I'm not an accident investigator, but I am an aviation lawyer who defends accident cases. In that line of work, I deal with trained engineers, experts, investigators, test pilots, etc. on a daily basis.
First of all, whatever the NTSB finally says is NOT gospel. It's not even admissible evidence in court cases. I have to plead ignorance, on a personal level, of the subject matter of holes in the spar cap, as I sold my D model 10 years ago and haven't looked closely at one since. The science of flutter is very complicated, and requires not only an aeronautical engineer to analyze, but it requires such an engineer with further education in the flutter area. So, I will wait and see, but in the meantime, if I owned a Coupe, I would be very cautious to examine the spar very carefully, and I would make sure that the control system, from the wheel in the cockpit to the control surfaces on the wings and tail is totally up to specs in all respects. Jerry E. -----Original Message----- From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]]on Behalf Of bbartsey Sent: Wednesday, September 30, 2009 2:05 PM To: [email protected] Subject: SPAM-LOW: [ercoupe-tech] Re: Let's step back and take a deep breath here. Seems like this Sebring accident has turned into a private conversation between just a few people based solely on speculation. I am inclined to believe there are a few trained aircraft accident investigators on board here who remain silent because they know better than to speculate on the cause of an accident. On the brighter side, stop for fuel in Bay Minette, Al if you go that way. You'll think you landed at Hooters. You will also see a lot of Navy T-34's out of Pensacola refueling there, for some reason. Bart
