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Fossett's Plane Found
Posted by
timothy
on Thu Oct 02, 2008 02:54 PM
from the last-word dept.
from the last-word dept.
otter42 writes "Sadly, it looks as if all those crazies claiming Steve Fossett was still alive were wrong after all. The NY Times has the confirmation that wreckage of Fossett's Bellanca Citabria was found. Now it's up to the NTSB to tell us why this happened, although, statistically, dollars to donuts it was engine/fuel-related."
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Hikers May Have Found Fossett Items 219 comments
An Anonymous reader writes "CNN is reporting 'A weathered sweat shirt, cash and a pilot license with Fossett's name were found Tuesday near Mammoth Lakes, police Chief Randy Schienle said.' The license did not have a photo. '"We're not certain that it belongs to Steve Fossett, but it certainly has his name on the ID," Schienle said.'"
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Science: Steve Fossett's Unfinished Project 97 comments
MazzThePianoman writes "Steve Fossett left behind a secret vessel project called the Deep Flight Challenger. Fossett was funding the development of a winged submersible being designed by Hawkes Ocean Technologies in California. The intent was for the vehicle to be capable of travel to the very bottom of the ocean — the Mariana Trench, more than 11,000 meters beneath the surface. 'It would have dramatically, dramatically opened the oceans for exploration. It would have been a game changer,' said Graham Hawkes, the designer. Testing had been completed at Department of Defense facilities. Field testing was only four weeks away when Fossett's untimely death, a year ago, put the project on hold." Hawkes Ocean Technologies owns the design, but the vehicle itself is owned by Fossett's estate.
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Bones Found Near Crash Site Confirmed Fossett's 129 comments
Trip6 writes "Bones found near the wreckage of the plane flown by Steve Fossett when he disappeared last fall have been confirmed to be Fossett's by DNA analysis. The NTSB is still investigating the crash. Fossett may have been searching for a place to break the land speed record, his next quest."
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Technology: NTSB Says a Downdraft Killed Steve Fossett 101 comments
jd writes "The National Transportation Safety Board has now released the text of its examination (full narrative available) into the crash of Steve Fossett's aircraft on Sept 3rd, 2007. It concludes that downdrafts were the likely cause of the crash, dragging the plane into the mountain with such force that, even at full power, it would have been impossible to escape the collision. Pilots experienced in the area report that those winds can rip the wings off aircraft; and Mark Twain remarked that they could roll up a tin house 'like sheet music.' One must wonder why such a skilled aviator was taking a gamble with such hostile conditions, given that he was looking for a flat stretch of land to race cars on, but that is one mystery we shall probably never know the answer to."
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He's still kicking! (Score:4, Funny)
Re:He's still kicking! (Score:5, Funny)
I think it's pretty obvious what happened here: Fossett was teleported out of his plane by the crew of a Starship from the future that used the "slingshot around the Sun" technique to travel back through time in order to retrieve him. They then took him back to their time in order to speak with an alien race that was accidentally destroying the Earth in its attempt to communicate with any daredevil billionaires that might be on the planet. Unfortunately for them, the Earth no longer used money, so there were no billionaires available, hence the need to fetch Fossett.
The evidence points so clearly to this scenario that there must be some sort of vast conspiracy covering it up, perhaps to avoid the embarrassment that would result from revealing that two of the Starship's crew members were able to infiltrate a nuclear wessel undetected.
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Re:He's still kicking! (Score:5, Informative)
I've flown a Citabria. It's designed for aerobatics (the name is "airbatic" spelled backwards, even) and, at least in the plane I flew, the "seat" is actually a sling that holds your parachute. There was no way to sit in the thing unless you were wearing one.
Of course, it may be possible to buy a version of the airplane with normal seats--epecially if you're a billionaire, as Fossett was--but I never saw one myself.
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Re:Fuel / Engine Related? (Score:5, Funny)
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Or weather, or health related (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Or weather, or health related (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes being a sail plane pilot is good experience if your engine quits. But have you ever flown a Citaboria? I have. Here is how you land one: The plane has no "flaps" so don't worry about those. While at pattern altitude (about 1,000 feet above ground) when you are on down wind abeam of the numbers. Put the engine to down to idle. Make two left turns and the plane will land right on the number. basically you loose that 1,000 feet "way fast" the Citaboria glides like a rock. You really have to keep the nose down or you run out of airspeed. By comparison any two seat trainer flys like a sailplane
If the engine quits that plane is going to land within only a couple miles at best. That said there was a road within walking distance of the crash site. Any reasonable pilot still in control of the aircraft would have at least attempted to aim for a clear area. I don't think he was in control when it hit the ground.
My gues is the caue was either a mechanical, non engine failure of the structure or control system or a medical problem.
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I think the cliff he hit was the problem (Score:5, Informative)
At that high an altitude, if you get clouds/ fog, you can run into a mountain at 10,000 feet, even if you're a good pilot ( who forgot to check his map).
NTSB said that the wreckage looked like high velocity impact, with little chance of survival.
Dollars to Donuts I say... (Score:5, Funny)
Now it's up to the NTSB to tell us why this happened, although, statistically, dollars to donuts it was engine/fuel-related.
Dollars to donuts the CRASH was gravity related...the engine/fuel is just a side problem!
Re:Dollars to Donuts I say... (Score:5, Funny)
Exactly. Gravity is just an unproven theory. Intelligent Falling [theonion.com] is clearly to blame.
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Wrong about Fossett, wrong about Reiser... (Score:5, Funny)
What are the random internet nutcases right about anymore?
Head on collision (Score:5, Informative)
They're saying that the damage looks like he flew straight into the side of the mountain and that it was extremely unlikely that it was a survivable impact.
http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/10/02/steve.fossett.search/index.html [cnn.com]
My experience that day (Score:5, Interesting)
The day Steve Fossett was lost I was driving from San Francisco
to Las Vegas by way of Barstow. Just after Barstow we entered one of those huge desert storm systems, a line of thunderheads
stretching North and South, and all of a sudden it rained so hard
and the wind blew so hard that it was hard controlling the car,
even when we slowed to 20 MPH. Soon after we left the storm, I
heard about the disappearance of Steve Fossett on the radio.
I have been convinced ever since that moment that that storm
killed him. I cannot see how a light aircraft could have flown
through it, and yet it came up pretty suddenly. Looking at the
map, I might still be right.
Re:My experience that day (Score:5, Informative)
Barstow is 256 miles [google.com] from Mammoth Lakes. Granted, that's by car, but it's a fairly straight-shot route.
That's like saying a thunderstorm in New York City killed someone in Washington DC
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Weather History (Score:5, Informative)
Mammoth Lakes, CA
Week of Sept 2, 2007
No precipitation.
http://www.wunderground.com/history/airport/KMMH/2007/9/3/WeeklyHistory.html [wunderground.com]
See the radar loop from that date by using the link in the Radar Archive box near the bottom-right of this page:
http://www.wunderground.com/radar/radblast.asp?ID=HNX®ion=c1&lat=37.65124893&lon=-118.98217010&label=Mammoth%20Lakes%2C%20CA [wunderground.com]
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The area (Score:5, Informative)
As mentioned in another post, as best as I can tell from the news articles, this [gass.ca] is a Google Earth view of the area he went down. The Minaret Lake area is where the hiker found his ID and money, and the Minaret Peak is near where his plane hit.
So, how close were we? (Score:5, Interesting)
I, like many of us, participated in that mechanical turk thing a few days after the crash to try to find his airplane in satellite photos. Did we cover that area? I kind of hope not.
1 foot = 3.04 metres? (Score:5, Funny)
Mammoth Lakes is about 10,000 feet, or 30,400 meters, above sea level, and snow makes already difficult terrain largely impassable and could bury plane wreckage.
Re:Check your own logic before calling others craz (Score:5, Insightful)
that someone else found the crash site and (for reasons unexplained) took his ID and a grand in cash from it, then hid them where the hiker later found them
My guess would be that "someone" would have been something like a raccoon or a buzzard.
Parent
Re:Check your own logic before calling others craz (Score:5, Funny)
My guess would be that "someone" would have been something like a raccoon or a buzzard.
That certainly explains why when I'm killing rats and spiders they keep dropping gold and broadswords.
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Re:Check your own logic before calling others craz (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:Occam's razor... (Score:5, Funny)
I think it is becoming clearer that Fossett survived the crash, and was shortly adopted by a bear, and is currently living in a cave, having forgotten his human status due to traumatic brain injury.
*sigh* More of this? You he's-alive-and-adopted-by-bears people are crazy nutjobs. It's the he's-alive-and-adopted-by-wolves people who have their fingers on the pulse of truth. Wake up!
Parent
Re:Too early for amature guesses. (Score:5, Informative)
I don't know what it is but the end result looks like controlled flight into the ground.
Yeah, I don't get the "statistically, dollars to donuts it was engine/fuel-related", because statistically, CFIT is a much more common cause of air accidents than engine or fuel problems. Fuel problems are actually one of the *least* likely causes, be it contamination, starvation or exhaustion.
There were reportedly clouds at around the altitude he'd have been flying at that day obscuring mountain peaks like this one. I think the most likely cause at this point is he was flying in a cloud and ran into the mountain. It happens, even to airliner pilots with sophisticated ground proximity warning systems. General aviation pilots usually have either no such equipment, or rudimentary ground avoidance equipment. I'm not sure what, if anything, his plane would have been equipped with, but even if it had such equipment, it wouldn't necessarily have been enough to prevent a CFIT accident.
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Re:That's really a shame. (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:That's really a shame. (Score:5, Informative)
He pushed the envelope in sailing and flying, setting more than 100 records. He was also active with the Boy Scouts at the national level, even heading up the National Eagle Scout Association. He set the bar very high, and inspired thousands, maybe millions. His money was incidental, though it helped him to set those records. It's just the kind of person he was. That's why so many people care about it.
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Remains were found in the wreckage. (Score:5, Informative)
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