26,000..-720
12:14....317°................. -720

I'll take that (getting sucked into the fans) over the fall. Those variables make sense, have there been any studies on what the airspeed limits of the human body are? Altitude is pretty easy to figure out, I'd guess. Some quick math formula computing time, temp, and altitude will figure that out.

What does ejection seat data show about the forces of airspeed on the human body?

Usually in the 120ish range, but if the airplane is doing 250, you've got some slowing to do.

Very sad...I know a lot of people who fly the PC-12. I hope the cause can be determined.