Flight Control Failure in the Mountains
It was a smoky day in South Carolina…
I started the day early for a flight in a Cirrus SR-22 from Hilton Head, KHXD to Mount Pleasant, KLRO South Carolina to pick up the airplane owners wife and take her to Raleigh Durham, NC KRDU. She just had a surgery and needed to be taken her to a doctor’s appointment. I had an instrument student preparing for his check ride in the left seat, just there to gain some experience in the IFR system. This was a great trip for him to see some cross country IFR flying. The weather was mostly VMC, but with smoke from the fires in Appalachia drawing visibility down to 1-2 miles below 4,000’. I had the student fly the leg into Mt. Pleasant. We had just met that morning and this was my first flight with him. I didn’t do any instruction and just wanted to see how close he was to being ready for the check ride. We were running a few minutes late, and were conveniently aligned for a straight-in, but he elected to fly over mid-field and do a standard traffic pattern entry. Once he made the radio call I knew I would simulate an engine failure crossing midfield.
I have been flying since I was twelve. I soloed on my sixteenth birthday and got my Private Pilot’s License at age seventeen. I continued training and immediately started on my instrument rating. My instrument instructor Oscar gave me a simulated engine failure every flight. He insisted I not only know and recite the emergency procedures by memory inflight, but that I also do them under the hood. Usually he had me simulate the radio calls for vectors to a nearby strip and he would have me uncover at around 500’AGL and complete the landing. This foundation in training has helped me in several different emergencies.
Today, the setup for a mid-field engine failure practice was perfect. My student flew it a bit wide and we were low on energy getting to the runway and not lined up yet. We would not have made the runway. I took the aircraft and went around and I demonstrated an engine failure from downwind. It went well and we landed on my target, 1,000’ down the runway.
Every aircraft has a “key position” above the runway. In June of 2011, I had the chance to fly the Space Shuttle Simulator at Johnson Space Center. As far as scheduling goes, I barely got in under the wire. The Shuttle program was coming to the end and as soon as the last flight landed, the simulator was disassembled. I walked into the simulator a week before the mission, just as the mission crew was getting out. I met them, and then stepped up to the left seat. I flew a launch to a Return to Launch Site Abort. It is an amazing maneuver in which you end up ‘flying’ backwards at MACH 3 and ends with you at “high key” above the runway crossing at 20,000’ and MACH 1. You fly an overhead pattern and end up in final at 10,000’ 300KIAS and 17-20 degree nose low. You do a pre-flare at around 2,000’ and touchdown at around 190KIAS. After spending ten years flying the F-16, I noticed that the pattern was similar with an overhead at 7,000’-10,000’ and 200-230KIAS, touching down around 165KIAS. For small single-engine airplanes I use 1,500’ and best glide, 1,000’ at base abeam the runway and roll out on final at 500’. I was glad to have a chance to demonstrate a dead-stick landing the morning of the emergency landing. Little did I know, what the future had in store for me in that I would be doing an actual engine out emergency landing within the hour on a highway.
We picked up our passenger and she got in the back seat. She had work to do and asked to be isolated from the intercom and radios. Takeoff and cruise went smoothly. Visibility was 2-3 miles from smoke up through around 4,000’. It was clear and beautiful above, but there was absolutely no ground showing below. About 25 minutes outside of Mount Pleasant, the engine lost power and began to run rough. When I say ‘rough,’ I mean it sounded like a spoon in a garbage disposal. I knew something was very wrong. I immediately turned east towards the nearest airport, Conway, SC. The airport was 13nm on our nose and we were at 5,000ft. I declared an emergency with Myrtle Beach Approach and said we were heading to Conway. I had hopes of reaching the airport since it seemed we still had about 30% power. We got a helpful vector that confirmed the decision to Conway.
At 4,000ft we had very little thrust and I knew we wouldn’t make it to the airport. ATC appointed out Conway Airport. I told them, “we won’t make it.” Approach asked for souls onboard, fuel onboard, etc. I told him “three souls on board and the engine is dead.” The pilot in the left seat said he had a field out the left side. When I turned to look at the field, I saw it was too short. We had about two miles visibility with smoke. At about 4,000ft oil began coating the windscreen. I looked at the field and determined we could not land in it. It was about 1,000’ long and full of stumps. At 3,000’ I briefed we may pull the chute. I told ATC the same. My main concern was pulling the chute at 3000’ over a densely populated forest. The controller was great, as once I told him we wouldn’t the airport he stopped asking questions. I found out later he was already on a map looking to alert EMS in my area. Many controllers would have kept talking the entire time. This guy knew I was busy and only provided information we needed and didn’t ask unnecessary questions.
Again, I feel like my prior experiences with flying prepared me for everything that happened this day, from getting my Commercial Glider Rating to my prior emergencies. While attending the Air Force Academy, I had an engine failure while flying a friend’s airplane on a weekend from Colorado Springs to Dallas. We almost had to land on a road in Oklahoma, but made it to a runway. That was a key turning point in my life; from that moment and that experience, I made it a habit of noticing where each state puts power lines on roads. For the last twenty years, every time I drive down a road, I look around and wonder can I land here? Where are the obstacles? What are the clues? In aviation, you make your own luck.
One thing I noticed in South Carolina was that whenever they build a bridge across a river or drainage, they lay the power lines farther away from the road. As we went through 3,000’ I looked up at the CAPS (aircraft parachute) handle and made a decision not to pull it right then. Based on oil on the windscreen and smoke in the cockpit, I figured we had an engine fire. I really didn’t want to be stuck under a parachute while on fire. I certainly didn’t want to be hanging from a tree 40’ in the air on fire. I noticed a road north of us. It was running roughly east-west. I could make out a bridge on a straight section. I assumed the bridge would probably be clear of wires. All I needed was a few hundred feet with no wires to get underneath them. I aimed for high-key at 1,500’. Once I assessed we had the energy to make it to the bridge I shut down the engine via the emergency landing checklist. I saw a good bit of traffic running both directions on the road and across the bridge. My plan was to cross the bridge, assess wires, obstacles and traffic and make a decision. If it was clear, we would land. If not, I would aim to pull the chute over the smaller trees north of the road. South of the road was a thick forest of large trees in a large swamp. I didn’t know it at the time, but it was a national forest. To say the terrain there was inhospitable, is an understatement. It was quite deadly in actuality. Tall trees, swamp, bears, mosquitoes, and alligators. When I did search and rescue with the Civil Air Patrol in South Carolina, we always regarded this terrain as the worst case scenario for a rescue. This would have been a nightmare on a good day, I did not want to have to manage that with injured passengers and a fire.
Yeah, fire…
The engine had been producing some usable thrust, but at a cost. At 4,000’ I saw oil start to coat the windscreen. The engine was showing 20-30% power. We had some thrust, but not much. I wanted to keep all available thrust until we were in a safe position to activate the parachute or make it to a safe landing. At 2,500’ I started to get all sorts of warnings that I paid zero attention to. I was too busy flying the airplane. Numerous cautions were going off. I assumed some were due to the oil pressure, which I lost at around 4,000’. Others started around 2,500. I assumed they were electrical as I noticed some displays changing. I knew the fire would be destroying all of the systems forward of the firewall. The airplane was dying. The only thing I cross checked was airspeed and altitude. In reality, both alternators tripped, probably due to fire. I knew we had a trashed engine with oil all over, and tons of heat and friction. The only time operations limits like oil pressure and temperature (or G-limits in combat) matter are when you plan on using the airplane again. I elected to use all available thrust to find the safest location to either land or pull the parachute.
If you asked me before the flight, “you are IMC at 4,000’ no airport in sight and no place to land, what will you do?” I would have said activate the CAPS and taken a parachute ride down. In reality, having some options to land, a passenger who would certainly be injured under the best possible CAPS landing, and smoke from the fire up front in the cockpit, well, today was different. I decided to keep flying and just keep working the problem.
We were high on energy for the bridge so I dropped the nose to get to a high key position of 1,500’ over the bridge and perpendicular to the landing zone. After I dumped the nose to hit high key, we crossed the bridge at 1,500’ and 125KIAS. I told approach we could not make an airport and would be landing on a road. I had a lot of things I wanted to do: Activate the ELT, turn on my Spot beacon and make a descriptive radio call as to where we were landing. I dispensed with these for two reasons. One, there simply wasn’t the time. In cockpit tasks were too difficult while maintaining aircraft control with no forward visibility due to oil. Two, where we were going, people would certainly see us. In fact, having too many people in cars was one of our key problems. I valued the crew communication from the other pilot in regards to any obstructions, traffic or wires. He did a great job of keeping quiet when needed and speaking up when needed. After less than an hour airborne, we had become a crew and my other pilot was doing a great job.
We flew above the bridge at 1500ft. I banked to the right (since I was in the right seat) and saw no power lines on the road, but a good bit of traffic. I confirmed several times with the other pilot that he did not see any power lines, he did not. I could see where the lines ran before and after the bridge. I estimated 4,000’ of road free from power lines. We decided then to commit to land and abandon the parachute option due to a lack of traffic and no power lines. In my belief, this was directly God’s hand. At high key, the busy 8:30 a.m. traffic on highway 378 had stopped. What had been 15-20 cars per mile turned into one truck. We were clear except for one F-150. I made the direction of landing decision based on traffic. Since there was only one traffic factor, the truck, and he was going from east to west, I chose that direction. Luckily, that was into about a 6 knot headwind. I did a right hand engine out pattern which also helped since due to all the oil, my only visibility was out of the right seat side window. At 500’ on final, oil completely coated the right side of the windscreen. I had zero forward visibility. On final I added left rudder and right aileron to slip and attempt to use the lower right-hand windscreen to line up on final. The slip only lasted long enough to establish ground track on final and asses both wires and traffic.
The truck was going at a rate to put it on my target, the bridge, at the same time we would get there. I lowered the nose to try to land short. The line of sight on the truck was moving aft. We couldn’t land behind him. I shifted my aim point long. I aimed long of the F-150 on the road and estimated based on the timing in my head that we had passed him and could descend. I wanted to descend as fast as possible from above power line height to under power line height. Once we were under power line height and in ground effect, I kicked out the rudder and lined up on the road. Once in the flare my student in the left seat said we were drifting toward the guard rail on the left. My forward view was totally obstructed by oil. He added right stick and we touched down. I said over and over “I can’t see!” I saw him put in right stick and move us to the right. Once we were down, I had no idea what was ahead. He said “I have the aircraft” and did some MAXIMUM breaking. He helped track center line and clear for traffic. I had been slowing carefully since I flew the airplane onto the ground around 90KIAS, but he seemed eager to stop and got on the controls and helped stop us. At about 40 kts, flames from the engine went over about two feet high over the cowling. I told everyone to prepare to get out and we were “on fire!” As soon as we stopped I was already unstrapped and opening the door. Once I opened the door, I reached in for the back seat passenger. I lifted her up onto the wing, jumped down, then bear hugged her and lifted her off the wing. We ran about 30 yards away and I left her with a homeowner who saw us stop and directed the homeowner to take care of her and call 911. She said she already called, I told her to call again. You can never be too sure.
I ran behind the airplane to all of the traffic that was stopped. The first four vehicles didn’t have fire extinguishers. The other pilot had already run to the front of the engine and discharged the fire extinguisher. The fire was still raging. I kept running extinguishers from commercial vehicles to him over and over. It took one small and two full sized extinguishers to extinguish the fire.
Once the dust and smoke settled we awaited the first responders.
It took over 25 minutes for fire response to arrive. I was very glad we were not in a tree, miles from the nearest road, hanging 50ft over a swamp, injured, trapped and on fire. This was an amazing experience where two pilots worked as a crew and saved not only the airplane but, all lives on board. I can’t imagine things working out better than they did. Things really worked out for us today.
Our outcome was not chance.
The outcome of this emergency was determined by a decade’s long solid commitment to training and preparedness. Don’t leave outcomes to chance. Have option A and B and C all waiting. Continue to work the problem. Above all else, don’t stop flying the airplane until all the parts come to a stop.
ATC AUDIO Start at around 3:45
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