... In two cases they put gas in a turboprop. Makes me wonder about water or trash in the fuel. AC engines don't like that very much.
It's Turbine Fuel contamination in a Gas Powered Aircraft that Guarantees an engine failure shortly after takeoff. It's happened to the best! Airlines have done it and even the Great Bob Hoover was signing autographs after his Air Show while the Jet Fuel Truck behind him was filling his Gasoline Powered Aero Commander. (Lot's of different Turbine and Gasoline Aircraft models look alike, Cessna even used to put a "Turbo-System" logo on their Turbo-Charged Gasoline Powered models.)
Bob Hoover's extraordinary skills allowed a successful (no injury to his passengers) off-airport emergency 'landing' and he then put his fame to great use in leading a campaign to prevent occurrence of these events and the FAA started requiring special Aircraft fueling ports and Jet Fuel filling nozzles to stop the practice.
Pratt & Whitney allowed use of Gasoline (80-87, 100 octane or 100LL) in my Turbine PT-6A's for up to 4% of the hours on straight gasoline and up to 12% of the time for "one-part gasoline, three parts Jet-A, JP-1 or JP-5"; JP-4 Jet Fuel already contained 10% gasoline and was allowed for 100% of the time. The downside was mainly increased possibility of Vapor Lock, the increase in consumption and a buildup of Lead deposits.
Pilots are responsible for confirming quality and quantity of their fuel prior to flight, but they 'get-in-a-hurry'
too often and the outcome can be so tragic.
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Rick's summation seems to tell the main cause of this unfortunate teenager and his dad's loss.There is a little connection here with Amelia's Tragedy in that it occurred on the correlating leg to Honolulu, but the Suleman's just decided to try and bypass
their 'Howland' fuel stop.
Jeff Scott's
Link really supplies a lot of insight for this operation, especially all those arrogant posts or 'tweets' from the participants as well as the 60 comments below from the public.
That Law passed after the child's tragic 1996 crash:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jessica_Dubroffshould provide protection for some innocent children, but Babar and Haris Suleman's stunt was legal because the child Haris had his license/medical. We certainly don't need more laws to protect Adults from their own foolishness that does not endanger others.
The Suleman's were even past their time-line to establish their 'record' before their fatal decision of an overloaded take-off in the dark.
I can't imagine trying to claim a 'Record' for a flight that contains another
'qualified' person aboard that is there to provide support for the mission.