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Wow - yesterday two Ercoupe 415-C airplanes landed off airport. There was the one in Puget Sound and then there was mine, near Perryville, Missouri.
I had just picked up my plane from Cape Avionics in Cape Girardeau, Missouri, where they had installed a new Garmin SL40 comm radio. It's a really nice radio, and has a special "EC" button which tunes your radio to 121.5 automatically. i figured I would never need that button. I used it about 40 minutes later.
I was flying home to St. Clair, Missouri, and decided that my fuel was a bit low, so I diverted toward Perryville to get fuel. I was at 4,500 feet. About 15 miles out I throttled back to descend to about 2500 as I flew in to Perryville. When I tried to throttle up a bit, nothing happened. I worked the throttle and it did absolutely nothing. The engine slowly went to idle. That was all I had. I was at about 4,000 feet. I set best glide speed and wanted to see how I was doing in making it to Perryville. I descended to 2,500 feet and I was still 11 miles from the airport. So much for making it there.
I knew I had to find a spot and get it on the ground. I used my fancy EC button and notified KC Center, and set my transponder to 7700. All around were small fields, all surrounded by trees. But then up ahead I saw a huge wheat field, very long and narrow. I headed toward it, set up to land on it.
Unfortunately, there was a very tall cell tower in the southeast corner of the field. I knew there had to be guy wires, and lots of them. I flew around that and then dived down to the tops of the wheat, holding it up until it slowed down and sank into the wheat.
The landing wasn't too bad, really. The ground was bumpy and uneven, and wheat flew everywhere, but it came to a halt, the engine still idling happily. I shut it all down and called FSS. They took my information and advised me to call 911. I did, and they were trying to figure out where I was. I gave them the lat/long and while I was talking to them, a KC-141 tanker from Scott Air Force Base began circling the field at about 2,000 feet. This REALLY freaked out the entire town of Perryville! Then the rumor started that the tanker had gone down. Needless to say, they were disappointed when all it was was a tiny Ercoupe sitting in the middle of a wheat field.
The folks were really nice. The fire department, the sheriff's department, the Highway patrol all showed up, took statements, looked at my credentials. I called my insurance company, and the investigator flew out from KC. A mechanic from the local airport came out and together we removed the wings, and flatbed tow truck came out and the main gear BARELY fit on the bed, but fit they did. We trucked it over to the Perryville Airport. Looking under the cowl, the bolt holding the throttle cable to the carb and the carb heat arm had fallen out. FALLEN OUT! The engine had just been installed three weeks ago by Advanced Air in Council Bluffs, Iowa, after Central Cylinder overhauled it. I think they forgot a cotter pin...
We could have reassembled the plane and I probably could have flown it home last night, but the FSDO wanted to have the option of coming out Monday to look at it. My guess is they will not come out, and we will send them digital photos of the linkage. I think Advanced Air may be in a bit of trouble.
So I managed to activate all the law enforcement in Missouri in that area, talk to the FAA, Get circled by a huge Air Force jet, talk to a TV station and a newspaper, all in one day. Busy day! My insurance guy had flown out in an A35 Bonanza, and he dropped me off home as he flew back to KC.
I plan on picking the plane up next Saturday. It will be reassembled by then, and I'm out of town all next week.
I was very blessed in this - a perfect field, a smooth landing (relatively speaking), and lots of nice people helping. The lady who lived in the nearest house was thinking about charging admission - she had hardly ever seen so much traffic on their little country road!
But when I think of the possible other outcomes, I'm pretty upset. All for the lack some sort of safety on a small bolt. How frightening!
So good old N99340 is still in good shape, still got my shiny new engine and radio, and I'll still be in Terrell. Life is good!
Larry N99340 ============================================================================== To leave this forum go to: http://ercoupers.com/lists.htm
