Military jet collides with Cessna

[A930Rocket]

How does this happen? I know there is a small local airport nearby but shouldn't radar, etc. pick up the Cessna?

This happened a couple of miles from me today but I didn't hear anything about until I got home.

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2015/07/07/officials-f-16-small-plane-collide-in-midair-over-south-carolina/


Military jet collides with Cessna

An Air Force F-16 fighter jet and a Cessna collided Tuesday over South Carolina, killing two aboard the smaller plane and raining down plane parts and debris as the fighter pilot ejected to safety.

National Transportation Safety Board spokesman Peter Knudson confirmed Tuesday afternoon that two people were in the Cessna and both were killed. Their identities were not immediately released.

Maj. Morshe Araujo, a spokeswoman at Air Force headquarters at the Pentagon, told The Associated Press that the F-16 originated from Shaw Air Force Base in South Carolina. Araujo said the pilot of the jet ejected safely.

Lt. Jenny Hyden at Shaw Air Force Base said the pilot was taken to the base for observation.

There also are reports that toxic flames were coming from the F-16, according to WCSC.

The Federal Aviation Administration said in a statement that the fighter jet collided with the Cessna around 11 a.m., about 11 miles north of Charleston. A witness told WCSC that the crash occurred in a rice field close to the historic Lewisfield plantation home.

North Charleston Fire Department spokeswoman Bianca Bourbeau said the agency has sent a chief and a boat to assist Berkeley County with the crash, and will send other help as needed.

Berkeley County Airport manager Stacy Thomas declined to comment on the plane crash, referring questions to the FAA.

The Air Force has flown F-16s since the 1970s, though very few active-duty squadrons still fly them. Many F-16s still in service in the U.S. are assigned to Air National Guard units. However, Col. Cindi King of the South Carolina Air National Guard said the F-16 involved in the crash did not belong to the Guard.

F-16s from Shaw Air Force Base, about 35 miles east of Columbia, do routinely fly training missions over eastern South Carolina and the Atlantic.

Since 1975, the F-16 has been involved in 359 accidents that have caused more than $2 million in damage or resulted in a fatality or permanent total disability. The crashes have resulted in the deaths of 84 pilots. The plane's safety record has improved over the past decades, however. In the 1988 fiscal year, there were 23 of the most serious accidents. In the 2013 fiscal year, there were 7, and zero in the 2014 fiscal year, according to the most recent statistics.

The smaller plane was a Cessna 150, according to the FAA, a two-seat plane that debuted in 1959 and remains one of the most common single-engine planes in the U.S.

The Cessna 150's maximum altitude is about 15,000 feet, according to the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association. Most models weigh about 1,500 pounds when fully fueled.

By comparison, an F-16 is about 50 feet long and weighs nearly 10 tons, not counting fuel or weapons.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

[Baz]

Saw that on the news tonight.

I'm sure we'll learn more about how it could have (or did) happen in the coming days.

[greglepore]

Flying IFR practice and crash happened at 2-3000ft near a GA airport...

[cashman]

Don't F-16's have on board sophisticated radar? They are an air to air fighting aircraft. I don't get it.

[onewhippedpuppy]

Originally Posted by cashman

Don't F-16's have on board sophisticated radar? They are an air to air fighting aircraft. I don't get it.

Exactly my thought. I find it hard to believe that they don't have onboard radar and some variety of traffic alert system.

[Heel n Toe]

It's always good to get some perspective from locals.

"It was like a movie!"

No lady... movies portray this kind of stuff... you've got it backwards.

Here she is... telling us alllll about it...

Witness describes scene when fighter jet, plane collide: 'They b - wistv.com - Columbia, South Carolina

[Tervuren]

Originally Posted by cashman

Don't F-16's have on board sophisticated radar? They are an air to air fighting aircraft. I don't get it.

Depends, fighter jet Radars have a "noise" filter based on the size of the target you are searching for. The physical size of your radar effects the resolutions you can work with as well, and a fighter jet, fights a size(bad aero) vs radar function.

Lots of objects reflect back at the radar, especially ocean waves. Until software was developed to filter out this noise, radar was mostly effect to the horizon, or above, but not below. The problem arises, if the small aircraft was filtered as noise - it wouldn't show up to the pilot.

Since we really don't have much to go on, I can't speculate much at all.

[Heel n Toe]

Size relationship... interesting that they have the same wingspan.

[Porsche-O-Phile]

Electronic doohickeys are no substitute for good old-fashioned situational awareness and "see and avoid" practices. I'm betting this is a classic case of not enough time looking out the windows - basics.

I'm very, very much against the trend towards more electronics in airplanes. I've got about 4,000 hours in airplanes flown the "real" way (either by visual reference or with steam gauges / "six pack" instrumentation). Electronics / GPS / TCAS are all well and good but ultimately unnecessary if you pay attention to what the heck you're doing, follow proper procedures and stay ahead of the airplane at all times.

I don't like speculating but this looks an awful lot like a classic case of "failure to see / avoid other traffic". It's the pilot's responsibility, not the radar's and not ATC's. Entirely preventable.

If indeed the C150 was doing IFR training at 2,000-3,000' near an airport, that might be an issue. I could see it if they were doing practice approaches - and there are ways to make that safer too including having a GOOD safety pilot / CFII on board, using proper radio reports, using flight following / ATC services to assist with traffic updating (if available) using available lighting, etc.

Lots of unknowns here - sad for all involved.

A C150 is about as small / light as one can get outside of a hang glider or "light sport" classification!

[Heel n Toe]

I'm prone to agree with you, PoP... and at the press conference today, the AF spokesman said the F-16 was probably going about 200-250. Earlier, "it was reported" that witnesses said the F-16 t-boned the C150.

All that may change as the investigation firms things up, as we both know, but it did give rise to a couple of questions in my mind... I'm gonna show a lot of ignorance here, but I'm okay with that:

1. Since the F-16 pilot was flying IFR, I wondered if there is some sort of dark screen that's used/rolled upwards in front of pilot to partially obscure his forward vision, or is he supposed to use "the honor system" and just keep his eyes on the instruments.

2. Barring either pilot getting a warning from their respective contol towers, I wondered why there wouldn't be some kind of "audible avoidance alert" in the F-16, since I tend to think it would/should have the technological capability. I realize it's not one of the newer fighters in our arsenal, but I also know stuff like this can be retrofitted if it wasn't there originally.

[Porsche-O-Phile]

Even under IFR, you're still responsible for "see and avoid" unless you're in IMC (in which case there shouldn't be any C150s buzzing about on your route in theory due to airspace use planning / flight plan filing and / or radar separation by ATC).

It sounds like someone just flat-out was staring inside the airplane instead of looking for traffic while at low altitude in the vicinity of an airport... Very common beginner (and non-beginner!) error and a tough thing to overcome while doing single-pilot IFR operations (you want to pin those needles so you tend to fixate on them and without a safety pilot, well... Something's gotta' give...)

[avi8torny]

Because these guys or girls think it's OK to go 250+ knots down low in airspace where all the puddle jumpers operate. Same thing happened in Tampa a decade ago, one ran into the back of a Cessna. Never had a chance.

Reckless. Sorry for the rant but almost got killed by an A-10 doing the same thing.

[Nickshu]

It would have to be the Chair Force, wouldn't it.

[SiberianDVM]

I work in a rural area of western SC and during certain times of the year, F-16s routinely fly slightly above tree-top level over the plant. Usually 2 of them, and they are LOUD. Awesome sound.

[Porsche-O-Phile]

F16s can fly pretty slowly too (well, for what they are anyway) - I saw a MCAS demo of one at an airshow a few years back - IIRC it was turning tight radius slow turns around 120 knots - pretty slow for a 20,000 pound jet. The tightness of the turns was remarkable. It's a very maneuverable aircraft (if flown properly).

[VFR750]

My understanding is per the FAA, 250kt is the acceptable airspeed below 15,000 feet. This allows passenger jets to fly. They can't fly as slow as a Cessna 150, neither can a f16. 250kt is reasonable for a high performance jet fighter with fairly high wing loading.

However, it does require the question to be answered: why did they end up it the same spot?

[GH85Carrera]

Imagine that little Cessna out there against the sky as a tiny little dot. You are coming up at 250 knots or 288 MPH or 422 feet per second. And that is assuming the jet was just poking slowly along. You will be up on that dot in seconds and that is assuming you see him unlike in this case. Very soon all aircraft will be required to have ADS-B and that will help.

http://www.faa.gov/nextgen/programs/adsb/faq/

In this case it would have alerted both aircraft they are on a collision course with time to avoid the accident.

[cashflyer]

Originally Posted by VFR750

My understanding is per the FAA, 250kt is the acceptable airspeed below 15,000 feet.

Military operations are exempt from this speed limit. The only speed limit the military must adhere to is staying below the speed of sound, except in a very few designated areas.

A Cessna 150 is still a very common plane for training. It is entirely possible that it was a training flight, or a low time pilot with a passenger.

Pilots are encouraged to check MOAs for activity before flying through them, but I don't know that an MOA fly-through is the situation. The pilot could have been passing through a VR route and just had the unlucky draw of the day.

VR routes are established for exactly the thing that avi8torny mentions - going fast at low altitude. It is the civilian pilots responsibility to know how to read a frikkin sectional chart and avoid these issues - or you can call the controlling agency in the area and ask before flying in those areas and hoping for the best.

As PoP said... it is the pilots responsibility to see and avoid other traffic.

But all of this conjecture about how and why is premature until more details come out.

[cashflyer]

Originally Posted by cashflyer

Military operations are exempt from this speed limit. The only speed limit the military must adhere to is staying below the speed of sound, except in a very few designated areas.

For what it's worth, Wikipedia says, "Military Training Routes are usually limited to 420 knots, and in no case are aircraft allowed to exceed Mach 1 within United States sovereign airspace, except in designated Military Operation Areas."

[avi8torny]

Very hard if not impossible to "see and avoid" anything going 250+ Knots. Especially an F-16. Cessna driver never had a chance. BTW, this accident was not on a MTR.