Boy didn't steal plane...

[HerkFE]

I'm not too sure here but it seems like there is more to this... I have a couple theories but both are about as stupid as this whole story.

https://www.montgomeryadvertiser.com/viewart/20130103/NEWS02/301030015/Mom-Boy-didn-t-steal-plane-crash

JASPER — A teen pilot killed along with two friends in an Alabama plane crash had his own key to the aircraft and had flown it many times, his mother said Wednesday, denying authorities’ assertion that the plane had been taken without permission.

Sherrie Smith said her 17-year-old son Jordan Smith was the one flying the plane that went down in the Alabama woods Tuesday night. The Federal Aviation Administration said the Piper PA 30 crashed less than a mile from the Walker County Airport in Jasper, which is northwest of Birmingham.

Smith says the owner of the plane had let her son fly it many other times and had given him his own key. Her son was a high school junior who fell in love with flying at an early age and was one test short of earning his private pilot’s license.

“He had used the plane many times before,” she said.

Walker County sheriff’s Chief Deputy James Painter said earlier Wednesday that authorities believed the three teenagers took off in the plane without permission.

“We don’t know for sure but we think it was some teenagers who stole the plane and were sort of joyriding it,” Painter told The Associated Press.

Walker County Coroner J.C. Poe said the other two people killed in the crash were Brandon Tyler Ary, 19, and Jordan Seth Montgomery, 17.

The plane had departed from the small airport around 10:30 p.m. in overcast skies and a low cloud ceiling, airport manager Edwin Banks said.

“It was a student pilot flying an airplane without permission, an airplane that he was not qualified to fly at night,” Banks said.

Banks said Smith had flown single-engine planes in the past, but the plane in the crash was a double-engine aircraft.

The Piper PA 30 is also called a Piper Twin Comanche. It is a low-wing plane with two propellers and can seat four to six, depending on the model.

Sherrie Smith said the plane was parked behind a security gate, but that her son had been given a security code to access it.

She also said her son had enough promise as a pilot that he’d already earned a scholarship to Wallace State Community College to study aviation.

Jordan Smith’s father is an Alabama state trooper and member of the Alabama National Guard who is currently serving in Afghanistan.

“We were working on getting him his own plane when he was a senior,” she said of her son.

The plane went down in a wooded, swampy area just over the fence from Margaret Swann’s hay farm. She said training flights from the airport circle over her farm routinely and she guessed that Jordan Smith was flying the same pattern before the plane went down.

“It’s just three kids making a wrong decision,” she said.

[drewpey]

was one test short of earning his private pilot’s license.

isn't that like one fuck short of being pregnant?

[HiFlyer]

Jeeze, a sleezy lawyer could make a fortune off this with law suits against every body involved (assuming there was some money to be had). Let's see, kid flies illegally with others (parent liability for the minor child), kid fly's a multi w/o license (did the owner know he did it, had he done it with permission before? Owner liability), did his instructor know of previous adventures? (Instructor liability), did the FBO/airport people know of previous flights w/o IP supervision? (FBO/Airport liability). Probably just scratching the surface.

Edited January 3, 2013 by HiFlyer

[HerkFE]

Jeeze, a sleezy lawyer could make a fortune off this with law suits against every body involved (assuming there was some money to be had). Let's see, kid flys illegally with others (parent liability for the minor child), kid fly's a multi w/o license (did the owner know he did it, had he done it with permission before? Owner liability), did his instructor know of previous adventures? (Instructor liability), did the FBO/airport people know of previous flights w/o IP supervision? (FBO/Airport liability). Probably just scratching the surface.

I wasn't even thinking of all of that. Mom probably needs to just STFU.

I kind of took special interest in this incident. I work for the FAA on the Tech Ops side of the house in an Operations Control Center (we are kind of like a MOC for Navaids, Radar, comm equipment, etc. used in the National Airspace System). We are also a POC for aircraft accidents. Our job, when it comes to accidents, is to make determinations (based on the circumstances surrounding the accident) about Navaids that may have contributed to the accident...think about the initial moments following the Buffalo commuter crash....that ILS was quarantined to determine if it was messed up and caused/contributed to the accident. I am working on knocking out a checklist of items to set me up for a promotion in the future. One of the items on that checklist is handling these incidents and making determinations about possible Navaid malfunctions. I was working the night the call came in on this and got my first real OJT on this incident. When we worked it we didn't have all of this info. I just stumbled upon it the next day in the newspaper. Thought it was kind of interesting because of that as well as all of the fishy details.

[Butters]

This is why we need tougher airplane control laws. Why was that guy allowed to own a "double-engine" airplane, in the first place? Everyone knows one engine is enough to sustain flight. If that guy had not owned that airplane that kid could not have used it legally. Enough is enough, we have to stop airplane violence.

[HiFlyer]

This is why we need tougher airplane control laws. Why was that guy allowed to own a "double-engine" airplane, in the first place? Everyone knows one engine is enough to sustain flight. If that guy had not owned that airplane that kid could not have used it legally. Enough is enough, we have to stop airplane violence.

Yeah, and keys, too. If we could just outlaw keys, he couldn't have open the secured area and gotten his hands on the airplane to cause mayhem! I think you're on the right track here. Call Dianne...

[HercDude]

This is why we need tougher airplane control laws. Why was that guy allowed to own a "double-engine" airplane, in the first place? Everyone knows one engine is enough to sustain flight. If that guy had not owned that airplane that kid could not have used it legally. Enough is enough, we have to stop airplane violence.

Hey, quit trying to politicize this tragedy.

[Smokin]

You can regulate airplanes all day and everyone knows people will still have access to them. What we really need is an excise tax on aviation fuel. That will make it cost prohibitive for people to be able to fill them up, then kids won't be able to borrow/steal them. Or maybe publish a map to everyone's house who owns a plane. Think how many lives will be saved. Won't someone please think of the children!?!

[BQZip01]

If we'd just fingerprinted the owner of the plane and forced them to register the plane with the government, we wouldn't be facing this tragedy...

[KState_Poke22]

We definitely need a ban on assault pl...I'm drunk.

[Napoleon_Tanerite]

If we'd just fingerprinted the owner of the plane and forced them to register the plane with the government, we wouldn't be facing this tragedy...

Or we could have come and taken the plane at any time when the government decided they may be a danger to themselves or others

[TheGuardGuy]

Airplanes dont kill people, student pilots kill people.

[Wolf424]

Anyone have a map of people who own planes in the Jasper area?

[pcola]

Airplanes dont kill people, student Co-pilots kill people.

FIFY (that's a crew airplane joke for you young fighter guys.)

[SocialD]

FIFY (that's a crew airplane joke for you young fighter guys.)

?????

Section IV. Crew Duties

Not Applicable.

Edited January 5, 2013 by SocialD

[HerkFE]

The latest:

An attorney for the owner of a plane in Jasper said Friday he never gave approval for a late-night flight that crashed and killed three teenagers.

Herbie Brewer, attorney for Jasper businessman Ray Whitworth, said the fatal flight Tuesday night was an unauthorized joy ride and that the 17-year-old student pilot was not trained to fly the twin-engine plane.

“This is the first time that young man had ever gotten in the plane, and he did it without Mr. Whitworth’s permission,” Brewer said in a phone interview.

The Piper PA 30 took off about 10:30 p.m. Tuesday from the Walker County Airport with skies overcast and clouds low. It crashed about a mile south of the airport, killing student pilot Jordan Smith of Jasper and two of his friends, Jordan Montgomery, 17, and Brandon Ary, 19, both of Arley.

Smith’s mother, Sherrie Smith, said Wednesday her son had flown the plane before and had the owner’s permission to be in it, but Brewer said that was incorrect.

He said Whitworth took Smith for a flight about two years ago in another plane when the young man expressed interest in flying, but Smith had never used the twin-engine plane.

“He entered the airport and took the plane without permission,” the lawyer said.

Smith had been taking flying lessons at the airport, but Whitworth is not a flight instructor and had not given any lessons, Brewer said.

The plane was owned by HiFlight Aviation, which is a limited liability corporation Whitworth formed in 2010. The Federal Aviation Administration said its records show HiFlight Aviation bought the Piper PA 30 in May 2010. The company applied to the FAA for registration, but the application was returned to HiFlight in June 2010 for correction. The FAA said it received no response and canceled the registration that summer.

Brewer said Whitworth had brought the plane up to federal flight standards and planned to get it registered with the FAA.

The National Transportation Safety Board is investigating the cause of the crash. Brewer said Whitworth is cooperating and has supplied plane records to the board.

https://www.montgomeryadvertiser.com/viewart/20130105/NEWS02/301050019/Fatal-flight-Plane-s-owner-didn-t-OK-trip-Teen-pilot-s-joy-ride-claimed-3-young-lives-Tuesday

Edited January 7, 2013 by HerkFE

[Spoo]

Young and dumb. I can picture the conversation in which "Hey, I know what we can do tonight!" came up, immediately followed by the beer shotgunning.

[Duff_Man]

Edit: fixed link once and for all

Edited January 10, 2013 by Duff_Man