Small plane crashes at Nashville airport, and no one notices

There has to be an easier way to fake your own death.

Seems that mysterious airplane crashes are not new to Nashville.
April 22, 2012 a 1961 Twin engine beech craft was crashed landed on purpose at the closed Cornelia Fort Air park.
The Pilot was not found until he came forward a few days later.
While there was no sign of drugs the 74 year old pilot did have a criminal past in drug smuggling.

www.newschannel5.com...
"EAST NASHVILLE, Tenn. - Police are calling it mystery. A 1961 aircraft was discovered at an airfield in East Nashville, but there's no sign of the pilot.

The plane apparently crash landed at Cornelia Park Air Park, which is closed, sometime over the weekend. But they don't know who put it here or where it came from. Police said it's not a crime, but it's highly suspicious."

www.wkrn.com...
"NASHVILLE, Tenn. -
Authorities have identified the pilot of a vintage airplane found at the closed Cornelia Fort Airpark in east Nashville over the weekend as 74-year-old Russell Brothers.

Metro police said Brothers, of Burns, Tennessee, acknowledged in a telephone conversation with authorities that he crash landed the 1961 Beechcraft twin-engine airplane overnight Friday at Cornelia Fort because of his familiarity with the property.

He said he had flown the plane from Miami, Florida.

In addition to landing gear failure, Brothers reported the two-way radio on the plane was not working."

Gee that's convenient, gear failure and a busted radio.
Hate to see his prefilght check list
"Hey! Look it's got two wings! lets go flying!"

reply to post by mash3d


I'm sure there could be, but what better way? Crash remains are usually identified through DNA and dental records, because they're so mangled and burned, and sometimes they can't even get a good DNA sample. Being a pilot, it wouldn't be unexpected that he die in a plane crash, so there may be a predisposition to identify the remains as his.

Strange.

A.) Experienced pilots do not fly unapproved flight plans. That's both dangerous to the pilot and the plane, but also to the pilots license he/she holds.

B.) Pelee Island, Ontario is a long way from Nashville, TN. While at 500 nautical miles, it's well within your typical rental Cessna 172's flight range, but I don't see why any Canadian pilot, in a rented Canadian plane, would fly half way across the US without a flight plan...not to mention we're told he'd have been shut down because we're a paranoid nation of sociopaths and if it doesn't come planned and squawking, it goes down quiet and blazing. No flight plan = terrorist/spy/infidel to a flight controller.

C.) If he crashed between 2am and 8:30am, he would have left (based on a Cessna's cruise speed of 143mph, rounded up to 150mph) Pelee Island between 11:00pm and 5:30am.

I'd like to know what a flight controller at Pelee was doing when he took off at those hours? Surely it was documented.

A lot of smaller regional airports, like Peele, only have someone manning it during certain hours.
At night if no one is there the runway lights can be activated by radio.
In Class G and E airspace a pilot can take off and land by just announcing it on the radio.
Usually you just look for other traffic, if there is someone else in the pattern wait for them to land,
announce your taking the active run way and take off.
Not sure what the rules are for crossing the border is.

reply to post by mash3d


It used to be a fairly easy process. Now, apparently, not so much.

www.copa70.com...

Which may be why he chose to not tell anyone he was heading down to Nashville.

if your flying VFR within the the Continental U.S. you do not have to file a flight plan.
It's recommended that you do but it's not a requirement.

They are required if your cross the border though like this guy seem to have done..

"The FAA has updated its guidance for pilots planning flights across international borders to mandate the use of International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) flight plans in any case where an international border will be crossed, even if the flight begins and ends in U.S. airspace."

www.aopa.org...

mash3d
He may have talked to the tower, been cleared to land and told to contact ground control once down. He calls in final and then crashes just before landing. As far as tower is concerned he landed ok.

Surely it's the sole duty of the tower controller to control traffic on and off the runway,and to ensure the safety of everyone else who uses the runway? It's his job is it not to make sure that ALL landing aircraft are clear of the runway before handing them over to the ground controller? "Nashville tower,Cessna 48Papa (callsign made up) is clear of the runway" "Thank you 48Papa,contact ground on 121.75 (again made up frequency).That aircraft isn't out of his control until it's been confirmed that is under someone elses control,especially as it's still moving on an active airfield.

you would think airports these days would atleast have SOME sort of crash detetctors, listening for explosions, or general crashing sounds.

Imagewerx
Surely it's the sole duty of the tower controller to control traffic on and off the runway,and to ensure the safety of everyone else who uses the runway?

It is but if the pilot never advised upon initial contact, then ATC was never in control of the situation to begin with. Which it is amounting to. There are a few questions moving forward though given the point of impact as reported and my guess the tapes were pulled to find out these questions:

Was there any MSAW warning; Low Altitude tag would have been applied; (in this case, it might really not have picked up on it though)on their STARS system that went ignored by the controller on-duty?

I am sure NTSB has already pulled the voice data and confirmed that no contact was ever initiated.

That aircraft isn't out of his control until it's been confirmed that is under someone elses control,especially as it's still moving on an active airfield.

It was, apparently, never in control of ATC.

reply to post by ownbestenemy

Ok then,I know that generally here in the UK the tower controllers don't normally have access to or can even see the local radar screens.That is the job of the approach contollers,normally in another room.So the approach controller would have had an unidentifed object on his screen with no allocated transponder code,am I to assume that in your VERY busy airspace it's normal for this so close to an airport that a controller would ignore an unidentified plane heading towards him? He would only raise the alarm if he was talking to it and it was showing a transponder code and then it disappeared off his screen?

Xterrain
I'd like to know what a flight controller at Pelee was doing when he took off at those hours? Surely it was documented.

NTSB will be requesting that data be sent to them for the investigation. My guess? His ICAO flight plan (if there is even one) was meant for a different destination and he flew south.

The fact that there was no FAA flight plan doesn't exclude the notion that he filed with ICAO. Did he stop at the first airport of entry upon entering the United States? There as so many questions that will eventually be answered.

Imagewerx
reply to post by ownbestenemy

 

Ok then,I know that generally here in the UK the tower controllers don't normally have access to or can even see the local radar screens.

Nashville tower will have tower displays (they have STARS (automation system)) -- though it is up to a controller to utilize it or not; many opt to look out the window as they are typically in contact with aircraft they are controlling.

That is the job of the approach contollers,normally in another room.So the approach controller would have had an unidentifed object on his screen with no allocated transponder code,am I to assume that in your VERY busy airspace it's normal for this so close to an airport that a controller would ignore an unidentified plane heading towards him? He would only raise the alarm if he was talking to it and it was showing a transponder code and then it disappeared off his screen?

Well, flying in class B airspace (controlled airspace), it would have probably caught the eye of the TRACON handling that sector. If he was flying in class G it might not have caused any alarm; though that will all be looked at as NTSB starts pulling tapes.

At 3am, the airspace ins't that busy save mundane flights that typically depart/arrive at that time. I haven't heard confirmed reports of no transponder; though I am playing catch up right now.

Should be noted: Flying in Class G airspace requires no transponder but it is of course, highly advised. I am guessing he crossed into Class B at some point so this is going to be an investigation going back to his point of origin and then pulling tapes tracking him all the way to Nashville. Should be interesting.

ownbestenemy

Imagewerx
Surely it's the sole duty of the tower controller to control traffic on and off the runway,and to ensure the safety of everyone else who uses the runway?

It is but if the pilot never advised upon initial contact, then ATC was never in control of the situation to begin with. Which it is amounting to. There are a few questions moving forward though given the point of impact as reported and my guess the tapes were pulled to find out these questions:

Was there any MSAW warning; Low Altitude tag would have been applied; (in this case, it might really not have picked up on it though)on their STARS system that went ignored by the controller on-duty?

I am sure NTSB has already pulled the voice data and confirmed that no contact was ever initiated.

That aircraft isn't out of his control until it's been confirmed that is under someone elses control,especially as it's still moving on an active airfield.

It was, apparently, never in control of ATC.

"Advise on initial contact" in the ATIS means to let the approach controller know that you have the most current information. The full sentence in the ATIS is "advise on initial contact you have information Bravo" (or whichever letter). They're essentially saying that they want you to say "I have information Bravo" or something similar when you first call the approach controller so they know that you have the current altimeter setting, which they will tell you if you don't mention what ATIS information you have when you call.

Nashville is class C airspace, so it only has a 10 NM radius. Approach controllers will usually provide flight following up to 20 NM out if their workload allows, though. The VFR sectional has a notation that pilots should contact approach within 20 NM of the airspace.

I tend to agree with those who have proposed that it may be a complete electrical failure. With no radio contact or transponder it seems that is the likely cause. It seems bizarre that they wouldn't find anything odd about a primary target (reflection of signal off a surface) near the airport, though. Perhaps they assumed it was a flock of birds. As far as the drug running hypothesis, I don't think anyone with half a brain would be running drugs into a major airport when there were several non-towered airports nearby. Perhaps the visibility was so poor that the pilot thought that Nashville was a nearby non-towered airport like Tune and was making calls on CTAF instead of approach/tower. This still wouldn't explain the lack of transponder and the fact that they were not in contact with approach from 20 NM out. I would be very curious to know what charts he had on board. A partial or complete vacuum failure could have caused his heading indicator to read erroneously, which could have caused him to be off course if he didn't realize that happened, although it's extraordinarily poor practice to not verify the heading indicator and compass are in agreement every couple minutes.

What's even more odd is that the same aircraft flew just one day later a 19min flight from CYXU to CYQG with active tracking. Could be a glitch but kind of weird.

flightaware.com...

aviation-safety.net...

reply to post by flyandi


This flight occurred on August 31st. FlightAware has data on IFR flights and some VFR flights if flight following is used, so it could be either. Since no route is available, I'm thinking it was a VFR flight. Looking at a past VFR flight that I took that was tracked by FlightAware, it looks like only following by an ARTCC will show up. I took the route down on Boston and New York centers, and then oddly enough one leg of the return trip was on Wilkes-Barre Approach despite being on almost the same route in the reverse direction. This leg does not show up on FlightAware, whereas the ones where I was being tracked by an ARTCC were.

Was there any more news on what happened here?

reply to post by Imagewerx


There was no communication with the tower at Nashville before the crash. He apparently circled at least once, before landing on 2C, where the plane bounced and skidded 400+ feet before burning. No flight plan, no DHS clearance, nothing.

reply to post by Zaphod58

Aaaahhh ok,but how do they know all this if he wasn't talking to anyone?

reply to post by Imagewerx


Radar tapes. That close to the airport they'll have a primary radar return off the plane, which the controller could have easily missed at the time, but they can track back after the fact, when they have time.

reply to post by Zaphod58

And they can get that amount of detail from the tapes,that it skidded 400 feet?