You Can't See Through the Wings

This scene got a lot of media attention yesterday:

Non-pilots may wonder how something like that could happen, but take a look at the aircraft involved. The plane on the bottom has a high wing and the plane on top a low wing. That's a perfect set-up for this type of accident because each plane had a blind spot that blocked out the other.

When I was flying high-wing Cessnas there was a protocol to making turns. Before you'd turn left, you'd lift the left wing a few degrees and look out that way to clear your turn because once you starting turning left your vision in that direction would be blocked by the wing. The visibility in climb was better, but if an airplane was coming from above and behind you (as it was in the Texas accident) it would be impossible to see.

I also flew low-wing Grumman aircraft for awhile and had to learn some different techniques to make sure I didn't descend on top of someone else. It's all part of piloting small airplanes.

Accidents like the one above happen every now and then, usually at uncontrolled (non-tower) airports like the one in Texas. Aircraft are supposed to announce their positions via a common radio frequency and most of the time that works pretty well at keeping everybody separated, but once in a while, two guys try to occupy the same airspace at the same time.

Fortunately, nobody was hurt in the Texas accident, which when you consider how close those props got to the cabins, is lucky.