Accident Analysis: You Think You're Embarrassed?

Are you feeling a little sheepish after starting the engine with one wing still tied down, or being seen throttling up to jump the chocks you forgot to pull (see “Brush It Off,” p. 42)? Well, if it’s any consolation, the record’s full of errors more spectacular than yours:

What’s “navigation?” After hitting terrain at what he thought was pattern altitude during a visual approach at night, a Mooney pilot “reported that he was surprised when local law enforcement informed him that he was in Seligman, Arizona, instead of his intended destination of Boulder City, Nevada.” Both were about the same distance from his point of departure—in nearly opposite directions.

Preflight. A Cessna 182 had to make a forced landing on a city street, after which its pilot acknowledged that “If I had checked the fuel [prior to departure], I would have found that there was not enough fuel to complete the flight.” Give him points for honesty.

Priorities. The pilot of a Cessna T210 who flew it into the ground while trying to troubleshoot a gear problem admitted that “the accident could have been prevented if he had remembered to keep flying the airplane.” Hard to argue with that.

Aerodynamics 101. After coming in fast and ballooning twice, another Mooney pilot “added some power to stay on the ground.” Guess how this worked out? (Hint: The airport fence got involved.)

Systems knowledge. A flight instructor preparing to give dual in a Taylorcraft decided to practice flying it solo from the right seat. Only at the end of a high-speed taxi run did he discover that the left seat had the only brake pedals.

Runway, taxiway… It’s not just general aviation pilots who occasionally mix them up. Airliners land on taxiways more often than the traveling public might care to know. Recent examples include Continental Flight 1883, a Boeing 757 that landed on Newark International’s Taxiway Z in October 2006; Delta Flight 60, a Boeing 767 that landed on Taxiway M at Atlanta Hartsfield in October 2009; and Alaska Airlines Flight 27, a Boeing 737 that touched down on Seattle-Tacoma’s Taxiway T in December 2015. You have to think a taxiway looks a lot narrower in an airplane with a 150-foot-plus wingspan than to the driver of the average piston single.

Navigation revisited. At least those crews found the right airports. In the course of six weeks beginning in November 2013, two professional crews—one flying a Southwest 737, the other an immense Boeing factory freighter—mistook much smaller general aviation fields for their planned destinations, landing on runways so short as to raise questions about whether they could take off again. (Eventually they did.) An Air Force C–17 did the same thing in Florida.

Being human, even the pros can goof up once in a while, and embarrassment has its uses. Chances are you won’t forget those chocks or tiedowns again.