MICHAEL MISKA OF THE WOLK LAW FIRM WINS IMPORTANT JURISDICTION CASE IN NORTH CAROLINA
Some years back, the United States Supreme Court turned the concept of jurisdiction in this country on its head. Jurisdiction is the power of a Court to hear a case based on either the systematic and continuous activities of a defendant in a State (general jurisdiction), or some specific act that caused harm in a State but coupled with some continuous efforts to avail themselves of the benefits of the State (specific jurisdiction). What the Supreme Court held in a very simple case that was neither briefed nor argued on jurisdiction was that a defendant could only be sued where it was incorporated or where its nerve center was located. Justice Sotomayor railed at the decision as being on the wrong side of history in a famous dissent.
But based on the Supreme Court’s wrong decision courts all over the country threw out cases unless the strict criteria for exercising jurisdiction was met. Our case in North Carolina captioned Cohen v. Continental Motors, Inc. was one of those cases.
Mike Miska created an excellent record that CMI not only purposely availed itself of the benefits of doing business in North Carolina, made money from its activities there, the part that failed was sold there, the accident happened there and the Plaintiff’s decedents lived in North Carolina so the harm from the defendant’s conduct occurred there.
The North Carolina Court of Appeals interpreting the new Supreme Court more relaxed view on the law of jurisdiction found that CMI indeed should be subject to the power of the North Carolina Courts to hear this case and reversed the lower Court’s decision to throw the case out. A copy of the opinion is attached here.
The Wolk Law Firm is known Worldwide for its tenacity in behalf of its clients.
N560AR CITATION 560XLS+ ACCIDENT AT PLAINVIEW CONNECTICUT LOOKS LIKE AN ABORTED TAKEOFF THAT WASN’T SUCCESSFULLY ACCOMPLISHED BECAUSE OF SUDDEN MECHANICAL FAILURE
This terrible accident is speculated the result of mechanical failure. There is no question about that. Cessna Citation 560XLS’s do not crash on takeoff on a clear day with two accomplished pilots aboard without something going terribly wrong. The airplane was not at gross weight, the runway while short was not too short for the takeoff but the balanced field length was about 300 feet longer than the existing runway. What that means is that at gross weight once the aircraft reaches V1, the speed at which engine failure results in continuing the takeoff, the airplane can be stopped on the remaining runway if it is 3900 feet long.
This airplane if the decision was made to abort the takeoff at or before V1, should have been able to stop on the remaining runway but that requires an immediate recognition of engine failure and an immediate decision to abort. All of this assumes engine failure which is very rare in today’s jet aircraft but possible. This aircraft has thrust reversers and perhaps one of them became unlocked or worse started to deploy. Bird strikes during the takeoff can wreak havoc with jet engines and many accidents have occurred due to reactions to that encounter.
Another possibility is a mechanical failure unrelated to the engines, like a control malfunction or jam when the crew attempted to rotate for takeoff which caused the crew to realize that continuing the flight was unsafe and a decision made to abort. That would have been a later made decision and would account for the lack of remaining runway to stop.
Aborting takeoffs is a leading cause of fatal accidents because on short runways a perfect response is required and perfection is usually a judgment call made by Monday morning quarterbacks when an airplane crash occurs.
This accident is eerily similar to another Cessna 560XL in 2019. That aircraft crashed when it couldn’t stop on the runway when the crew aborted the takeoff due to the controls not responding to them pulling back on the control yoke to takeoff. This Citation has a hydraulic actuator to move the leading edge of the horizontal stabilizer nose down when the flaps are extended for takeoff. If the stabilizer did not stop at 2 degrees nose down but went further, the crew wouldn’t know that the nose down stabilizer authority exceeded the ability of the elevators to rotate the nose. That would account for the later than usual abort command and the inability to stop on the remaining runway in both accidents. If The Wolk law Firm investigates this accident, that’s where we would first look, an overtravel of the horizontal stabilizer nose down.
A careful review of recent maintenance will be helpful in ascertaining the cause of this accident together with cockpit voice and data recorder analyses. Someone on this flight deck called out a malfunction and crew coordination would have called out the appropriate checklist if a memory item before impact.
I fly a twin-engine jet single pilot and when taking off on a short runway, I often think about what an abort would look like. No one wants it to look like this but there will be lessons learned at great cost because of the tragic loss of life.
Recently my airplane suffered hangar rash that no one owned up to or even mentioned to me before I discovered it on pre-flight. If someone backed this airplane up into a wall hitting the elevators damage to their function could have occurred that would not be visible on a preflight since the tail is so high.
There is also always the possibility of maintenance gone bad, some part that failed causing a warning or malfunction. Even a false warning like engine fire would be enough for any pilot to consider aborting the takeoff.
Hopefully the CVR or FDR will be undamaged as the tail looks like it was spared the fire destruction thus these components should be able to be read and some light shed on the cause.
For the families, their great loss will be aggravated by the NTSB’s insistence on not releasing the wreckage until it releases its report and probable cause determination. The NTSB will be “assisted” in its investigation by both Cessna and the engine maker so the chances of it coming up with an unbiased conclusion are nil in my experience.
The Wolk Law Firm regularly fights the NTSB in Court to gain access to and preserve critical evidence. We wait for no one.
Our condolences to these families who have lost so much. May the memories of their loved ones be a blessing.
PETERSON/ CHRISTENSEN CESSNA 182 ACCIDENT IN BOUNTIFUL UTAH MAKES NO SENSE ABSENT MECHANICAL MALFUNCTION
Three young beautiful young adults, just beginning their lives are dead in what should have been a no risk simple sightseeing flight and return.
They departed Bountiful Utah at 7 P.M., daylight, to view the church of the Peterson’s marriage by air.
A few minutes later they were dead as the airplane crashed into a mountain that should have been plainly visible.
The winds were very light only about 3 knots, the temperature was a hot 90 degrees and the conditions were visual flight rules.
They were flying an old Cessna 182H, built in 1965, and owned by J. Parker Christensen, a new pilot.
Kallie was an experienced pilot who had just been hired by the airlines to start training in November.
The Cessna 182 is a simple airplane to fly when everything works.
The mountains around Bountiful are high around 9,000 feet or more. There were some showers above the mountains that day.
The airplane has a carbureted engine and given the density altitude (about 8000 feet), temperature and the showers, any loss of power would make the airplane incapable of climbing above the peaks or even making it back to the airport.
A careful examination of the ADS-B data showing altitudes, rates of climb and airspeed demonstrate that the climb rate and airspeed was as expected given the weather, loading and age of the airplane but airspeed slowed in an obvious attempt by the pilot to keep climbing as the aircraft passed about 7200 feet above sea level. That occurred either because this normally aspirated aircraft simply ran out of climb capability or the carburetor simply could not keep up with the engine’s power needs.
This should never have happened. There was enough talent, experience and knowledge in that aircraft.
It was well below its gross weight.
Something else caused this accident.
We hope the families are able to learn what the cause was and The Wolk Law Firm can help.
MARTIN BEERMAN’S TBM 700 MAY HAVE BROKEN UP IN FLIGHT
In a terrible accident well respected physician and internist Dr. Martin Beerman was killed while flying his TBM 700 aircraft. There was no significant weather at the location where radar contact with the aircraft was lost in a flight from Northern Ohio to Cincinnati. The flight proceeded normally until it neared Urbana Ohio when it was lost. The wreckage distribution after what looks to be a loss of control shows that it may have come down in pieces which is indicative of an in-flight break-up.
The TBM series aircraft has been around for many years and is now manufactured by Daher in France.
There have been several loss of control accidents of the Socata built airplanes and most have not been weather related. There have also been accidents where pressurization loss has resulted in pilot incapacitation. Some 27 fatal crashes have occurred and some 47 total accidents involving this model. For a limited production aircraft that is a single pilot, single engine aircraft, that is a lot.
An in-flight break-up which is supported by the radar data is a pilot’s worst nightmare come true because once it occurs there is nothing a pilot can do to avoid a fatal crash. Engine failure may also be a factor but the pilots communication with Air Traffic Control should be telling. If there is none about what’s wrong, that could confirm an in-flight break-up. Some pilots who suffer from loss of control are also too busy trying to regain control and do not talk to Air Traffic Control. The aircraft had been cruising at 20,000 feet where pressurization is vital. It then descended to 11,000 feet where oxygen is not required and then sharply down after that.
The NTSB will take possession of the wreckage an ask for the help of Pratt and Whitney who made the engine and Daher who has legal responsibility for the aircraft’s Type Certificate today. That truly is the fox guarding the hen house but after the wreckage is released, the Wolk Law Firm, if engaged, will find the cause.
Our condolences to Dr. Beerman’s family and his colleagues.
CHALLENGER 600 ACCIDENT AT TRUCKEE-TAHOE APPEARS TO HAVE BEEN A CIRCLING APPROACH
Corporate jets have an amazingly good safety record. It is rare that one crashes because most are flown by two experienced pilots, there are numerous redundant safety systems and the power reserve is such that going around in the event of trouble is almost always an option.
Flight Aware appears to show N605TR, on an RNAV GPS instrument approach to Runway 20 at Truckee Airport. This airport is down in a valley surrounded by very high mountains. Runway 20 is the shorter of the two runways only about 4600 feet long vs. Runway 11 which is 7000 feet.
The winds had switched direction so they were from the East during the approach which would create a quartering tailwind during the approach and landing had the landing been on runway 20.
It appears from the data that the crew elected to circle to land to runway 11, the much longer runway and into the wind which therein lies the problem.
There is a reason airlines no longer fly circling approaches, they are dangerous. The airplane is in landing configuration, in high terrain the visual cues are misleading and a mistake can be fatal.
Instrument approaches, and there was one for Runway 11, end right at or very close to the end of a runway, are usually straight in and require virtually no change in aircraft configuration, speed or descent rate.
That’s why they are flown in what is known as a stabilized approach. On speed, fully configured for landing, normal descent rate. Making a circling approach changes all of that and increases the risks associated with landing especially at a hot, high and mountainous airport like this one. Adverse weather otherwise does not appear to be a factor.
Both approaches are not standard descent rates, both approaches are in mountainous terrain, both can be challenging from the wind direction, suddenly changing, but straight in is way better and way safer.
This is not to say that this accident was caused by the foregoing, but this is what the data shows and this airplane crashed in what appears like a circling approach to the longer runway. A recording of ATC communications on this approach is attached.
Dale Snodgrass, one of the worlds most accomplished pilots perished in the crash of his single engine aircraft.
Those of us who knew him and flew with him knew ‘Snort” as a magnificent leader, selfless teacher, and fearless pilot.
His accomplishments as a Naval Aviator are legend. He could make an F-14 talk.
I had the privilege of flying with Snort in the CAT Flight for eleven years.
He knew more about war fighting from the air than anyone I ever knew.
He was revered amongst all of us who had the opportunity to fly with him and learn from him.
This accident, of all of them, has impacted me the worst. Dale Snodgrass did not belong among the dead from airplane crashes.
For every man and woman there is that time when no time is expected to follow. Snort was so large, so capable, so magical, such a moment was just never expected.
This is the third of the CAT Flight members who have died and while each passing has been painful this one is so unexpected, so inexplicable, the pain is real but different.
To his lovely family, and the legacy that I hope comforts them, my sincerest condolences and the wish of all CAT Flight brethren that they are able to soon cope with the magnitude of this loss.
ANOTHER CESSNA 421 GOES DOWN CLEARLY FROM ENGINE FAILURE ON TAKEOFF KILLING 2
The Cessna 421 cabin class twin engine airplane was the queen of Cessna’s attempt to corner the cabin class piston powered twin market in the 1970’s. It was big and was powered by two of the worst engines in modern piston engine aircraft history, the Continental GTSIO-520.
The G stands for geared, the TS turbo-supercharged, the I injected, the O opposed and the 520, the number of cubic inches of displacement. Virtually everything about this engine was troublesome.
The supercharging ruined cylinders that regularly failed before their overhaul time, the gearing made the cabin quieter but was never up to the job of dealing with all the power demanded of the engine. Engine failures occurred constantly especially on takeoff when the power demand was highest.
Worse the airplane’s exhaust system was made first of stainless steel which is brittle and failed repeatedly causing fires and later Inconel parts which should have resulted in better reliability also were found deficient.
All of the above would have been bad enough but if there were an engine failure especially on takeoff the airplane was a handful to control. It flew sideways and unless airspeed was adequate to avoid the dreaded VMC, the airplane would suddenly roll into the failed engine at astonishingly high-speed dooming all aboard.
Because of these well known and documented inadequacies Cessna 421s became cheap to buy though expensive to maintain properly, very expensive!
In Monterey California, a Cessna 421 departed on a mercy flight and flew into overcast conditions.
Suddenly the aircraft bean turning to the right and ultimately descended, crashed and caught fire. Both the pilot and her passenger were killed. While a turning flight after entering an overcast can be caused by lots of things, failure of the right engine is most likely given the good credentials of the pilot and the history of engine failure in this model.
Careful analysis of the engine wreckage is important here but initially the propellers will tell a lot. When loss of engine power occurs, one propeller is bent differently than the other, a tell-tale sign that a failure of the turbocharger, exhaust components, cylinders or even a crankshaft may be the real culprit.
While the airplane is supposed to be able to climb on one engine, in reality on takeoff that rarely if ever is successful because the single engine climb rate and airspeed was determined in a perfect airplane, flown by a test pilot under ideal conditions who knew the failure was going to be simulated. That isn’t reality.
Engine specialists will be needed to examine these engines in detail but no worries the cause of this crash is mechanical and will be found by lawyers like the Wolk Law Firm. We always do.
Sadly, the pilot, an experienced and well thought of woman Mary Ellen Carlin and her passenger Alice Emig, whom she offered to fly to Sacramento on a mercy flight both perished. Their loss is mourned.
MOONEY M20J GOES DOWN RIGHT AFTER TAKEOFF IN DINSMORE CA. KILLING 4
The Wolk Law Firm recently litigated a takeoff crash of a Mooney M20J in Kansas City Mo.
In that instance two people were killed when the engine lost power intermittently and finally control was lost and it crashed.
The initial NTSB analysis was that water in the fuel caused the engine interruption and it doubled down on the fiction that a rainstorm the night before departure caused water to flood into the fuel tanks that the pilot allegedly did not check after refueling.
It turned out that not only was there a drought and no such rainstorm (that occurred a year later) but the fuel caps on the tanks did not leak and the pilot was seen on surveillance video checking for water.
The cause of the crash, found by The Wolk Law Firm was a failed magneto that had been overhauled some 4.7 flight hours before. A jury trial resulted in a 9-million-dollar verdict for the plaintiffs.
The magneto in Mooney aircraft is know as a single drive dual mag, in other words a single drive from the engine turns both magnetos in one housing which makes the term “redundant” a euphemism for disaster. The single drive dual mag is not redundant and has been responsible for many accidents and incidents in Mooneys and all other aircraft that use them.
The other recurrent issue in Mooneys is the difficulty in draining water out of the fuel tanks. The fuel drains are raised from the bottom of the fuel tank and care must be exercised to drain enough fuel to get all the water out.
The fact that this airplane flew four hours that day without problems means that likely a mechanical failure in the engine such as the magneto may have caused this crash.
Careful investigation by the Wolk Law Firm is vital to determining the cause of airplane crashes especially when post-crash fires damages or destroys much of the evidence. That is what we do.
We are especially sad that four lives were lost in this crash and wish the families of Henry Punt, Jacquie Ann Fig, Steve Sanz and Kenneth Malinowski our fervent wishes for peace in the face of this tragic loss.
New acronyms from the FAA. Fresh from being caught red-handed in the Boeing 737 MAX scandal that killed 346 people, the FAA, ever the agency of Government with no clue about aviation safety, has a new Acronym for pilots who have used the previous terminology for a century.
Instead of referring to contaminated runways as “Braking Action Good, Fair, Poor or Nil”, now the FAA has introduced a series of numbers that pilots must memorize and ignore the obvious runway contamination instead.
So, for example yesterday I landed at Salina Kansas, where even Dorothy refuses to live anymore, and the runway condition was listed as “333”. The ATIS said patchy hard packed snow on the runway which meant to me that braking action was likely Good/Fair on this 12,000 foot, grooved, military spec. runway.
But such a clearly understandable description is all of a sudden unsuitable for the FAA anymore.
Out of a range of 0-6, with 6 being hunky dory, “333” is meaningless and a wholly unnecessary addition to the Lexicon of confusing aviation acronyms that thanks to the FAA, which has too little to do when they are ignoring critical certification responsibilities, will be a substitute for the plain language we are all used to using. “333” means that on each third of the runway the braking action is medium. So instead of saying braking action is medium, the controller says “333”. What if the controller says braking action is 00? We know that 00 is no ceiling and no visibility and has nothing to do with braking action. How many pilots will confuse the number of zeros with something that has nothing to do with braking action and think the airport is below landing minima?
For example, before this change if the controller or ATIS said “braking action is nil”, that meant it sucks, and you should go somewhere else. If ATIS, or the controller said “braking action is good”, that meant land and be happy you can likely fly again another day. Now, if the braking action is reported “nil” or now “0” the runway must be closed until it’s better than nil. Great but that only applies to airports that the FAA has jurisdiction over.
The attached chart is part of the Safety Alert for Operators. The Assessment criteria are what the FAA used to figure out the numbers we must now know and the Control/Braking Assessment Criteria is what the numbers mean in plain language. So why not use the plain language? That would be too easy and safer!
But alas nothing will change and after a few planes run off the end of a runway because the pilot mistook “333” for whatever today’s FAA interpretation is someone might just use the old descriptions again instead. I will use the ATIS description as my primary guide because I know that if the runway is a sheet of ice, another destination is preferable and that’s a decision I make before departure not while on the approach.
I guess we’ll just have to “Line up and wait” for the FAA to change its mind, if any.
The Barnes TBM crash has bizarre twists. The crash of prominent New York City Lawyer Stephen Barnes bears some very unusual twists as the NTSB decides not even to travel to the scene to commence its investigation.
While the NTSB blames COVID-19 for its decision not to travel, it apparently ignored CDC guidelines about how masks and washing hands will protect us all from that influenza.
That leaves this investigation in the hands of the Plaintiffs’ lawyers, which is how most airplane accidents are resolved after investigation anyway.
The TBM is a pressurized single-engine turbine aircraft. It was flying along at 28,000 feet when communications with Boston Center were mysteriously lost. This makes no sense since once on the frequency there should have been no interruption. The procedure is to go back to the last frequency assigned if radio contact is lost or to guard 121.5, the emergency frequency if that doesn’t work.
The radar track shows the aircraft descending at a prodigious rate as the pilot was instructed to descend and maintain 8000 feet. In fact, just as it began its descent the airplane’s speed was 300 knots, 140 knots higher than its maneuvering speed (the speed at which full control inputs will stall the airplane before it breaks). The speed in the descent actually exceeded 440 knots, which in my experience means it broke up in the air.
The pilot asked for radar vectors to intercept the Instrument Landing System but was instructed to fly directly to the airport where he would overfly and be vectored to the ILS from the other side.
Instead, the aircraft flew in a more Northerly heading and not to the airport. When queried about it by Approach Control there was no response from the pilot.
The aircraft descended at a ground speed (radar shows only speed across the ground) of 440 knots more than 280 knots above the turbulence penetration speed of the TBM and descended below the assigned altitude until it crashed.
The following comes to mind:
1. Assuming the pilot was in good health was he impaired due to loss of pressurization as others have in the TBM?
2. At 28,000 feet, useful consciousness is between 2.5 to 3 minutes and perhaps the loss of pressurization put the pilot to “sleep” for a time.
3. Regaining usefulness is immediate as one descends and the pilot, had he been impaired by a pressurization loss, should have been able to fly as he got lower.
4. The increase in speed means either the airplane broke up on the way down or the engine was still in cruise power as the airplane descended.
5. The pilot had only flown this aircraft 8 hours in the prior three months.
6. It is unknown the recency of the pilot’s training or total flying experience.
7. A failure of the flight control system is possible such that the radios could have gone dark, the autopilot could have failed and other features to protect the pilot and the aircraft could likewise have failed, but when asked by Buffalo Approach, the pilot answered that everything was ok.
8. There is no cockpit voice recorder onboard this model but there are computer chips that may be readable that might disclose whether there were any of the failures that could cause loss of control.
9. A pressurization loss such that the pilot became impaired is a very strong consideration and a careful examination of that system is vital as a starting point in this investigation.
10. The aircraft appears to have broken up in or right before the descent.
11. The NTSB will dawdle and not release the wreckage for months and maybe years to keep Plaintiffs from finding out the cause until it issues its own report which will no doubt be written by parties it invites to the investigation, the manufacturer of the aircraft, and the engine.
12. They will be more concerned with their legal liability than serving aviation safety.
13. A review of maintenance records will thus be an important tool in preliminarily helping those who represent the victims in investigating the cause.
14. It is therefore vital that when the FAA or NTSB attempt to muscle the victims’ families and colleagues into giving up these records, that copies be made first and kept for counsel who represent the victims.
Only the most experienced air crash litigators should be engaged to work this case.
