Richard McSpadden, who no doubt you’ll have all seen presenting the excellent Air Safety Institute YouTube channel, has been involved in the crash of a C177RG.
A reminder that no matter how much experience you have, how good of a pilot we think we might be, this could happen to anybody. Sometimes it can just be purely bad luck. Lake Placid has trees and houses on both sides of the runway.
RIP Richard, blue skies.
Not much info at ASN…
Piecing it together from news reports
The plane was sideways, down near the bottom of an embankment at the end of the runway, visible from Recycle Circle Road.
Places it here which is corroborated by the manmade rubble pile in the background (from the earthworks)
Wind from nearest METAR was from the N (350 degrees) at 5 MPH (4 knots; 2.1 m/s)
The airplane attempted to return to the airport but failed to make the runway.
So they took off Runway 32 and turned back, a came up short by 150m. Sad. Not the kindest undershoot and, looking at Google Maps, nowhere else to go
Very sad.
Proof, if that was needed, that it can happen to the best of us. RIP.
I wonder what altitude they had reached before attempting to turn back.
It seems strange to me from someone so steeped in safety that they should even attempt to do so unless they were above 500’ AGL.
The wreckage off Lake Placid airport :
As I read, Richard McSpadden was not the one flying, he was on the right side; still though he might have been instructing with his C177 the pilot sitting on the left.
Amazing you spend all these years to promote air safety …
https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/articles-by-author/richard-mcspadden
https://www.youtube.com/@AirSafetyInstitute/videos
… and end up in a very accident you were trying to teach people how to avoid … who knows why … we shall learn in a few months I guess.
https://youtu.be/bZyacn7gBE0?si=1HYZluzWJNSFAWxX
Aerial photo shoot with another aircraft… returning to land on opposite runway from take off …
“the impossible turn”
