Shock! Horror! Door pops open!

Gig 601XL Builder wrote:

Here's my bet... The door came unlatched. the 2 cops sitting in the back
seat freaked and pushed someone into the yokes while they were trying to
close the door.

No takers here. Bet you're right.

George Patterson
There's plenty of room for all of God's creatures. Right next to the
mashed potatoes.

I don't want to seem to be insensitive to it or something but
honestly this sounds to me like another very minor news
piece over-dramatazied by attentioned-starved media.

Well, quite. That was the point I was making........

haha ... I suspected as much.

good point then!

--
Marco Rispoli - NJ, USA / PP-ASEL
My on-line aviation community - http://www.thepilotlounge.com

"Mike Granby" wrote in message
ups.com...

I don't want to seem to be insensitive to it or something but
honestly this sounds to me like another very minor news
piece over-dramatazied by attentioned-starved media.

Well, quite. That was the point I was making........

On Wed, 13 Apr 2005 08:52:22 -0700, "Bob Gardner"
wrote:

If the door of an Aztec pops open, it will only open about 4-6 inches and
will kind of oscillate back and forth between those extremes. Causes some
tail feather buffeting. Anyone trying to pull the door shut is fighting air
pressure and wasting his or her time.

Bob Gardner


That's what I wondered. They probably didn't realise they couldn't
close the door in flight, and kept trying. They'd likely be unhappy
to be told that they could have just sat there doing nothing and the
flight wouldn't have changed a bit.

Corky Scott

Bob Gardner Apr 13, 8:52 am show options

Newsgroups: rec.aviation.piloting
From: "Bob Gardner" - Find messages by this author

Date: Wed, 13 Apr 2005 08:52:22 -0700
Local: Wed,Apr 13 2005 8:52 am
Subject: Shock! Horror! Door pops open!
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If the door of an Aztec pops open, it will only open about 4-6 inches
and
will kind of oscillate back and forth between those extremes
************************************************** ****************************8

Same on the Apache when the CFI in the right seat apparently couldn't
close a door reliably... Non event - and I was in no hurry to land as
he was the one getting his butt frozen (that's called 'behavior
modification')...
Since then however, I let no one close the cabin door but me...
Actually ticked off one high time, ace pilot (in his own mind) when he
slammed and locked the door against my clear instruction that I would
close the door, I reached over and opened the door then re-closed it
myself... He never asked to fly again... ah well....

Denny

In article 3oc7e.19394$1p4.12250@trndny06,
George Patterson wrote:

Mike Granby wrote:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/4439341.stm

And the headline from the Daily Mail link on that site is "New Zealand PM
cheats
death in air drama - 4 hrs ago" -- all because the door on an Aztec popped
open
in flight? Give me a break!

George Patterson
There's plenty of room for all of God's creatures. Right next to the
mashed potatoes.


There are GA aircraft whose doors will latch closed? Not sure I've ever
seen one...

--
Take out the airplane for reply

Granted it's not normally a big deal to have a Piper door unlatch, my
IFR instructor failed to close it properly once. It was about 15
degrees F and we were IMC when it popped open. Strong, very cold gale
through the cockpit, instruments began to fog over, and by the time we
found a place to land we were both shaking with the cold. Since then
I've always briefed passengers not to freak out if it happens.

"Wallace Berry" wrote in message
...
There are GA aircraft whose doors will latch closed? Not sure I've ever
seen one...

Lake amphibs (LA-180, EP, Buccaneer, Renegade), for example. The doors are
hinged on a forward-facing surface, and the pressure on the door from the
slipstream is far greater in the closing direction than any minimal opening
force caused by pressure differential.

Pretty much anything with a sliding canopy (Grumman Tiger/Cheetah, Ercoupe,
Thorpe T-18, etc), of course. Without a hinge, there's no problem at all.

Anything with a canopy that opens forward, like the Diamond DA40 or Lancair
360, probably would not have any trouble either.

In fact, there's such a wide variety of cabin door designs, that I think
it's entirely possible that there are more designs that CAN be closed in
flight than that can't. Of course, the most popular designs all have that
problem, and so might outnumber the others in terms of actual numbers of
aircraft. But it's certainly not hard to find an airplane whose doors can
be closed and latched in flight.

Heck, for that matter...even those designs that "can't" be closed actually
can, given the right airspeed and airplane attitude. I probably wouldn't
bother trying, unless it was REALLY cold and I was a long way from landing.
But there's often a way.

Pete

"Gig 601XL Builder" wr.giacona@coxDOTnet wrote in message
news:kea7e.37$nh1.2@okepread03...
Here's my bet... The door came unlatched. the 2 cops sitting in the back
seat freaked and pushed someone into the yokes while they were trying to
close the door.

Might not have even required a push on the yoke. The dive might not have
been nearly as dramatic as the terrified passenger(s) describe (interesting
that the reports don't include any quotes from the pilot(s)), and a couple
of people rushing forward would be enough to adjust the trim to a descent.

I've had trim trouble just from a rear seat passenger reclining his seat.
An actual movement of two people within the cabin would cause a significant
change in pitch, in a small airplane like the one in this incident.

Whatever the cause, it's pretty clear that the door popping open was
certainly not a direct cause of the descent. Only panic could have caused
that. On whose part, we may never know.

Pete

During my pilot training, one day were were in the pattern when my
instructor grabbed the yoke, pulled us into a quasi-unusual attitude,
and popped the door open (Piper Cherokee) and held it as far open as he
could against the wind. "You've just had a mid-air!" he yelled over
the noise. I corrected the attitude of the plane and began a short
approach to the runway. He was explaining to me that 'see, the plane
doesn't fall out of the sky. It's loud, but you can still fly
safely-oh CRAP!' I look over, and he's looking back out the door over
his shoulder. I'm still flying the plane, but I ask calmly what
happened. He starts laughing, and it turns out that the wind in cabin
grabbed the new instrument training hood that he had purchased the day
earlier (to replace a cracked on) and sucked it out the door.

I landed without incident (except for the whole shaking cabin and
missing hood) but it was a complete non-event.

When I try to understand why people panic about stuff like this, I
remember that they see movies like 'The Aviator' that has airplanes
turning into flaming meteors that drop out of the sky when they run out
of fuel, so assuming that an open door is going to do the same thing
isn't that much of a stretch.

It's also possible that this was the first time some of the passengers
on that plane had flown in something smaller then a 737, and they were
ALREADY nervous.