With video now available to most people through their phones and devices, not only can people easily capture the happy memories on the spot, they can also video the horrifying ones. For a birthday gift for his wife, Jonathan Fielding and his family took a flight over snow covered Utah. When the pilot announced that the carburetor had iced over, Jonathan pulled out his phone and filmed the impending crash.
Thankfully, everyone walked away from the crash without any major injuries.
Wow.
That's pretty incredible.
Whoa. Is there more information about this anywhere? That was crazy.
although its pretty damn cool to watch and Im glad everyone is ok.. this is not an Fstoppers story... Tighten it up guys.. just cuz a camera was used doesnt mean its part of fstoppers. Seriously
What?
does it matter? i find it interesting and im a photographer
Ditto
Yup. He was in the right place at the right time to capture something that not many people get to survive. Luckily my dad survived a plan crash WAYY worse than this. I will definitely NOT be showing this video to my dad.
Seriously, who are you to dictate what they publish on their site? Arrogant.
Photography and VIdeography isn't always about having a beautiful image or fancy lighting set up
this is not the kind of POV i like watching :)
nuff said..
Glad everyone's ok, but now that its over, the guy recording this should be slapped...more interested in his cell phone than checking on the well-being of his family...really!?
This. Had I been flying that day I would have slapped him, too - once while still airborne, for endlessly dribbling commentary while I picked somewhere to land; and again after we landed when I realised a flying camera/mobile phone/video camera missed my head by a couple of inches after I told my passengers to secure any loose objects
Bloody oath mate ! You can clearly hear a baby on board. This guy's the lowest breed of cockroach.
Short of taking control of the plane and landing it himself, what do you think he could have done differently to help? Most people would be freaking out, yet he stayed pretty calm. That alone was probably more helpful than anything else.
Well, being a pilot for 37 years I can tell you this guy should never be allowed to fly a plane again. Carburetor Heat is available to warm the carb and help the ice melt, this is one of the most basic pilot skills and I cannot believe with the altitude this guy had when he got the warning, that he could not lean the engine and apply carburetor heat and keep flying. This is unbelievable to me that he would risk the lives of that many people including an infant child.
I hope when the NTSB sees this video they take his license away for not paying attention in Ground School and Flight Training. I mean this is as basic as turning on the key in a plane.
You HAVE to know this to get a pilot's license and you have to be able to apply what you learned in an actual emergency or you should not be flying.
I saw him look at his Checklist placard, which should have told him step by step action to take, but more importantly, he should have that scenario drilled into his head, especially if you are flying in conditions that accommodate carburetor icing.
As a pilot myself, I did not enjoy the video, but it is vitally important that people see these types of things so they can understand not every guy with a camera is a photographer and not every guy flying an airplane is a PILOT.
Unbelievable!
Why did he attempt to land on deep snow with out snow landing gear?
Ops. It is a photographers blog not pilots blog ;)
Do you actually think he planned on crash landing his plane??? "I think I'm going to crash land my plane today so I might want to prep my crash landing snow gear."...... When your engine fails you don't really have a choice in where you land, you just want to do it away from as many people as possible to avoid injury to the least amount of people as possible.
... I missed the "carburetor iced"...
it was emergency landing. My bad.
I saw many safer landing zones he could have chosen, unless he saw powerlines or obstacles I did not see, there were many roads he could have landed on, but... as Bert said, he had not planned on landing on snow, he was sure he would land on a runway, but he clearly did not have enough experience to know, all he had to do was to apply carburetor heat and begin leaning the engine and with the high altitude he had, he surely could have corrected the carburetor icing without any major issues. A senseless crash! It did not have to happen.
Kind of curious that he didn't try to set it down on one of those roads. But glad everyone came out ok.
I thought that as well, but couldn't see if there were any lamp posts or roadsigns...
Someone forget to turn on the carb heat?
Exactly Dan! Something is wrong here, this was a simple fix that did not have to end in a crash. Even in his PRE-FLIGHT he is required to make sure he has carb heat. Irresponsible pilot!
I would have turned around and said: Dude, quit you're yapping I'm trying to land the plane without killing everyone.
I almost first-person recorded a crash once. I was working for an aerospace company. We were up in a Cesna 152. My job that day (actually, a lot of other days as well) was to video record and photograph a drone the company was developing. We were flying over the Mojave Desert. They lost control of the drone and it crashed. We were at very low altitude, descending lower while maintaining a tight circling maneuver over the crash site so the ground crew, in off-road vehicles, could spot where the drone went down. It was a very expensive piece of aviation technology. More so with all the surveillance gear and more on board. I'm sitting sideways in the doorway with a vidcam pressed to my eye. (They had removed the door on my side.) They had me tethered to the seat in a way that allowed me to lean-out but not fall-out. I always got a little nervous in small planes, especially with no door on my side while hanging out the sides of them, so, to combat that anxiety, I kept a camera always pressed to my eye from takeoff to landing. Somehow, the world in two-dimensions is less scary than in three-dimensions when you're thousands of feet up in the sky. Suddenly, we were hit by some kind of really powerful downdraft. It was like an express elevator to hell going straight down. The pilot managed to regain control of the aircraft, literally, seconds before we would have crashed. It was like in a movie. Actually, it could have been in a movie.... the last movie I would ever shoot.
Having done many PFLs , I found myself looking for a place to land on the video... Amazing that my mind went into auto and I started thinking about my forced landing checks! Even though I haven't flown for some time! I think the pilot did a great job, as everyone survived intact... surprised he didn't use carb heat a bit more often though.
The pilot did a lousy job! With all the altitude he had, he only had to move a lever to apply carburetor heat, if the engine was running at all, he would have to lean the fuel mixture. If the engine had stopped, he had so much altitude he had plenty of time to initiate a restart once the ice had melted, leaning the fuel allows the fuel to ignite and there were in my opinion from what I saw, other options for a safer landing other than a field of snow with an unknown depth, especially with a fixed gear plane which is without question going to get hung up in the snow and flip. BEST BET IN VEGAS! I saw roads everywhere, surely one of them had to be free of power lines and poles.
He did get everyone home alive and as we are taught, any landing everyone walks away from is a good landing, but that is not saying this pilot acted responsibly, he clearly did not.
He did not have to crash in the first place. He is required by FAR to ensure all control functions on that plane are operable before taking off, including checking to make sure the carb heat works.
I've iced carbs, the fix is easy and does not require a forced landing unless someone is not doing what they should do.
Glad they are alive! Hope he is not allowed to fly again at the very least until he has had a major and lengthy review of emergency procedures.
PPSEL 37 Years.
I didn't hear him attempt a restart, but maybe that happened before the video started? I would guess that was the case. I also thought about the roads but wasn't sure about any roadsigns or lamposts... It's all very well, making a judgement on a video of an event that's life threatening... We all have the benefit of hindsight, something the pilot wasn't afforded. I just hope that no-one on here finds themselves in a similar situation. A friend of mine had an engine seize in his Bulldog on take-off, even after pre-flight checks... Fortunately he had gained just enough height to make a circuit and land back on the runway.
To summarize: everyone got out pretty much unscathed - Good job, to my mind. You do what you can to survive... Many don't make it unfortunately.
We can make judgments, because there are procedures he was supposed to follow and the NTSB will indeed make similar judgments after the investigation. It is good everyone got out alive, but I believe from what IS shown in the video that he had other options besides running the plane into the ground. Based on what is shown in the video.
I have had similar experiences and had I not taken action to avoid a forced landing, everyone on-board would be dead.
I fly out of Boulder City, NV 61B and as you can see at the END of this video
https://youtu.be/ARCrVePsVag
just as I am on Left Base, there are about 300 108 foot tall High Voltage Towers with intersecting High Power Cables between them which makes a forced landing on approach to Runway 27L virtually unsurvivable once you have committed to the TPA.
The words "FRIED" and "TOAST" are usually mumbled by passengers when I turn final.
As is part of every pilot's responsibilities, during the flight one must constantly be selecting possible landing options should the engine fail, right here, right now.
I have found myself talking to myself out loud, "Could I make it over there? Is that free of poles and wires?" even when there is no condition of concern. I was taught to do that, not everyone was.
People ask me, "Are you having as much fun as we are?" my answer is, "No! I am busy trying to keep us all alive, every moment we are in the air. My ENJOYMENT comes in knowing YOU had a good time!"
But that's just my view...
Why do I hear a baby crying and see this guy running for his cellphone video?
Reminds me of this video I saw last year
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yDu0jYiz-v8
I have seen this video, have not read the details about it, but it looks like the typical overloaded plane attempting to take off with a Density Altitude too high for the plane to actually fly. The only reason it flew as far as it did was because he was in GROUND EFFECT, once he climbed out of ground effect, the plane no longer wanted to fly with that much weight on a hot day. Either that, again, not having read the details... either it was Density Altitude or one thing I noticed is the engine did not seem to be at an RPM that would indicate full power on the take off. It just did not sound like he had the throttle wide open to me... as he should have until he reached TPA. Weird watching that one! I suspect Density Altitude miss or no calculation, but that engine sound is disturbingly quiet.
Someone had told me about this, craziness!!!
For those two posters that wanted to slap the guy.....you watched it didn't ya?...i bet you even went back and watched it again...and somewhat enjoyed watching it ....if he didn't record it, you'd have nothing to watch OR complain about for that matter....so please....just SHUT THE FUCK UP and keep your opinions to yourself!.......Look at your own short comings and flaws before you point the finger.....so you can point that fuckin' finger up your ass!! You douche-bag opinionated judgmental cunts!!
So true...If I hadn't watched it I wouldn't have complained. If I hadn't complained you wouldn't have been able to give such a moving lesson in keeping personal opinions to one's self. Sounds like you had a bad day and just needed someone to vent to and I'm sure you felt better afterwards, you're welcome. Hope today goes better for you.
The pilot nearly killed all and dude apologized for the plane. The pilot laughed and apologized too. WTF.
The engine failure due to the icing in the carbonator nearly killed them all. The pilot was able to safely land the plane without anyone being injured. I think he did pretty damn well all things considered.
That was my thought too. I am a pilot, and I have made a couple of forced landings over the decades, though I never flipped my plane. (A renter of one of my planes DID flip and destroy one of my planes, but he also walked away unscathed).
Those roads looked pretty inviting to me. I would not have landed on a snow field with a fixed landing plane, as it is a surefire way to flip the plane. With retractable gear, you could belly-in, but not with wheels down...
Burt, he had way too much altitude and opportunity to clear the carbs, there should not have been a forced landing at all. The plane is designed to clear the carbs, I've done it, adding C-Heat and leaning should have been the first thing he did. If the engine died, C-Heat and allow it to thaw, then lean and attempt a restart and yes... lots of roads to choose from, unknown deep snow with fixed gear would have been my second choice. Glad everyone lived... his piloting skills need to be reevaluated before he can fly again.
You have a baby on the plane, tend to the baby and your wife. IDIOT.
still after landing wants to film, your baby, check your baby. MORON.