Real Pilot Story: Engine Failure in IMC

my name is Robert Shapiro I'm 27 years old been flying for five-and-a-half years currently I am a commercial helicopter pilot CFI cfw I in helicopters and private instrument-rated in airplane single-engine land it was a good IFR day I realized this would be a great day to go up and practice some instrument approaches in actual instrument conditions the temperatures were warm enough I didn't have to worry about freezing levels the clouds were high enough that I knew I would at least be able to break out on an approach but they were low enough that I could shoot the entire approach at least past the final approach fix so I preflighted the aircraft was a 2005 Cessna 172 with g1000 avionics I departed Martin State Airport on an IFR flight plan with the intent of shooting an approach at Carroll Frederick Martinsburg and then three at Martin State you right about reaching 3,700 feet I I noticed a horrible shake in the aircraft and at first I thought it was just a faulty mag but the shake got worse and then the power dropped off obviously did all my normal checks made sure the mixture was in full at the throttle scroll that I was in both mags and it was on both tanks and when I realized that I was on all of them that's when I realized this was a real emergency Victor I emergency secure Victor go ahead secure Victor I need sectors to final it may be kind of hard to tell by these my voice on the audio recording from air traffic control but I honestly thought that I was not going to see the ground alive I couldn't hold altitude I was descending in about one to two hundred feet per minute it was only pushing about 1,800 rpm at that time it was still running just shaking very violently November 60 or Victor's see the typeform urgencies and souls on board please one on board and I'm getting a horrible shake I'm a sixer of the Roger maintain 3000 affable and you still want to stick with the GPS 5 correct correct clear Victor after a few minutes of flying towards the final approach fix for runway 5 into Frederick the controller told me that it's VFR at Gaithersburg and offered the option to go there number 6 here Victor is bf are Gaithersburg if you want to try it at 7 call it 1-0 miles south east your position if you want to continue southbound Victor now the the difference in this case between VFR and ifr was actually only about a hundred feet and so it really would have been negligible but he said VFR and I thought let's go there so I started my turn towards Gaithersburg which is about 10 miles south still descending at this point at about one to two hundred feet per minute I tried to pitch for best glide but every time I pulled back on the yoke it sounded like the engine was going to completely quit as I continued south towards Gaithersburg I think Potomac approach realized I wasn't going to make it all the way there what's the cure Victor Lowe outfit alert check out to do immediately MVA in your area 2500 a lot able to maintain quickly record number six dear Victor Davis field is won 4-0 heading in seven point four three miles from the current position how long runway two thousand feet asphalt I'm going to get work at the time I was a straight in for a runway that was four thousand feet at Gaithersburg not having not had that much experience in airplanes I didn't want to try to make a no go around powered off approach and landing into a 2,000 foot runway especially not knowing when exactly I was going to pop out of the clouds having the MFD on my right and looking at my other options I'd strongly considered landing on i-70 or i-270 but decided against that option mainly because I was concerned about signs and power lines going over the highway as I continued to descend they made another attempt at that trying to get me to go to Davis I'm sick Sarah Vicki a Davis field is about three miles southeast you position you've heard on one try that right about the time they made that suggestion I received several oil alarms in my headphones and at that time I I knew my oil was gone and thought that my engine was just going to fall off the aircraft so I decided to go towards Davis number six Pierre Victor Davis fields down twelve o'clock three-mile Rogers a clear Victor how low can I get here home six the Arabic the NBA is 2500 and the altitude below your position is reporting 943 feet they lost radar contact with me at about 1100 feet msl a minute or two later I popped out of the clouds didn't have the airport in sight but I could least see the ground below me and it was very low visibility and didn't actually see it until I was right over the numbers for runway eight and realized that there was no way I was going to be able to drop another five hundred feet and still make the runway so I broke off into an immediate left downwind for runway 26 in hindsight I turned base way too early but part of that decision was the fact that I saw a building and power lines on the approach end into runway two six and didn't want to land into either of them but I was still 90 knots and about 400 feet off the deck so I immediately dumped my flaps pulled back on the yoke and pull back on the throttle which at that point or still giving me a little power I touched down at about a thousand feet down the runway but every time I would pull back on the yoke to try to slow down I would bounce off the runway and really just skidded down the last thousand feet I went off the runway and realized this was going to be a crash luckily I was able to steer the aircraft down a small embankment and into a rather thick bushy area which eventually brought the aircraft to a stop luckily I made it down with with no injuries and with only a few scratches on the aircraft the next thing I did was called Potomac approach on the phone and let them know that I made it down safely told hi Scott one on sixteen victor happy needed on a ground a life without the one you just did the measurement yes sir number one one six zero Victor I for cancellations received thank you my job I did a walk around to see what the damage was on the aircraft when I went around the right side of the aircraft and saw oil spewed across the cowling I checked the dipstick and it was reading zero so when the engine was pulled out it was still under warranty from an overhaul that just occurred less than 200 hours before when the shop received the engine they found that several push-pull rods were bent in half as a result of stuck valves the whole situation was a complete shock to me my biggest concern through all of my training since starting to pursue my instrument rating was an electrical failure or vacuum pump failure when I used to fly steam gauges I never thought a concern while flying IMC would be an engine failure I always thought it would be something else one of the other lessons that I would take for the future was that when you're not getting the information that you need from air traffic control requested again make sure they know what you're asking for I think that would have resolved a lot of anxiety that I was having a - Potomac approached several times how high the ground is below me but I think what they understood me to mean is what is the weather in this area and there was a lot of confusion if I could go through the situation again I would have continued towards Frederick now from where I was positioned ideally I would have been a straight-in for runway 3-0 but unfortunately there aren't any instrument approaches into runway 3-0 in this situation had I continued West to set up for final into runway five it would have been a little bit out of the way and I would have had to take several turns before being established on final but I think the outcome would have been a little better the biggest thing I can stress is that when you're experiencing a problem declare the emergency get some help and get a lot of it as soon as you can and the second thing although cliche it's to remain calm at the end of the day if I were to have panicked it would have only made the situation worse

Channel: Air Safety Institute

Views: 312,545

Rating: 4.8981819 out of 5

Keywords: engine, failure, imc, pilot, instrument approaches, asi, rps, aopa, safety, institute, ifr, out, approach, instrument, emergency, final, vectors, altitude, vfr, airplane, aircraft, radar, maryland, potomac, forced, landing

Id: Md63jpyEnQU

Length: 9min 14sec (554 seconds)

Published: Fri Nov 18 2011