Why: Fatal Cirrus Crash - Brett James N218VB [Parachute System]

We have an update to breaking news out

of Eastern North Carolina tonight where

we now know an award-winning songwriter

was on board that small plane that

crashed. The National Songwriters Hall

of Fame just put out this post sharing

condolences for Brett James. Brett James

wrote several songs including Carrie

Underwood's Jesus Take the Wheel and

Kenny Chesny's When the Sun Goes Down.

>> Jeez, man. Look at this. A Cirrus SR22

Turbo. the same exact paint scheme, mind

you, as what I got my pilot's license

in. And in this segment, we're going to

cover exactly what I think went wrong.

Keep in mind, there is a level of us

looking at the data and then having to

make assumptions at this point because

this is just within 24 hours of another

terrible loss of life in aviation. It's

a sad day for the aviation community

when anybody dies. Remember the odds of

dying in an aircraft uh on an annual

basis are a fraction of that of

vehicles. We have maybe 400 deaths per

year in aviation compared to over 40,000

in driving vehicles. By the way, look at

this same exact color aircraft. This is

a Cirrus SR22 in this photo. This was

the day that I passed my pilot license

test uh last year and uh you know since

then went on to get instrument rated,

get multi-engine rated and get uh pilot

in command single pilot operator

certified in a Phenom 300 jet aircraft,

multi-engine jet aircraft. This uh photo

right here though really hits home

because that crash scene we just saw is

is basically what I trained in. I

trained in the SR22 and the SR22 Turbo.

So, I did train in both versions. And

the photo here is the uh 22. Uh the

difference at lower altitude, not that

big of a deal. We're talking about a

difference of maybe 5 knots on on, you

know, my rotation speed. But beyond

that, very very common questions that

come up with these Cirrus related

accidents is Kevin, these Cirrus related

these Cirrus aircraft are known for

their CAPS parachute system. That's the

Cirrus airframe parachute system, CAPS.

And what's really important to know

about the Cirrus airframe parachute

system, where yes, these aircraft do

have a parachute, is that they do not

deploy automatically. Uh, a lot of

people think that they do, uh, but they

actually need to be uh pulled with a

substantial amount of force to get them

to to actually function. So, uh, you

could see, let's see here, uh, somewhat

what some of these systems looks like

look like. Here you go. Here's some

diagrams of what these parachutes look

like. And uh these aircraft are rated to

deploy the parachute at minimum at 600

ft above the ground. Uh and Cirrus

trains that you should use the parachute

at 2,000 ft above the ground, which

means in very critical phases of flight,

the parachute system is actually not

going to help you. So, not only is it

hard and heavy to pull down, but you're

generally only going to utilize this if

you had an issue above or outside of

your takeoff or landing uh sort of phase

of flight. Uh at 600 ft when we take

off, we usually say caps available. So,

technically at the the end of sort of

our takeoff, we could utilize this if we

needed to. But most of your fatal phases

of flight are going to occur in the

final moments of your approach to land

or right when you're taking off and

you're going to rotate and you have some

form of a sudden engine failure right at

the worst phase of flight. And again,

those are the phases where unfortunately

the parachute system is just not going

to help you. So when we take a look at

this aircraft, we have November 218

Victor Bravo. This aircraft took off at

12:41 central time and went to land uh

about uh a little over 1 hour later in

the Eastern time zone. So, it looks like

2 hours later, but that's because we

switched time zones here. And we uh

traveled from uh Nashville to North

Carolina.

Uh and uh what we'll do is we going to

grab the weather yesterday for because

the takeoff weather in Nashville was

fine. The weather yesterday we had calm

winds. We had weather between 88 to 91

degrees. Nothing unusual and relatively

clear skies. That was yesterday. And if

we look at the weather yesterday for

North Carolina, it's actually a little

bit cooler. So, we have less of a

potential density altitude issue here.

East Franklin yesterday, we had winds of

about five knots. Nothing unusual. We

did have some scattered clouds, but it

seemed like it was uh mostly sunny here.

And uh we had a temperatures uh at a

high of about 81 in the afternoon

yesterday. Uh so it didn't look like we

were in any kind of IFR, IMC conditions,

any kind of major weather. It looked

like this was a relatively clear day. No

major winds, no major crosswind factors

here to consider, at least from what we

can tell. And so when we look at the

flight path here, what we find thanks to

flightaware uh is initially, you know,

we look at this and we wonder, okay, you

know, we have a pretty uneventful

flight. We have our departure, we have

our turn, and we fly what appears to be

a mostly autopilot flight. This aircraft

would have been equipped with autopilot.

And so pretty basic flight. Then what we

have here is what appears to be a uh

360. Now, a 360 before coming into land

would be very common when uh you need to

get lower because maybe you were a

little high. So, you wanted to get lower

a little bit more rapidly in your

descent. So, we could see this here. The

aircraft right here was at about 6,800

ft in the f in in the base turn to the

airfield. The airfield is about 2,000 ft

off the ground. I believe it was 275 is

the airfield elevation. So we are 4,800

ft above the airfield when we're turning

base. That's not possible to land. Uh I

mean like even in an emergency descent,

we're probably going to have to pull a

360 here. So that's what we find. We

find that the aircraft does a 360 here

while descending uh and slowing down.

During this descent, we're going about

130 140. This is pretty fast uh for for

an approach to land. So, we don't we

don't want to be going this fast. Uh so,

we do a 360 to slow down and get a lot

lower. By the time we finish our first

360, we're about 1,500 ft above the

ground. Still a good height above the

ground. And then we get to the airfield

at 3,000 ft.

We're at the airfield crossing the

threshold at 2900 ft. We are now 900 ft

above the ground and we're supposed to

be touching down.

So, not surprisingly, the aircraft goes

around. We're going to go mist on this

and we're going to take off again. This

is actually very safe in aviation. I

want you to know goarounds are safe in

aviation. There's nothing wrong with

goarounds. Uh, I'm a big fan uh of doing

go-arounds because we like to say in

aviation that goarounds are free. As a

licensed pilot, I would much rather any

day be in the back of a Boeing 737 or

whatever and the pilot go around because

I I would my first impression would be

they are doing something that is a safe

move to make. I much prefer a goound

than try to force a landing by by

pushing this down. So, I actually think

in this case, Brett probably made I

mean, he had to make this decision. I

believe I think he was way too high, but

this is a smart decision. Let's do the

right thing. Let's take Let's try it

again. We're way too high. We didn't get

down fast enough. No problem. Some of

this in a part 91 flight, really any

flight, is a little bit of a red flag,

though, because it does send us a signal

that maybe they just weren't ahead of

the aircraft here. Maybe they got

distracted while the plane was on

autopilot and they really didn't plan

out this descent properly to where they

didn't start descending early enough and

their bottom of the descent was just way

too high to align with being able to

land at this airfield. Unfortunately,

that is an early red flag of a lack of

planning by the pilot. It looks like

this was uh based on the FAA report a

one crew aircraft. Uh we know that these

Cirrus planes can be flown single pilot.

They're not two pilot aircraft. Uh but

it says here total crew one and two

passengers and we believe that Brett was

flying though we're not certain. Uh this

does indicate aircraft crashed under

unknown circumstances in wooded area in

Franklin, North Carolina. Part 91

operation on the approach phase of

flight. Okay. So what do we know about

uh these how should I phrase phrase it?

Uh, what else do we know about this

flight and we we saw this goaround

happen? What happened after the

goaround? Well, let me show you first

what a go-around typically looks like

and why it's important to practice them.

So, here's an example of a goaround. And

this is in uh in a jet aircraft. And you

can see we're in IMC here. There's a

this there's a lot going on. We are

doing this for training purposes. And

when you're in these conditions, you

really want to plan ahead. Now, we know

we're going to go around, but it's a

practice thing. You regularly have to

practice this. Otherwise, it's very

common for you to forget your go-around

procedures. You potentially leave your

flaps in. Potentially, you forget to go

full power on your goound. Uh sometimes

people will push the throttle forward

halfheartedly. You don't get enough

power to that engine and on your

goaround you end up stalling the

aircraft out. that becomes really really

important in what you're about to see of

the flight path of this Cirrus aircraft.

Now, this is an example here of going

through uh IMC into the Santa Barbara

airport. Uh and we're just listening for

the go

>> approach. Unstable approach.

>> Yeah,

just a little fast. Fine. All right. Go

miss. Yep.

>> Full power to set up.

>> All right. And then we get our takeoff

and we go take off again. We go flying

again. All right. So then there are a

lot of procedures that we're going to go

through. Obviously, we got to get the

flaps up. In our case, we got to get the

gear up. Uh you know, so full power

flaps up, gear up. Like there's

obviously a lot that we have to do.

Fine. In the Cirrus, you're not going to

put a gear up. Uh not in this Cirrus. So

why does this matter? Well, it matters

because it's very common to be licensed

but not actually current or how should I

say it? Like you could be legally

current but not proficient in doing

goarounds. Not a lot of people are going

to go out and purposefully go practice

their go-arounds. Here is actually a

Cirrus aircraft. This is the SR22. I

don't think this is the Turbo. And this

is me landing that same aircraft almost

that you see in the uh uh the crash

footage or uh crash photo. This is me

landing the Cirrus in Santa Paula, which

is a very very small airport. And what I

want you to think of is on their first

approach here, they went into this

airport 900 ft high.

As you can see, we're there's the there

are the numbers. You could tell in this

Cirrus I'm like 50 ft above the ground.

I'm not high at all. I'm not 900 ft

high. Right.

There it is. There's our land into uh

Santa Paula.

>> The sound of those tires hitting reminds

me so much of Microsoft Flight

Simulator. But u that's a Cirrus. So

you've now seen a few different angles

of of what these aircraft look like when

it comes to land. So why do I show this

and why do I bring this up? I bring this

up because when we go back to what

happened here, look what happens next.

We get them going around again. Okay, so

well this is the first go around. Uh

they did their 360, they do their first

go around. Uh this is our uh we are on

the upwind phase of flight here. You can

see them actually turn a little bit like

this could just be the way the map is

set, but it looks like they're veering

to the right a little bit, which

somebody in the chat in the live stream

chat mentioned, did they put enough

right rudder in? And honestly, I didn't

notice this the first time, but you're

right. Look at this. They veer to the

right here, which is very weird before

turning left. That could be a data

anomal anomaly. But anyway, this is also

a very funky turnout. like there's

there's really no good crosswind here.

This is sort of a Uturn out to the left

which somewhat suggests that maybe the

pattern work wasn't exactly the best

over here. So not not the best if the

data is correct. Uh and then what we

find is they come in for a much closer

approach this time. Now the reason the

closeness of an approach matters is

because the mo one one of your I would

say probably the most dangerous portion

of flying is your approach to land.

>> Now my favorite way to land an aircraft

is straight. You want to fly straight

into the airport. It is the easiest all

of them. You're good. You're good.

>> It is the easiest way to land. And this

is going into Hebrew, for example, and

you want the straight in. But what's

dangerous is when you're making these

turns,

uh, to actually make that turn to final,

which you'll see here.

>> Out all the way.

>> Oh, yeah. It's so out.

>> This is

>> so a little fast, but um, glide path is

starting to come in here.

>> Sink rate.

>> Pull up.

Go around. Wind shear ahead. Unstable

approach.

>> So, the lady's really pissed. you know,

the automated voice of the computer.

It's fine. Smooth landing and

everything, right? But this is this is

tight. In Utah, you're dodging mountains

to turn into this Hebrew airport. It's a

very dangerous airport to fly into. It's

a very hard uh and unforgiving airport.

And it's a tiny, very narrow runway to

come into that turn into that final

approach segment, the straight portion.

Very dangerous. Very common to people

for people to stall out over there.

extremely common, but it doesn't look

like that was the issue that happened

here. And the reason I say that is we

end up looking at the data and we could

see this aircraft

uh doesn't actually crash until much

later uh off off I mean the data ends

here, but it looks to me like they were

right back over the threshold again and

they were able to get above the runway

again. And the reason I find this

interesting is because when we look at

the track logs, we can see right here

they got to within about 25 ft of the

airport elevation, which we can't see

very well on the map. And then their

vertical speed goes positive. So they're

coming in to land at about 103, which is

a little fast. Little fast for the

Cirrus. You know, I would have liked to

have been a little bit slower. Uh but

that's okay. Like I can land fast. Slow

is not my friend, but I can land fast.

you know, we have to land fast if we

have a hydraulic issue or, you know,

we're doing a no- flap landing or

whatever. But look what happened here.

The aircraft then went for another go

around about 25 ft above the ground. And

you could see the vertical speed go

positive to 265 ft uh per minute and

then 600 ft per minute. And you could

see the aircraft's speed drop from 79,

which is already mega slow, to 72. And

then the data ends.

Now, here's my opinion of what happened.

I don't think this was a base to final

stall. I think this was another goound.

A little fast, didn't feel comfortable.

The second time you're already a little

pissed, right? Like you were late to

come down, so you're pissed. You have to

do the 360. You had to go around for the

first time. You're like, "Uh, I don't

want to go around again." Like, you're

already like frazzled, right? You've got

two passengers in the back who might not

be uh uh pilots, so they don't know.

They're like, "Come on, man. Like, get

us on the ground." So, you have all

these external pressures.

And then what happens is

you start losing

sight of all of the elements and your

training of what goes into actually

performing a proper go around. Are you

putting the flaps up? Are you going full

throttle? Do you have the rudder in

correctly? Are you doing everything you

should be doing on that go around while

at the same time communicating to

traffic like, "Hey, uh, I'm going around

again, whatever." Right? These things

are important. Uh so uh what happens uh

when

you go around and you don't put enough

power in or you pull back too much and

you're potentially heavy. We know that

this aircraft had two passengers in the

back which makes you back heavy. I have

had a Cirrus that I've manually had to

drain fuel from because these suckers

don't have a lot of payload. So, I had

two passengers in the back, myself and a

co-pilot, and we had to drain fuel

because the computer said we wouldn't

even be allowed to take off because we

were too heavy. These planes are very,

very quick to fill up. That's with no

baggage, mind you, which is crazy. Now,

this aircraft had been flying for about

an hour, so we don't think that we were

full fuel, but we definitely had

passengers in the back, which is going

to make us tail heavy, which makes it

more likely for us to pull up too much

on that goound again. So, I think what

happened here, and this is my

speculation, so I want to be clear about

that, but I believe that what happened

in this accident is this aircraft came

into land. We're coming into land, we're

coming to do our flare, and we don't

feel good. We're going too fast. Okay,

we're gonna go around. We go full power.

It's, you know, a modestly warm day.

It's not a cold day, so our performance

is a little lower, maybe humid. We've

got passengers in the back, so it makes

us a little tail heavy. We're going to

be a little less performative, but not

dramatically. I don't think weather was

a huge factor here. and we go to pull up

and we get that 200 ft of climb and for

whatever reason we get maybe impatience

or what we won't know until the

investigation is done. we we don't want,

you know, maybe stress, maybe anxiety,

maybe he's on the radio, you know,

going, "Hey, I'm going around again."

And just doesn't realize he's pulling

back on that stick a little too much.

And that aircraft goes nose up a little

too much.

Once you hit stall speed,

there's really no recovering

when you get into a full stall. It's

entirely possible that very rapidly he's

on the radio queuing up. Hey, I'm going

around again. He's pulling that stick

back. Before he knows it, he's getting

the pings, the stick shakers activating.

Oh, we're stalling. Oh my gosh, what's

happening? Aircraft goes to stall. It's

done. There's no recovering that low. If

you stall at 200 feet above the ground,

there's no parachute system that's going

to save you. There's no amount of

training that can save you. it's over.

You stalled it. You crash.

And my guess is this was a go-around

gone wrong. And it's terrible. Uh but it

shows us how important it is to

constantly train uh in aviation uh all

of our emergency procedures, especially

gorounds, which should be a very normal

thing to practice, but very, very few

people say, "Hey, this weekend I'm not

doing anything. What am I going to do?"

"Oh, I'm going to go brush up on my

go-arounds." like I showed you with that

Santa Barbara approach. Why? Most people

aren't going to do it once they're

licensed. I'm not saying that's for sure

what happened here. We got to be

respectful obviously of all the

circumstances around it. So yes, this is

there's some speculation in this, but in

case you're wondering what my take is on

what potentially happened here based on

the data we see, I think this was a

stall on a failed goaround on a tail

heavy aircraft that is not really good

at handling uh a lot of weight.

>> Knows about this. We'll we'll try a

little advertising and see how it goes.

>> Congratulations, man. You have done so

much. People love you. People look up to

you.

>> Kevin Praath there, financial analyst

and YouTuber. Meet Kevin. Always great

to get your take.