Reply #135: I have had at least 4 pilot friends die by their own errors in 40 years. [View All]

As much as it pains me to admit, pilots make mistakes. Some are fatal.

Here are their names:
Cecil Gibson
Lou Simmons
Bob Johnson
Jimmy Stephenson

Cecil was a mediocre pilot. He did not have the temperament and skill that is paramount. He managed to finally get a license to fly a Lear jet and crashed it, killing himself and 3 (or 4, I forget now) other people.

Lou was a great pilot. A Captain with Frontier Airlines and part-time
instructor. He died in a stupid accident in a teeny little Cessna 150 along with his student. We never found out why. *

Bob was very experienced and loved to fly gliders. One day he was in a
Bergfalke glider that was being launched with a winch. For some reason he didn't release the hook and the winch yanked his glider down, pulled a wing off and he smashed into the ground right at the end of the runway, and

Jimmy, who had over a thousand hours in a Commander 500 inexplicably one day stalled it and crashed.

No evidence of any mechanical malfunction was ever found in any of these incidents.

* which has reminded me of a bittersweet memory. The first time I ever flew a glider was with Lou. We met up at the airport, he wanted to fly, and besides we two, there was only one other pilot certified to tow gliders...nobody to "walk the wing" (normally there is a person who will hold one wing tip level for a few dozen feet until there's enough airspeed for the glider pilot to keep it level with the ailerons) so we thought "well, let's just hook up the tow rope and let it pull us along for a bit, we'll have control in a few seconds."

So we did that. The tow-plane started down the runway, took up the slack in the rope and off we went. After a few seconds, I noticed we were heading for the fence on the east side of the runway. It didn't alarm me right away, I figured Lou was avoiding a pothole or something. But we kept going off to the side...I turned around (I was in the front seat) and said "where the hell are you going?" He yelled, "I thought YOU were driving!"

I am not making this up. It only became funny much later.

If I could write, I'd write a book.