Kobe Bryant crash lawsuit

[carusoam]

3 hours ago, toto said:

Setting aside the legal issues here, and assuming all of the asserted facts to be true, it does highlight a potential VFR safety scenario .. 

The first controller asks the pilot to squawk VFR, but never terminates radar service, and then goes off shift.  The new controller comes on shift, and doesn't have a card for the a/c because the first controller thought he had terminated flight following.  The pilot, meanwhile, is under heavy workload and thinks that he still has flight following with radar service.  So there's a period of confusion where the new controller is trying to identify the a/c while the pilot is overloaded, and shortly after that an accident occurs.

The cautionary tale for the SE piston crowd is dealing with distractions..  Aviate, Navigate, Communicate.  

P.S.  I have zero rotary hours, and I have no idea how that all works.  But I imagine that a multi-engine turbine helicopter would have a magic "hover" button on the AP that could keep you out of trouble while you get your bearings.  Does that sort of thing actually exist?

The really cool thing about this accident...

Somebody posted video that matches the flightaware track... Taken from the ground...

Instead of hovering in the clouds, with passengers on board...

The helicopter flew in circles to pass some time before proceeding...

It din’t look like any flying I would want to be involved with...

Going quickly, with the opportunity to be in clouds, close to the ground...

Ultimate High risk, with very little reward...
 

Our advantage... 2020 hindsight...
 

Add the beach flying Mooney to the list of things caught on camera, miles before disaster strikes....

Best regards,

-a-

[jaylw314]

2 hours ago, carusoam said:

The really cool thing about this accident...

Somebody posted video that matches the flightaware track... Taken from the ground...

Instead of hovering in the clouds, with passengers on board...

The helicopter flew in circles to pass some time before proceeding...

It din’t look like any flying I would want to be involved with...

Going quickly, with the opportunity to be in clouds, close to the ground...

Ultimate High risk, with very little reward...
 

Our advantage... 2020 hindsight...
 

Add the beach flying Mooney to the list of things caught on camera, miles before disaster strikes....

Best regards,

-a-

My understanding is that hovering in IMC is pretty much impossible.  You end up moving in any direction without realizing it.  Forward flight is generally easier because at least you know what direction you're going in.  Knowing what's in front of you is, of course, the other problem that us fixed wing pilots also face.

[toto]

1 hour ago, jaylw314 said:

My understanding is that hovering in IMC is pretty much impossible.  You end up moving in any direction without realizing it.  Forward flight is generally easier because at least you know what direction you're going in.  Knowing what's in front of you is, of course, the other problem that us fixed wing pilots also face.

Is there something inherent in a helicopter that makes hovering in IMC impossible?  Or just something inherent in humans?  I would think that a sophisticated autopilot with an accurate nav source and a radar altimeter could maintain position in IMC.  (But I have absolutely no clue about this - I'd love to learn more.)

[ArtVandelay]

I don’t think helicopters are inherently stable.

[Ibra]

On 8/29/2020 at 7:24 PM, toto said:

But I imagine that a multi-engine turbine helicopter would have a magic "hover" button on the AP that could keep you out of trouble while you get your bearings.  Does that sort of thing actually exist?

I understand the goal was to get the client ASAP to destination without any delay, hence the helis was flown like a faster fixed wing on the corner of it's flight envelope and limited manoeuvrability (e.g. max turn radius, min climb gradient and 20s separation from terrain in that low visibility), so even if such AP thing exist it would not have been pressed ON

That kind of flying is sensibly done at 30kts in helis (or about 80kts in SE pistons), the pilot was doing +130kts in the valleys for about 30min...
Slowing down would means 2h to destination (or 75min) not 45min promised to his VIP !

IMO after 1h of that kind of flying the outcome would be the same with ATC or without,
I think that pilot had probably more stamina but how long before he breaks?

[jaylw314]

20 hours ago, toto said:

Is there something inherent in a helicopter that makes hovering in IMC impossible?  Or just something inherent in humans?  I would think that a sophisticated autopilot with an accurate nav source and a radar altimeter could maintain position in IMC.  (But I have absolutely no clue about this - I'd love to learn more.)

Not a helicopter pilot, but from what I understand hovering is REALLY hard and usually trained and done with visual references.  I don't know that there is even any such thing as hovering training in IMC.  Airspeed instruments aren't sensitive enough to show less than 20 knots, and you have no airspeed instruments in the lateral direction.  You could be sliding sideways or even backwards at a significant speed without realizing it, and the artificial horizon is no help--it only keeps you from speeding up, but you still could be sliding backwards at 20 knots with the horizon level.  The only way you could keep an actual hover would be referencing your GPS position, but this is totally different from the mental flow that human pilots use.

In contrast, above a certain speed, a helicopter flies surprisingly very much like an airplane--pitch for airspeed, power for climb and so on.

I read somewhere that helicopters have a minimum regulatory airspeed in IMC.  There are some that have a sensor-based auto-hover, but it would therefore be a violation to engage it in IMC.  I'm unsure how much of that is true, though.

[tigers2007]

It’s good to work for the crown.
“In enacting the Federal Employees Liability Reform and Tort Compensation Act of 1988 (FELRTCA), Congress abrogated this common law rule and extended absolute immunity for common law torts to all federal employees regardless of whether the conduct at issue was discretionary. See United States v. Smith, 499 U.S. 160 (1991). “
I’ve read some cases that involved Postal employees (accidentally) running over pedestrians and the victims civil suits didn’t quite go as planned.

[MikeOH]

On 8/29/2020 at 5:46 AM, Dave Piehler said:

 

5.  Yes, juries do stupid things.  Remember the Carnahan crash in 2000 and the $4M jury verdict against Parker-Hannafin because a vacuum pump died and an AI went Tango Uniform?  That problem is exacerbated by judges letting juries hear junk science and letting emotional appeals about damages bleed into the liability determination.  The Daubert and Kumho Tire doctrine about experts is fine in theory, but in practice it often get ignored by judges and ipse dixit nonsense is allowed to be spouted to the jury.  And bifurcated trials separating the determination of liability from the determination of damages are frowned on as inefficient.

6.  Can we please avoid cheap shots at lawyers? 

 

I suspect one of the reasons for 6 is the false claims of "facts" by lawyers as exemplified by 5.

There was NO evidence the vacuum pump died per the NTSB report. According to the report the copilot AI was operating and there was other evidence of proper vacuum. Yet, IIRC, Parker-Hannifin got stuck with paying out! They exited the vacuum pump biz after that. i can't blame them.

 

[NotarPilot]

On 8/29/2020 at 10:24 AM, toto said:

Setting aside the legal issues here, and assuming all of the asserted facts to be true, it does highlight a potential VFR safety scenario .. 

The first controller asks the pilot to squawk VFR, but never terminates radar service, and then goes off shift.  The new controller comes on shift, and doesn't have a card for the a/c because the first controller thought he had terminated flight following.  The pilot, meanwhile, is under heavy workload and thinks that he still has flight following with radar service.  So there's a period of confusion where the new controller is trying to identify the a/c while the pilot is overloaded, and shortly after that an accident occurs.

The cautionary tale for the SE piston crowd is dealing with distractions..  Aviate, Navigate, Communicate.  

P.S.  I have zero rotary hours, and I have no idea how that all works.  But I imagine that a multi-engine turbine helicopter would have a magic "hover" button on the AP that could keep you out of trouble while you get your bearings.  Does that sort of thing actually exist?

I have a little over 6,000 hours of SE turbine time and some newer helicopters do have the ability to auto hover on AP. The USCG helicopters have it as well as the AW139s that LA City Fire has (Not sure if that’s a standard feature or an option) but this is a somewhat newer technology on newer designs.  
 

Truth is Kobe went cheap and was flying in a 29 year old helicopter that although was IFR capable, was not IFR certified either by lack of equipment but definitely by lack of authorization on their 135 certificate. Bristow, PHI, EMS operators all operate similar for smaller helicopters under IFR on their 135 operating certificates but for whatever reason Island Express did not have this authorization quite possibly due to expense, if I had to guess. I highly doubt this helicopter had this magic honor button you speak of. Hell the company didn’t even seem to spring for a 530 with TAWS in the helicopter from what it sounds like.

Also, we keep having this argument about flight following, TAWS, and what not, yet I’m still failing to understand what those things would have done to save them.  Let me explain....

1. Flight following - Generally provides assistance for calling out traffic and weather such as rain or convective weather. ATC cannot see clouds and has to rely on surface weather reporting stations or PIREPS to get an idea on what visibility looks like in a particular area.  The pilot didn’t need to be told that the weather was shitty. He was in it and continued to press on.  
 

I spoke with line people from a local FBO who dealt with Kobe and they said the guy treated people very poorly.  Did his pilot feel pressure to continue flying in poor weather because he felt otherwise he might not still have that job tomorrow if he didn’t complete the mission?  Yes, I know, the PIC has the final authority but that’s easy to say coming from a majority of guys who own their own aircraft and don’t have to make hard “go, no go” decisions like that.  We can only speculate whether he felt his job was on the line but based on information we have about Kobe it needs to be considered if we want to do an honest discussion about all the contributors to this accident.
 

2. What would TAWS have really done but alert them that they were about to hit the ground in 10 seconds.  Let me explain again, I fly a helicopters equipped with a 530W and the other with a 650. Both have these pretty Garmin G500s that show synthetic vision and even give aural alerts when we get close to terrain.  We fly in VFR and sometimes at low altitudes below 1,000 feet and even below 500 feet.  As soon as we get close to terrain we just about always inhibit the aural warnings on the G500 because we really don’t need them and all they do is announce “Terrain, terrain” which we can already see. We’re in VFR and the only way we would impact terrain is if we had an engine failure at a really bad location or we intentionally kamakazied into a hillside. Point being is that at the altitude he was flying he probably would have disabled his TAWS aural alerts probably near the LA Zoo, which has some terrain in that vicinity, if not earlier.  It seems he was set on completing the mission No matter what and the only equipment onboard that could have said their lives was a different pilot who made better decisions.  Sorry, that’s the facts as I see them. This landed squarely on the PIC and maybe to some extent anyone applying “external pressures” on him. I get what the lawyers are trying to do here, there’s a tremendous amount of money at stake but really this is about trying to shift responsibility and not accepting responsibility which is one thing that has always bothered me about society in general. Sorry if they seem harsh but it’s the truth as I see it.

[NotarPilot]

The edit button seems to be missing. 

I want to add that I further believe TAWS would not have helped much being that the pilot, to my knowledge, learned to fly and spent most of his flying career in the LA area and was likely very familiar with the area. Especially if he had been ferrying Kobe on this route between Orange County and his Mumba academy in Thousand Oaks.  That further makes me believe any TAWS warnings would likely have been disabled long before he reached the area near the accident, especially  if he already knew the terrain like most of us do. I personally have flown that route in both FW and RW aircraft.  The likely route would have been to follow the 101 freeway through the rising terrain and stay directly over the freeway (turnpike for you east coasters). Evidently the rising terrain pushed him up into the clouds and he wasn’t prepared for that.

[Hank]

Just now, NotarPilot said:

The edit button seems to be missing. 

Thank you for your knowledgeable, detailed input!

The Edit button now resides inside the "..." to the right of your name at the top of each post . . .

[carusoam]

Great tech details, and east coast translation, Notar!

Thanks for sharing them...

Best regards,

-a-

[NotarPilot]

 

10 minutes ago, carusoam said:

Great tech details, and east coast translation, Notar!

Thanks for sharing them...

Best regards,

-a-

Just the opinion of the little guy.  Glad I could help.  Having started flying when I was 15, long before I even liked airplanes, I learned that people who only fly one category of aircraft tend not to fully understand the other. Fixed wing guys tend to fly high up at several thousand feet while helicopter drivers tend to fly at several hundred feet, almost always in VFR, so when you start throwing around terms like TAWS and flight following you need to put that into the context of how most helicopters are operated.

[NotarPilot]

On 8/29/2020 at 6:11 PM, toto said:

Is there something inherent in a helicopter that makes hovering in IMC impossible?  Or just something inherent in humans?  I would think that a sophisticated autopilot with an accurate nav source and a radar altimeter could maintain position in IMC.  (But I have absolutely no clue about this - I'd love to learn more.)

Yes, unaided hovering in IMC is impossible. I’ve never heard of someone being able to do it. Hovering is possible by having exterior visual references to keep the aircraft level.  Also, most helicopters have a slightly tilted mast to the left on American (counterclockwise rotating rotor system) helicopters and to the right on French (clockwise) helicopters to counteract something called translating tendency, which is to counteract the force of the tail rotor trust pushing the entire aircraft to the left or right. They usually slightly tilt the mast, in the design of the helicopter, to counteract this.  Some helicopters may have their controls rigged to counteract this but don’t ask me which, I think most have tilted masts.

Point being is that in a hover the helicopter slightly leans to the left or right. I’ve sometimes closed my eyes while allowing another pilot to fly and try to sense the turns and let me tell you it is VERY difficult to feel what the helicopter is doing without exterior references.

 

On 8/30/2020 at 12:45 AM, ArtVandelay said:

I don’t think helicopters are inherently stable.

Helicopters ARE inherently unstable, you are correct.

 

Here you can see the helicopter slightly leaning left.

[N201MKTurbo]

It reminds me of a conversation I had with a Vietnam war helicopter pilot. I asked him about flying to a landing zone IFR. He said they used portable NDB transmitters. They would fly to the beacon until the needle reversed then turn back to the beacon descending on the inbound legs 100 feet each until you could see the ground. I asked him why they didn’t just hover down over the beacon and he said they tried but everybody would lose control if they weren’t moving forward.  

[Ibra]

17 hours ago, NotarPilot said:

What would TAWS have really done but alert them that they were about to hit the ground in 10 seconds?  Let me explain again, I fly a helicopters equipped with a 530W and the other with a 650. Both have these pretty Garmin G500s that show synthetic vision and even give aural alerts when we get close to terrain.  We fly in VFR and sometimes at low altitudes below 1,000 feet and even below 500 feet.  As soon as we get close to terrain we just about always inhibit the aural warnings on the G500 because we really don’t need them and all they do is announce “Terrain, terrain” which we can already see. We’re in VFR and the only way we would impact terrain is if we had an engine failure at a really bad location or we intentionally kamakazied into a hillside. Point being is that at the altitude he was flying he probably would have disabled his TAWS aural alerts probably near the LA Zoo, which has some terrain in that vicinity, if not earlier.

The "marginal VFR" route has to be done in good weather to appreciate how it's impossible it is in bad weather, as you said TAWS is 0 help on this regard aside from telling you it's game over 3s before impact 

For fixed wings pilots like me in similar flying, we rarely appreciate that our aircraft only delivers 3% climb/decent gradient and +1nm turn radius on 150kts cruise speeds at Rate1, at beast you get 10% gradient and 2000ft 45deg turn radius at VY speeds, so having good weather & terrain separation is the only safe way to go: 500ft agl on 1.5km visibility is 33% climb gradient, TAWS or Synt-Vision don't not make much difference to that !!

Edited September 15, 2020 by Ibra

[thinwing]

i recall in class g airspace ,my heli instructors when explaining vis and cloud requirements flying vfr or special vfr....the heli is flown at a speed to see and avoid.