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I swear I'm cursed.


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Haven’t tried to superimpose over Google Maps or whatever yet, but here’s where we were (3500’ to be under the Bravo shelf that starts around SADDE and to be setup for the Special Flight Rules corridor back down to Torrance):

https://flightaware.com/live/flight/N803RM/history/20180708/2043Z/KNTD/KNTD

Approximately here:

https://www.google.com/maps/@34.0888862,-118.9620585,15z/data=!3m1!1e3

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What's the Navy think about you as a guest?

The police on duty didn’t really seem to know what the next steps would be; plane’s still on the taxiway where I shut down. I chocked it and left a note re towing (not to turn past nosewheel steering indicators). Seems like everything gets determined by the airfield manager who wasn’t on duty yesterday but who I’ll try to get ahold of today. But everyone was friendly and professional. Lots of security protocols in place, as you’d expect.

 

Edited by chrixxer
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At least you got use of our tax dollars that many of us will not get to use.   You can let the Airport Manager that I am authorizing the use of my tax dollars for whatever help you need.


Unlike this guy who should have used a military airbase.





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I watched that one.  sad story.  I used to get all nervous talking to towers (learned at uncontrolled field)  Now I pretty much tell them what I am going to do(they correct me if I get it wrong) and all the nervousness has gone away.   If there is a runway and I need it, "Clear the field, and roll the equipment"  I don't care who you are.

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That’s sobering Chris


I remember the day pretty well. Brett Nicollete and I were supposed to meet up and he canceled out because the conditions in the east from Jersey through northern VA were really low.


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Damn I get so upset when I read stories like this. I have a few rules when I set out in IMC conditions and one of them is to always know where the VFR is. For weather planning purposes one of the tools I use is Weathermeister to get a feel for an entire area because their depiction is very easy to see. When requesting a route, the user has the ability to have it display conditions 25, 50 or 100 miles center of course. When a route is IMC along the way (Red and Yellow) it allows me to easily see where the MVFR (Blue) and VFR is. I just created this sample by looking where there is serious weather now and noticed that Austin is in the middle of some storms. Not a great example, but I entered a flight from San Antonio and as you can see, the VFR is easily seen. The display is dramatic in the winter when IFR covers a large area.

WxMeister.jpg

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It's my impression that at least some bases allow practice instrument approaches for civilians without any prior coordination, just not to a landing?  At least Mcguire AFB did during my training.  The familiarity that practicing at at an AFB brings could be useful in an emergency.  Mcguire seems like a top tier ATC facility with a 10,000ft ILS runway but not a lot of takeoff and landing traffic much of the time. If really in trouble, one might actually prefer a place like that over a busy class B or C with comparable facilities.

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Sounds to me like you did a fantastic job in making everything turnout as it should. Congratulations!

Now its down to basic trouble shooting- fuel and fire(ignition). My guess is fuel. Maybe start with a Coke bottle test of the injectors then move downstream- fuel spider, tank selector valve and screen, fuel pump, don't forget to check the flow from the fuel line that goes into the tank. There is a finger screen in the tank that might clog. Unfortunately you have to pull the interior to get to them. You may need to blow out all the lines just to make sure nothing is sliding inside the lines and clogging the works up. Had a devious A&P instructor do that to us once on the test board for our fuel system training. He'd put a ball bearing in the line and unless we disconnected the line and blew it out we'd never find the problem. 

If you don't find anything in the fuel system don't forget to look at the mag switch real close. Could be an internal failure affecting both mags. I doubt both mags would fail at the exact time. An easy item to check is the P leads where they come out of the mag backs. Are they frayed on the shielding and grounding on the center cores? I've seen it happen (even to me and I lost 1 mag but both were bad). 

You did a good job though. Three Cheers!

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8 hours ago, chrixxer said:

The police on duty didn’t really seem to know what the next steps would be; plane’s still on the taxiway where I shut down. I chocked it and left a note re towing (not to turn past nosewheel steering indicators). Seems like everything gets determined by the airfield manager who wasn’t on duty yesterday but who I’ll try to get ahold of today. But everyone was friendly and professional. Lots of security protocols in place, as you’d expect.

 

 

My guess is, your plane will be well protected.  I would also guess, there are a lot of aviation mechanics that would enjoy working on a GA, something different from Navy jets.

Glad you handled it successfully.  Can I assume you declared an emergency and the Navy airstrip was the closest?  Did they clear the runways and/or provide any additional assistance?  Just curious to hear about your actions once emergency identified.  Thanks.

 

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Just now, ValkyrieRider said:

My guess is, your plane will be well protected.  I would also guess, there are a lot of aviation mechanics that would enjoy working on a GA, something different from Navy jets.

Glad you handled it successfully.  Can I assume you declared an emergency and the Navy airstrip was the closest?  Did they clear the runways and/or provide any additional assistance?  Just curious to hear about your actions once emergency identified.  Thanks.

 

Question is whether they will allow it to be worked on and flown out. It may need to be hauled off on a flatbed.

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10 minutes ago, flyboy0681 said:

Question is whether they will allow it to be worked on and flown out. It may need to be hauled off on a flatbed.

That would surprise me if they required that.  Many military bases have flying clubs on base, but not sure about California.  Hopefully, they will be more amenable and allow you a hanger to have it worked on, to at lease become airworthy. 

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Update 7/9: Playing phone tag w/ A&Ps; left voicemail for the Pt. Mugu airfield manager. He calls, gives me his cell phone #, asks about "my mechanic." I explain I don't know how any of this works. The following is from memory and probably not a direct quote, but it's close enough:

"How it works is, you bring in your mechanic, fix it, and fly it off my airfield. But right now, you're parked on my taxiway, and I need that taxiway."

I tell him I left a note under the wheel chocks re how to tow (Mooneys are easily damaged; don't turn the nose gear past the turn indicators.)

"Can you get over here?" Of course. I finish up the "must do today" work on my desk and drive out to the base. Force Protection isn't expecting me, but I call the airfield manager on his cell and he drives over and blesses my access. I follow him over to the tower, park where I'm told, and hop in his truck out to the runway. "If you can't get it started, I'll get a bunch of guys out here to help you push."

She fires right up, easier than she's ever started before.

I hop on VHF with tower and get cleared across 21, and follow the manager's truck down the runway and over to the flight line, where he directs me to an open spot near the parked Hawkeyes. (Glad we didn't have to push; it seemed like it was maybe close to a mile... C / 21 / A2 to parking.)

"You can leave it here as long as you need to. You'll park over where you did and walk over. Whenever you or your mechanic get here, I'll come to the gate and escort you over." So that's where we are for now. Still trying to lock down a mechanic, have a few good referrals.


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2 minutes ago, chrixxer said:

"You can leave it here as long as you need to. You'll park over where you did and walk over. Whenever you or your mechanic get here, I'll come to the gate and escort you over." So that's where we are for now.
 

Sounds like a happy ending already.

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Can I assume you declared an emergency and the Navy airstrip was the closest?  Did they clear the runways and/or provide any additional assistance?  Just curious to hear about your actions once emergency identified.  Thanks.


I made a mayday call and then my right seater took over comms while I concentrated on not crashing. Mugu was definitely the closest, in fact we were still on with Mugu Tower. We wouldn't have made it had I not gotten some power back, and we were preparing to ditch in the ocean (driving up there today, I stand by that decision; rocky shore, mountains, and a narrow and traffic-heavy PCH bordered by cliffs and power lines (that also crossed the highway periodically).

Anyway, I remember being asked souls and fuel on board and we had 7700 in the transponder (all done by my right seater). I think I remembered them clearing the airspace, but it was a slow Sunday afternoon, I didn't see any Navy air ops in the hour plus we were there.

They cleared us to land 27 and gave us the wind and had the fire trucks on the runway waiting for us. We landed past the arrestor gear on the "27 numbers" end, hot (I was slipping down at about 100 mph), got it safely stopped past the 21/3 intersection, taxi'd over the arrestor gear on the "9" end and met the emergency vehicles (and then the Force Protection folks) on Taxiway Charlie.


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Update: A&P (referral from another Mooney flyer) out of CMA went over and checked it out today. Fuel servo. Ordered a rebuilt one from Aircraft Spruce ($1700 plus a $1000 core charge; new was $3600 plus core) today. Developing...

 

Text conversation with A&P:

 

Q: Just for my own peace of mind - failed fuel servo - any way I could have caught that pre-flight?

 

A: You did a run up and the mags checked good. You made full power on take off. The failure happened as you were flying and everything was fine, till it wasn’t. Nothing would have presented until it either locked up or a diaphragm ruptured. The reason you IRAN the mags is because there is no way to tell how long they will continue to make spark so you just do it. Fuel servos are a low failure rate item but when they go.... its dramatic.

 

 

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2 hours ago, chrixxer said:

Fuel servos are a low failure rate item but when they go.... its dramatic

Yes, except when there's an internal fault like the one I experienced.  In my case, a torn rubber "floater" caused intermittent issues, possibly over a few years.  The problems were few and far between, and then one day sudden stoppage. 

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