Plane and Pilot

SEPTEMBER 20, 2024

Missing its tail, pointing almost straight down, a Van’s RV-7A single-engine, two-seat homebuilt plummeted out of the blue and into the rocky ground. Alongside a nearby highway, some recognizable bits of airplane, the vertical stabilizer and rudder, a horizontal stabilizer and elevator, fell separately to Earth.

True Airspeed 87

True Airspeed Indicated Airspeed Horizontal Stabilizer Aileron 87

Plane and Pilot

SEPTEMBER 20, 2024

Missing its tail, pointing almost straight down, a Van’s RV-7A single-engine, two-seat homebuilt plummeted out of the blue and into the rocky ground. Alongside a nearby highway, some recognizable bits of airplane, the vertical stabilizer and rudder, a horizontal stabilizer and elevator, fell separately to Earth.

True Airspeed 86

True Airspeed Indicated Airspeed Horizontal Stabilizer Aileron 86

Air Facts

OCTOBER 7, 2024

It was a beefed up, militarized version of the Beechcraft Bonanza with a narrowed fuselage and conventional tail, seating two pilots in tandem cockpits with controls and indicators configured similarly to tactical aircraft of the period. Dropping like an inverted dart tail first, Morris, from his aft cockpit perch exclaimed,“Wheeeee!”

Cockpit 98

Cockpit Rudder Tail Indicated Airspeed 98

Chess In the Air

JUNE 24, 2022

The Rifle ASOS recorded a gust of 43 mph from the south: a 100-degree shift in direction, putting it right on his tail. Without knowing the horizontal wind direction and speed at this point it is impossible to say what his indicated airspeed was. I immediately pushed in the spoilers, hit hard right rudder, and hard right stick.

Pilot 52

Pilot AGL Wind Shear Runway 52