cessna crash in the everglades on Sunday sept 20th, 2009?
Posted By admin on November 13, 2011
Marc S asked:
Cessna with four people took off from Gainesville, after the gator football game, enroute to South florida. Plane crashed in the everglades. The newspaper article said pilot was overcome by smoke from the engine. Question is: why arent the general aviation planes equipped with ventilation fans to fan out any smoke from the cockpit. Some fans would be a good idea. Some air vents to the outside would be good.
Cessna with four people took off from Gainesville, after the gator football game, enroute to South florida. Plane crashed in the everglades. The newspaper article said pilot was overcome by smoke from the engine. Question is: why arent the general aviation planes equipped with ventilation fans to fan out any smoke from the cockpit. Some fans would be a good idea. Some air vents to the outside would be good.
Since some newspaper reporter has solved the cause of this accident I guess the FAA and NTSB can shutter the doors and retire early, huh? If a newspaper did report that as the cause of the accident, it’s irresponsible reporting.
Any smoke that might have been in the aircraft most likely came from something burning in the aircraft, probably from the avionics or other source in the panel. Engine smoke can not enter the cabin, even if it’s an engine fire, this is how aircraft are built.
Most aircraft do have ventilation using outside air, very few have fans because no matter how hot it is, it’s much cooler the higher you go.
Also, if everyone on board was killed, would it be to good to be true that Tim Tebow was on board?
There are vents. Sometimes there is just a bit too much smoke for the vents to handle it all. Cessna high wings are normally equipped with pop out windows as well, a pilot could also elect to pop open one or two doors. Normally you can’t push them open without stalling the aircraft (DAMHIK!) but they will normally pop out an inch or two on their own if you unlatch them.
I think it’s hard to clear out much smoke though, I believe the interior would be a low pressure area and it just doesn’t want to move out in to a higher pressure area.
I highly doubt that is the sole cause of the crash since investigations usually take more than a week or two to complete.
However, there ARE vents. And you can open the windows on a Cessna as well. So fans are not needed since there would be significant ventilation from these sources.
However, if smoke is coming from the engine I believe that the engine may have been having serious problems and/or has failed. That would far more problematic than just simple smoke blocking your view or making it hard to breathe (you can still vent smoke out the windows to help with that).