When my buddy, Ernie, and I decided that we would upgrade our aeronautical experience from the variety of fixed-gear aircraft we had been flying to something more complex, we were in luck. A 1947 Navion A was for sale at Teterboro Airport in New Jersey at a very affordable price. It may not have been a beauty queen, and its faded white paint with blue trim showed its age, but it stood high and proud as all Navions do and proved kind and forgiving to its new owners. We flew off the 10 hours required by the insurance company, which included adapting to the single hand-brake system (since there are no foot brakes on the Navion) and gear-retraction procedures. Having spent so much time in simple aircraft, we also had to adjust to coordinating the propeller control with the manifold pressure and tachometer gauges.
Each weekend when the weather cooperated we visited every fly-in or airport within our range. Our logbooks read like a diary of adventure of annual trips south to escape the cold dreariness of the Northeast, including one detour to the Bahamas, stopping at Bimini, Andros Island, and Nassau. And then there were the cross-country flights past the carved faces of our presidents on Mount Rushmore, and the visit to New Mexico to see the memorable depths of the Carlsbad Caverns and the white sands of Alamogordo. We skimmed the entire length of the rugged clefts and valleys that make up the Grand Canyon and marveled at nature's rendering of Monument Valley and the Painted Desert. Together we circumnavigated the continental United States and much of southern Canada.
However, age and time exacted their toll on our Navion, and its 205-horsepower engine was overhauled and a new paint design applied. We continued to enjoy its reliable performance, which was only interrupted during some of the cold-weather days when a tiring battery failed to kick the prop over.
Here the story takes a vindictive turn. It was three days after my daughter's wedding. I had brought the Navion from our home base at Essex County Airport in Caldwell, New Jersey, to Morristown (New Jersey) Municipal Airport for some radio work, and it was ready to pick up. My wife and father-in-law drove me to Morristown, where the plane sat on the ramp. I did my usual walkaround inspection before climbing aboard. As I passed the front of the plane, I subconsciously brushed my hand against the propeller, moving it slightly.
All hell broke loose. I heard two ear-shattering bangs, and before realizing it, I was laid flat out on the pavement. My left arm ached badly, and my wife ran toward me. Half in shock, I climbed up into the cockpit to see what I might have done wrong. One of the linemen arrived, and I asked him to check out the controls and switches as well. Neither of us could find anything out of order. By this time, I realized that I was in no condition to fly the plane back to Caldwell. The sleeve of my left arm was badly torn, my eyeglasses were broken, and my wristwatch was found about 30 yards from the accident.
Obviously not thinking too clearly, I turned down the airport's offer to call an ambulance and had my wife drive me to our local hospital. By this time, the pain had become excruciating, and I was feeling faint. An orthopedic physician was called, and after he administered Demerol to me, he was able to ameliorate the severe dislocation of my left shoulder. For the next eight weeks my arm was confined to a sling. Eventually, I could move my arm a limited amount and was able to return to work and flying. Unfortunately, after several years severe arthritis developed, with resulting increased limitation of movement that required a prosthetic-implant replacement of my left shoulder. I still feel fortunate for the marginal inches that allowed me to still be around to write this story.
So how did my Navion get to strike back so violently and imaginatively? The next day, the mechanic found a broken p-lead that left a "hot" magneto. Fortunately, the engine had been shut down previously with the mixture control leaned so that there was no fuel going to the cylinders. Otherwise, there is no telling how long the engine would have run. If I have learned nothing else from this experience, it is the power of the impulse coupler to activate the magnetos and start sequence. I have always had respect for the warning, "Every propeller should be regarded as hot," but underestimated how sensitive this margin of safety can be. Now, after each flight, a standard part of my shutdown procedure is to switch the magnetos off momentarily. If the engine continues to run with the switch off, you should suspect an interruption with the ground lead, keep clear of the propeller. and have the problem resolved as soon as possible.
Robert G. Kroll, AOPA 090491, is a commercial pilot with single-engine land and sea, multiengine land, glider, and instrument ratings. He has accumulated more than 3,400 hours since he began flying in 1948; 1,651 of those hours were in the Navion.
An original "Never Again" story is published each month on AOPA Online ( www.aopa.org/pilot/never_again/).
"Never Again" is presented to enhance safety by providing a forum for pilots to learn from the experiences of others. Manuscripts should be typewritten, double-spaced, and sent to: Editor, AOPA Pilot, 421 Aviation Way, Frederick, Maryland 21701.
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