Skates97

Very limited options...

Kathy and I never made it over there to go on a flight with you. We will do that when I catch up to you on the other side.

Went up for some therapy after work yesterday.

I used the same stuff years ago and loved it. Not sure what they put on after they stripped and repainted but I think it is the same thing.

Understand the set screw, mine takes about 5+ seconds in the air to retract completely so I could do the same, but it's just an extra step. Power, positive rate, gear up, flaps up works very well for me. Appreciate the concern, thankfully we are fine. We're in northeast Orange County in Yorba Linda so a long way from the fires in LA. We had some strong winds, gusting in the 40-50mph range but nothing compared to the 50-100+mph they had over in Ventura County and the foothills of LA where the fires are.

This is going to depend on what model/year you are flying. If you have hydraulic flaps there is a lever you push down and pump the flaps to lower. To raise you lift the lever which brings the flaps all the way up. Good luck trying to raise your flaps to takeoff position from full flaps.

If I'm flying a standard pattern I'm 15" to get down to my gear speed of 120mph, gear down abeam intended point of landing and reduce throttle to 13" which initiates my descent. Agree, gear first on a go around, just like when you take off. Gear up, then flaps.

Additional information is that they put his first call to return to the airport on the upwind leg, at about 375' MSL (FUL is at 96') and 132 mph. He continues the climb accelerating on the upwind, crosswind, and into the downwind turn when his speed starts dropping off and the descent begins. That possibly points to something other than an engine problem.

The grapevine at the airport is in full swing with "people" (nobody has said they were the eye witness, just repeating what "they heard") saying that he had a door open, they saw a hand trying to close it, and the engine sounded normal. Also that the door departed the plane somewhere on base or base to final. This RV-10 had gull-wing doors. From my hangar I have watched hundreds of planes on a left downwind to 24 and don't know how you could see a hand trying to close a door. If the door story is true that will be easily determined in the investigation. The ADS-B track looks more like best glide from an engine issue. If the engine was making power I wouldn't expect to see an almost constant speed with constant descent on downwind.

Tower said winds calm when initially cleared him to land 6.

Agree, which is why I was impressed by the Mooney pilot who recently put it down on Artesia with the runway just in front of him. The Mooney's last radio call to the tower was something like "I'm putting it down on the road." That decision saved the life of the pilot and passenger. You can't stretch a glide. The x in this post is where the Mooney hit the tree. The warrehouse that the RV went into is just up and to the right.

It was an RV-10, father and daughter on board, some reports say14yo and otherw 16yo, probably 16 as she was a junior in HS. From the ADSB track and tower recording this is a sad one that shouldn't have happened. Plane took off on 24, made crosswind and as he was turning left downwind something went wrong and he called tower with emergency coming back to the airport. Tower advised that there was a plane just rotated but to continue to 06. Tower then told the Cessna departing to begin a right turn for an emergency aircraft coming back. Tower went back to the RV and told him #1 cleared to land 6, winds calm, traffic no factor. Then told him 6 or 24 cleared to land. Pilot (stressed/overloaded?) responded 26, then 24, he would land 24. Tower again told him 6 or 24, his choice cleared to land on either. At the time he declared he was between 650-675' AGL, just turned left downwind. All he needed to do was turn about 15-20 degrees left and would be pointed right at the numbers for 6, instead he flew a downwind with a tight base but looks like stalled and then went through the roof of the warehouse. The warehouse that he hit is on the north side of Artesia which is the road that a Mooney a few weeks back made an emergency landing on, hit a fire hydrant before hitting a tree. That accident was maybe a few hundred feet up hte road from this one. Even with the bad decision to go for 24 instead of 6, I don't understand why the pilot didn't just try to put it down on Artesia.

Let me look for it later this week when I'm at the hangar, pretty sure I know where it is, but things tend to not be where I thought I left them...

I'll agree and disagree. When I bought mine it had no autopilot and because it began life as a D model didn't even have the wing leveler. Flew it for over 500 hours all around the Southwest with a trip to the East Coast thrown in there for good measure. At the time I didn't know any different as I had never flown with an autopilot and was just happy to have a plane. Once the GFC500 was approved I got it in a shop and had it added. Now with probably 600 hours flying with an autopilot I never want to go back.

My O-360-A1D was a narrow deck and replaced with a wide deck at overhaul. Previously my CHT's did well, but they had to make some modifications to the doghouse for the wide deck and I've been dealing with higher CHT's than before while tweaking things on the doghouse to get back to where I was with the old engine. Consequently during the process I have been trying different things (power/prop settings, airspeed) to reduce CHT's on initial climb out. I have found the most effective way to keep the CHT's from running away is to stay prop full forward but reduce throttle to about 22-23" after taking off until the CHT's stabilize and stop climbing, then as I climb I am able to add back in MP slowly.

I've been at KFUL for I think about 5 years now and use Ben at Ben's Motor Works. He services a number of Mooneys and is familiar with them. He's honest and very fair on his pricing. If you give him a call tell him Richard referred you. https://www.bensmotorworks.com/ 4119 W Commonwealth Ave, Hangar D28, Fullerton, CA 92833 Phone: 714-396-6090

This is how I added them to mine. Took a little work but they are nice. https://intothesky.com/2024/06/03/adding-headrests-to-a-vintage-mooney/

A year ago we flew to UT and had tailwinds both ways with groundspeeds running between 180-190mph, topping out at 203mph at one point. https://intothesky.com/2023/12/01/tail-winds-both-ways/ There's always the flip side. We went to St George at the beginning of the year and the flight back saw the headwind top out at 67mph. It took us almost as long to get back to SoCal from St George on that trip as it did from Salt Lake on the earlier trip.

There are two at FUL, one at the east end south of the 24 run up area and one at the west end south of the 6 run up area.

Full flaps brings you to the crash with the least speed/energy which I think would be preferable. He may have had the flaps up for less drag hoping to reach the airport and then when he saw he wasn't going to make it and made the mayday call had his hands full and didn't put them down. I was wondering what the standard width of a two lane road is looking at what he had to work with, as mentioned the train on one side and buildings poles on the other. Looked it up and a standard lane runs between 10-12 feet with the narrower found on city streets and wider on highways. Add in the center line and maybe you have around 25' to work with when you add a shoulder. That means our wings on some streets will hang over the sides if you are centerline, so pick the side without the obstacles. Just something to file away in my mind and hope I never need to recall it. For our pilot here, according to Google maps it's about 37' wide, but the right side slopes up to the train tracks, and if he judged wrong on that side and caught the wingtip it could have turned him right into the freight train. Great job putting it down under control. Here's the view back up the street the direction he came from, you can see the first pole that took out the left wingtip, the hydrant, and the tree to the right.

Yes, looked okay until the left wingtip hit that pole and it turned him towards the tree. The hydrant turned him back to the right and probably saved his life. He had some room to the right side but that freight train might have been a bit intimidating.

And great job not trying to stretch it out which would have just resulted in stalling it in. He was so close, I can't imagine how strong the urge to get just a little further is at that point. Looks like it's right about where the red x is, if you zoom in on google maps you can see the tree he hit and in the street view you can see the fire hydrant.

Just saw a new video. Came straight in, a pole took off the left wingtip, the right wing took out a fire hydrant, and then impacted the tree. Did a good job coming in under control wings level. https://ktla.com/news/local-news/plane-makes-emergency-landing-near-fullerton-airport-hits-tree/amp/

Looking at the bigger picture I wonder if he was going the opposite direction of how he ended up. Trying to put it down on the road maybe the right wing caught the pole and spun him 180° into the tree that entered the left side of the cabin. That's the only thing I can think of that would put that dent in the right wing and have the tree trunk enter the side of the cabin.

Looks like it was flown frequently. News is reporting no one injured on the ground, the two occupants suffered minor to moderate injuries. From the picture I am amazed that anyone in the front seats survived. A closer look at the picture and it appears the tree trunk went just behind the pilot seat and both front seats are turned about 45° to the left, probably what saved them. From the flight history looks like based out of Brackett (KPOC). Wonder if @MikeOH knows him? https://www.nbclosangeles.com/news/local/plane-crash-fullerton/3568885/ https://www.flightaware.com/live/flight/N9245V/history/20241125/2141Z/KFUL/KFUL Found the liveATC. They were on flight following, you can see from the track they departed and made the standard turn to 120 before they called tower back that they were experiencing some engine roughness. The flight following request and departure are earlier in the recording, the first call with problems is at about 17 minutes. At about 19 minutes declares mayday and landing near the train tracks. https://archive.liveatc.net/kful/KFUL2-Gnd-Twr-Nov-25-2024-2130Z.mp3