Fact Checking Nelson's "Doors Of Death" light aircraft near death experience

[Res Ipsa]

Problem is, there is no evidence whatsoever for such an engine-out event, let alone one with a fire and a death spiral plunge in flames with a miraculous left engine re-start to save God's chosen.

I wasn't sure how much you were intending on continuing to participate, but if you're here, I would like your take on nose dives.

I've done a fair bit of googling, and last night I spent some time in the database, and I'm just not coming up with much.

My gut reaction to nosediving an aircraft with people on board given what I know so far, is it seems crazy. It seems like someone has been watching WWII movies. But, I have to say, I read one semi-official source that suggested a nose-dive is on the table for putting out a fire; noting this is a controversial topic among pilots. Other than that, other than a single semi-official source saying that some pilots might suggest it (for unspecified context, solo? commercial? etc. ) and it's super risky, nothing I've read suggests a practice of nosediving civilian airplanes to put out an engine fire. I've read several fire mitigation check lists and nothing there. I've read that maintaining a certain speed in descent is important to 'blow the flame out' in a scenario with no engine due to fire. But that's not a nose dive, nor a pull up at the last second before impact.

In looking through these incidents or accidents in the database, later accounts are generally more detailed than earlier accounts, but I have yet to find an example of nosediving to put out a fire. Nor have I uncovered a news article where a pilot heroically nose-dived a civilian craft to get the flame out. I have uncovered references to other mitigation efforts, which have included notes about how the plane landed, cutting power to engines and so on. Perhaps in one of those, a nose dive and sudden pull-up also happened, it just didn't get mentioned.

To honor, I'd say that i'm trying to be very fair with my skepticism here, as I'm still looking for an example, mostly because one source mentioned nosedives might be considered. If it weren't for that one source, I wouldn't be looking. So yes, I'm staving off my skepticism at these points I feel I need to, and erroring on the side of caution.

It sounds like you and I have been reading the same (or at least similar) information. But context is everything. One thing folks seem to agree on is that keeping the plane in the air when you have had or might have an engine fire is a significant risk because it's difficult for the pilot to tell at any given time whether the fire has been extinguished. So, getting the plane on the ground quickly is a good idea. I think that's consistent with what Dr.W has said here.

The records available online are not much help because they omit incidents before 1978 and all that's available are fairly terse summaries of NTSB accident reports.

It strikes me that if you're just interested in what pilots do, you could run the same search on the NTSB's updated CAROL database, which is more complete and provides much more detail. It would not be for the correct years, but might provide some examples for what pilots have done in similar situations.

[Doctor Steuss]

I apologize if I overlooked it in the thread, but has anyone been able to find the general retention schedule for FAA incident and accident records? I went down a rabbit hole, starting with FAA Order 1350.14B (referenced in the email to Doc Cam), and eventually the GRS I was able to locate included everything but such records (i.e. it had things like memos, receipts, invoices, inventory audits, etc.). The closest thing I could find (maybe) applied to records that had to potential to be needed for litigation.

[Res Ipsa]

I apologize if I overlooked it in the thread, but has anyone been able to find the general retention schedule for FAA incident and accident records? I went down a rabbit hole, starting with FAA Order 1350.14B (referenced in the email to Doc Cam), and eventually the GRS I was able to locate included everything but such records (i.e. it had things like memos, receipts, invoices, inventory audits, etc.). The closest thing I could find (maybe) applied to records that had to potential to be needed for litigation.

I went down the same rabbit hole and it was very confusing. My recollection is that I found something that led me to believe that FAA accident and incident reports are considered "permanent" records, and so would be transmitted to the NA at some point. But I'd have to go down the rabbit hole again to figure out what I looked at.

[Doctor Steuss]

[...]. But I'd have to go down the rabbit hole again to figure out what I looked at.

in my opinion, it's one of those self-flagellation rabbit holes that no one should have to go down more than once.

[The Stig]

Where's the pilot? Where's everyone else on the aircraft? Surely they should be able to corroborate such an incident.

[Res Ipsa]

[...]. But I'd have to go down the rabbit hole again to figure out what I looked at.

in my opinion, it's one of those self-flagellation rabbit holes that no one should have to go down more than once.

LOL. I agree. If I were to take another crack at it, I’d use FOIA to request records of document management requirements for FAA Accident and Incident Reports.

[DrW]

DrW, can you, or can you not, use the Aviation DB database to generate a list of aircraft incidents in Utah for the years 1973 through 1977? If so, please post a screen shot.

When I saw this request I didn't think you were serious since the query information has been provided at least twice already on this thread, once with screenshots. But since you also asked the same question of Dean Robbers, here you go - and in great detail.

Click on http://aviationdb.net/aviationdb/AidQuery#SUBMIT. This URL takes you directly to the Query Menu. Enter the search terms circled and numbered as 1 and 2.

Enter the second date as 1977-12-31 as shown on the page header and not 1977-01-01 as shown on the screenshot.
I counted 208 entries between 1973 and 1977.



Entering the above search terms will return these pages.



To read about an incident, click on the Details and you will find at least the information that Tapirrider has twice mentioned as being the minimum required.

[Res Ipsa]

You’ve determined it’s just a “fantasy” without looking at a single document from the National Archives.

It is just a fantasy. No different than Nelson's fantasy of a gun being held to his head, the trigger pulled and the miraculous misfire, sparing his life, all in an incident in Africa that was well documented by others who were present, who said nothing of Nelson's tall tale. Nelson is a bullshitter. The burden at this point is on him and his defenders to provide the source document of evidence. No document is going to be found. Nelson could clear all of this up had his official biographer simply footnoted a reference to such a document. And you could just as well go search those hard copy records but instead you are choosing to drag this on and on over online availability of records.

Hi Tapir.

I think there's an important distinction between ultimate burden of proof and the burden of proof on someone making an argument. If Nelson or anyone else here were trying to prove the accuracy of his story, then I agree that the burden of proof should be on them. He apparently sees no need to offer proof to us here at the trailer park, and I don't see anyone "defending" him.

All I've done so far is to criticize what I think are bad arguments from evidence. Just because a party to an argument does not carry the ultimate burden of proof, he isn't entitled to rely on bad or sloppy arguments. If I argue that an inference made by, for example, IHAQ isn't reasonable, I'm not defending Nelson. I'm critiquing an argument, that's all. An argument that someone else's argument is bad isn't the same as taking a position on the ultimate question. It's simply making sure the arguments we are considering are valid. If I make a bad argument during this whole process, I would hope that someone points it out -- especially if they are inclined to agree with me on other arguments.

I'm not among the people arguing that the failure to find a specific record is conclusive evidence that no incident happened. What I've correctly pointed out is that you can't conclude anything from the failure to find something in a location if you haven't verified that the type of information you are looking for is there. I don't have any obligation to hunt down the information other people need to avoid making an invalid argument. It's their argument. By the same token, I'm interested in trying to figure out what happened, so I'm interested in looking at that set of records. But I'm not obligated to do anything, as I don't have enough evidence on which to even guess what happened.

I'm not sure I understand your criticism about "dragging things out." The easiest and fastest was to get information we need is online. The information we need is either there or it's not. DrW insists that the data for incidents is complete back to 1973. I think it only goes back to 1978. I think it makes more sense to reach a consensus on this than to jump in my car and drive to whatever records storage facility these records are in during a pandemic.

It's not a hard issue to resolve at all, and should have been put to bed days ago. If there are incidents in the Aviation DB database for 1973-1978, a simple search should generate a list. Inspection of the individual records would reveal whether they are accidents or incidents. In fact, I just now checked for the third time. I ran a search for all Commercial Aviation Incidents for the years 1973-1977. Result, no hits. I did the same for General Aviation Incidents. No hits. I did not restrict the search to Utah -- I looked for any incident anywhere in the U.S. So, of what use is searching for an incident in Utah in 1976 when incident reports for that year aren't in the database. And if you want to know why resolving this has taken so long, ask DrW, who has failed to locate a single incident report for 1973-1977 in the database he keeps claim is complete.

[Res Ipsa]

DrW, can you, or can you not, use the Aviation DB database to generate a list of aircraft incidents in Utah for the years 1973 through 1977? If so, please post a screen shot.

When I saw this request I didn't think you were serious since the query information has been provided at least twice already on this thread, once with screenshots. But since you also asked the same question of Dean Robbers, here you go - and in great detail.

Click on http://aviationdb.net/aviationdb/AidQuery#SUBMIT. This URL takes you directly to the Query Menu. Enter the search terms circled and numbered as 1 and 2.

Enter the second date as 1977-12-31 as shown on the page header and not 1977-01-01 as shown on the screenshot.
I counted 208 entries between 1973 and 1977.



Entering the above search terms will return these pages.



To read about an incident, click on the Details and you will find at least the information that Tapirrider has twice mentioned as being the minimum required.

DrW, please read my actual words. Every entry in your image is an accident, not an incident. I know. I looked. They all report "substantial damage." Now, rerun your search changing the search parameter to Incidents -- Commercial Aviation and then Incidents - General Aviation. Please report the total number of hits for each. If, as you keep claiming, the database includes reports of incidents dating back to 1973, each of those searches should generate a list of incidents, which we can verify by looking at the entries. And you should be able to screenshot examples of records of incidents that occurred from 1973 through 1977.

Please return and report.

ETA, your second image, which is of an individual record, is not from the years 1973 through 1977. It is from 1979

[Doctor CamNC4Me]

RI,

I got seven hits using 1976 and Incidents (C). Russell M. Nelson's flight information wasn't there. What's my takeaway supposed to be?

- Doc