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NTSB Says a Downdraft Killed Steve Fossett
jd writes "The National Transportation Safety Board has now released the text of its examination (full narrative available) into the crash of Steve Fossett's aircraft on Sept 3rd, 2007. It concludes that downdrafts were the likely cause of the crash, dragging the plane into the mountain with such force that, even at full power, it would have been impossible to escape the collision. Pilots experienced in the area report that those winds can rip the wings off aircraft; and Mark Twain remarked that they could roll up a tin house 'like sheet music.' One must wonder why such a skilled aviator was taking a gamble with such hostile conditions, given that he was looking for a flat stretch of land to race cars on, but that is one mystery we shall probably never know the answer to."
Perhaps they've seen wreckage where it was evident that's what happened.
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Are those two things mutually exclusive?
Perhaps experienced pilots in the area, who have seen such wreckage, choose not to fly when the weather indicates such winds are likely.
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
One must wonder why such a skilled aviator was taking a gamble with such hostile conditions, given that he was looking for a flat stretch of land to race cars on, but that is one mystery we shall probably never know the answer to.
I wondered, but in about a second I came up with this: An adventurer and thrill-seeker, in the course of looking for a place for future thrill-seeking, decided to seek some thrills?
Sure it's just idle speculation... but based on what little I know of the man, taking gambles with danger while tooling around alone in his private plane sounds exactly like something he would do. It makes enough sense for me, at least.
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Experience could certainly mean that they have flown the area and frequented places where fellow pilots who know about incidents congregate. They may have also experienced lesser effects of this phenomenon personally and then read about reports of similar incidents which match their (not as extreme) experience.
I am an experienced system administrator for large numbers of high-end systems. This means I know about all sorts of threats to my hosts, active and historical, because I am experienced and have had to explore the possibility of intrusions and read studies of those that went too far. That is a function of my experience that you would have trouble obtaining without time in front of the keyboard, if only because you'd usually have no interest in such things if you never had to deal with the real possibility of them happening to you. I have never experienced an intrusion personally, but my experience is why I would know about them.
While it is not "first-hand" experience, these mountain conditions are something that an "experienced" pilot would know about because it is their best interests to know about it... or they may die. That is why it is interesting that Mr. Fossett, who we all know is experienced, seemed to be either ignorant of these conditions, didn't care, or something else happened. This would seem to be pretty basic stuff for general aviation flyers to know, so we would be allowed to wonder what happened.