Airplanes was Re: [AT] an Iowa snowstorm

[Robert Brooks]

Ron;

I'm glad to hear you are on the mend!
There a lot to be said about having good safety equipment!
I'm surprised the FAA didn't look at things harder.

Bob


At 08:00 PM 3/17/04 -0600, you wrote:
>The only "story" is that I screwed up!  It was kind of a silly REC wire 
>arrangement cutting across the corner of one field and going to the other 
>side of the road.  I was finishing the field.  Going to do a headland 
>pass.  Apparently caught that angling wire with the landing gear.  Just 
>the top wire of the two.  That does absolutely nothing to a 6000 lb. 
>aircraft traveling at 130 mph.  However, the parted wire must have whipped 
>around part of the tail damaging it.  The airplane did some unusual pitch 
>changes.  Full travel on the controls from up to down about 3 times 
>overpowering me and then settled down to level flight.  I figured, well, I 
>guess I must have hit something and I better go back to the airport and 
>see what needs fixing.  And in the meantime I better hang on to this 
>damned thing.  I went about 1/8 of a mile and it pitched down abruptly at 
>about 45 degrees and smacked into the soybean field. HARD!  The wreckage 
>is laying in the torn up soybeans.  It didn't slide anywhere.  Just kind 
>of ran over itself.  Some part of the tail had to have failed.  Nobody 
>investigated.  I never saw the wreckage after I left the scene.  Just 
>those pictures that someone took.  The FAA says I hit a pole and 
>crashed.  There was a broken pole, but that would have happened from the 
>wire snapping.  I would have heard me hitting a pole.  No need discussing 
>what I think of the FAA.  They suspended my license for 30 days in the 
>interest of safety.
>         Yes I was maybe lucky to survive.  The airplane did exactly as it 
> was designed to protect the pilot.  The safety harness was up to date and 
> in good shape and I was wearing a custom fitted Kevlar crash 
> helmet.  There was no fire.  I crawled out of it, although I don't 
> remember how.  I couldn't walk, as my right leg and foot were broken, and 
> crawling on my hands and knees wasn't going too good either as my sternum 
> was also broken.  I was glad to see help arrive.  I was in the hospital 
> for 5 weeks and have been recovering ever since.  I finally was able to 
> walk a little with the aid of a cane by the end of December.  I am 
> getting better every day.  Kind of limpy gimpy, though.  The cane is hung 
> up now.  I lost the whole darned winter of tractor fixin'.<g>  Better 
> times is a comin'.
>
>Ron Cook
>Salix, IA
>
>Robert Brooks wrote:
>>Ron;
>>There has to be a story behind those pictures.  It's amazing you lived 
>>thru the crash.
>>Bob
>
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