Never Again: Deadly decisions

My timing couldn’t have been worse. The country was in what we were calling a “fuel crisis.” The airlines were not expanding. With no immediate job prospects, I decided to pursue my airline transport rating (later airline transport pilot). Raleigh-Durham Aviation offered ATP training and was also a Cessna dealer, so I trained in a brand-new Cessna 310Q. Immediately after my checkride, the airplane was sold to a business in Richlands, Virginia.

A day or two later the salesman who sold the 310 called and asked me if I would be interested in a job flying a Beech Baron for a business also based in Richlands. The pilot currently flying the Baron was going to work for the company that had just bought the 310.

I said I was interested, so he told me to catch an early flight the next day to Tri-Cities Airport in Tennessee, where the pilot leaving the job flying the Baron would meet me. The pilot was a nice guy a couple of years older than me. He had come to the United States to attend flight school and build flight experience with plans to return to Denmark and fly for the country’s airline.

We departed Tri-Cities with me at the controls and headed for Richlands. I had not taken the time to familiarize myself with the area, so I simply followed his instructions.

Arriving over Richlands a short time later, he advised me to begin my descent and start a teardrop turn to the right. He explained that we had just passed over the town of Richlands. He knew that because he had tuned in the AM radio station located in downtown Richlands on the ADF.

He said to maintain a 750-feet-per-minute descent while turning. As we entered the clouds he told me to tighten the turn. I was already in a standard-rate turn, but I complied, and we soon broke out of the clouds at about 1,000 feet above the ground with the small town of Richlands in front of us.

That’s when it dawned on me: We had just descended between two ridgelines and into a valley. I asked the pilot if he regularly flew into and out of Richlands using this method and he said he did. He told me it was no big deal: Just cross the AM radio station on a heading of 030 degrees and descend at a rate of 750 feet per minute while making a teardrop turn to the right. “At greater than standard rate. Right?” I asked.

I learned the owner of the Baron had grown accustomed to operating out of Richlands even at night as long as ceilings were at least 1,000 feet. Not me.

Once on the ground, the pilot wished me luck and departed. Around 5 p.m. the lobby erupted. Two men and two women entered walking fast, with the guy in the lead talking loudly. He said, “File for Merritt Island, Florida, and let’s get going”

I filed an IFR flight plan and we were soon off the ground. The owner sat up front with me, which was fine until he reached up and retarded the throttles right after breaking ground. I put my hand up to stop him, but he had already pulled them back to climb power. He informed me the engines would last longer if we didn’t keep them at full power so long. I told him I had learned most engine failures occur at the first power reduction so I preferred to wait until reaching a couple of hundred feet before reducing power. It was a debatable point and it was his airplane, so nothing else was said.

We landed in Merritt Island around 8:30 p.m. I was looking forward to getting to a hotel. But it was not to be. While taxing in to the FBO, the owner said, “OK, go back to Richlands and pick up three guys that will be waiting for you and bring them down here.”

I was stunned. It was at that moment I decided I would not be taking this job.

I thought I would do as he asked, knowing this would be the last time I would be subjected to him. I refueled the airplane; filed an IFR flight plan for Bluefield, West Virginia; and took off heading north. Bluefield was the closest airport to Richlands with an instrument approach. The weather at Richlands wasn’t too bad, but it would be late and I would be tired so I called ahead and told my passengers to meet me in Bluefield. It was a little after midnight when I arrived. The weather wasn’t too bad but bad enough to require an instrument approach. I was glad I had decided to meet my passengers in Bluefield.

Putting on fuel and filing an IFR flight plan back to Merritt Island took only a half hour or so, and my three well-lubricated passengers and I were off.

After takeoff, the tower released me to departure control about the time I entered the clouds. A minute or two after contacting departure I lost communications. I turned the com radios off and back on. I checked the circuit breakers. No good.

My clearance was to expect 9,000 feet 10 minutes after departure, so 10 minutes into the flight I climbed to 9,000 feet from my initially assigned altitude. I had already squawked 7600. When the radios suddenly started working after a couple of hours, I contacted Jacksonville Center and was asked twice who I was.

Later that day, I briefed the owner about the radio problem. He said I could take the airplane to Daytona for repairs, which I did.

After two days in Merritt Island, I flew the owner and three others back to Richlands. The owner informed me how much he was going to pay me to fly for him. I told him I wouldn’t be taking the job. He paid me for my time, reimbursed me for my airline flight, and had me driven to Tri-Cities for my flight back to Raleigh.

Sadly, the story doesn’t end there.

A couple of weeks later I got a call from the salesman who had sold the Cessna 310. He told me the Danish pilot with four passengers aboard had flown the new 310 into the side of a mountain just outside of Richlands. According to the NTSB report the weather at the time was 700 feet overcast, raining, with wind of 250 degrees at 12 knots. The aircraft impacted terrain at 3,200 feet at 20:15 on February 28, 1974.

I can only surmise he didn’t adequately account for how much the 12 knots of wind would stretch his teardrop—so much it no longer fit within the valley.

Gary Deck is an airline transport pilot who lives in Jacksonville, Florida.