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Now we have an replace on a Channel 2 Motion Information investigation on small aircraft crashes.
In February, we instructed you ways critics assume some could also be brought on by a design flaw within the gasoline tanks. After our first story aired, extra pilots reached out to us to share their crash tales. Channel 2 investigative reporter Justin Grey went again to digging by means of many years of federal crash knowledge the place he uncovered much more lethal crashes.
Safety cameras captured the 2012 crash touchdown of a Cessna 150 close to the Pickens County airport in Jasper, GA. The 2 pilots suffered critical harm.
“And I bear in mind coming to and lined in blood, I imply, simply lined in blood,” David Mathews mentioned.
That was 10 years in the past. However when pilot David Mathews noticed Channel 2′s investigation, he says all of it got here speeding again. Mathews wasn’t simply on a routine flight. He had simply bought the aircraft that day and was conducting a top-to-bottom evaluation. A post-crash investigation by the Nationwide Transportation Security Board (NTSB) discovered “water-contaminated gasoline.”
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And like so lots of the pilots we spoke with, the NTSB blamed him, saying his preflight inspection was insufficient. However Mathews mentioned he checked for water twice.
“The aircraft, I knew, had been sitting exterior for the previous couple of months. So, water within the gasoline line was a really entrance of thoughts concern to us. We have been stunned that there wasn’t any water,” Mathews mentioned.
In February, Grey uncovered crash after crash the place water was discovered within the gasoline in a number of the hottest planes within the sky. Since then, Grey did extra digging all the best way again to 1982. Grey discovered 307 Cessna crashes from water contamination with 37 deaths.
“What I can let you know with absolute certainty is that there was no water that was detectable from the ways in which we have been speculated to confirm whether or not there was water there,” Mathews mentioned.
“The gasoline tanks are severely flawed,” Bob Scovill mentioned.
At a Tennessee airport, Bob Scovill pushes open a hangar door to disclose what was as soon as his pleasure and pleasure: a 1981 Cessna 172P airplane. For almost 40 years, Scovill has stored the hangar and maintained his aircraft though he refuses to fly it. He alerted the FAA again in 1999 after three pressured landings triggered by undetectable water in his gasoline tanks.
The FAA witnessed a number of experiments carried out on his aircraft. Images from a kind of exams present thirty-two ounces of water, dyed crimson, poured into the tanks to see what it does.
An FAA memo says how, after sumping, even shaking the wings “13 ounces of water remained entrapped” contained in the tank. Grey was there when Scovill did the same check, once more with water dyed crimson. After a number of sumps, the gasoline is obvious of water within the check. However contained in the tank, the red-dyed water is accumulating and hiding.
“Water simply lays within the backside of the tank,” Scovill mentioned.
“No pilot will fly in his proper thoughts realizing he’s acquired water within the gasoline,” Joe Mazzone mentioned.
Pilot Joe Mazzone reached out to Grey about his 1991 crash in a Carrolton, Georgia discipline. He says seeing Grey’s story gave him a brand new perspective thirty years after he almost died when his engine give up. The NTSB decided the possible trigger was “undetectable water” in his gasoline tanks.
“It’s simple guilty the pilots, particularly a civilian pilot, you recognize, you possibly can’t defend your self,” Mazzone mentioned.
Among the many pilots we spoke with, Joe Mazzone was distinctive. He doesn’t simply pilot small planes, he spent 23 years as a Delta pilot flying industrial jets.
“I hadn’t thought of the chance that perhaps the tanks are designed, presumably, the place water might be trapped in it. And result in these these incidents,” Mazzone mentioned.
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Grey adopted a paper path beginning in 1999 when the FAA despatched a letter to Cessna after Scovill’s exams, figuring out “an unsafe situation exists” and “design adjustments are essential.”
However eight years later, in 2007, the FAA despatched Cessna one other letter reversing its findings, giving the planes a clear invoice of well being after Cessna carried out their very own exams.
The FAA wrote “there was no response of the check plane’s engine to the deliberate water contamination,” and went on to say that primarily based on these exams, their unique issues and warnings have been quote “incorrect.”
With that letter, the FAA closed the case, and no design adjustments have been mandated. However planes stored crashing. Mazzone was certainly one of a really small variety of pilots Grey discovered who wasn’t faulted by the NTSB. That might have value him his job. He says though pilots like David Mathews might heal from their accidents, that dedication can have an enduring influence.
“I’m positive they carry guilt, as a result of they’ve been blamed. It’s like tarnishing your loved ones title in a approach,” Mazzone mentioned.
A Cessna spokesperson instructed Channel 2 that Scovill’s concept was “rigorously investigated and examined by Cessna, with direct FAA participation and oversight.” They are saying “no security issues have been discovered to exist and the matter was closed” by the FAA.”
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The FAA declined Grey’s request for an interview.
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