The Ghost Cub

A hand-propping gone wrong launched a vintage J-3 Cub on a 1.5 mile flight on its own last week in Nebraska. The Lincoln Journal Star is reporting that police say a mechanic was trying to start the Cub at Central City Airport on the evening of May 3 but didn't realize the throttle was open. The Cub climbed to 200 feet and headed southwest where it met its demise in a corn field. Merrick County deputies responded to the report of a plane crash and were initially puzzled to not be pulling a pilot from the overturned wreckage.

They headed to the airport and got the story from the mechanic, who said he was trying to get the old bird going. "And when he hand-turned the propeller, the worst-case scenario happened," a police spokeswoman told the newspaper. That got the newsroom thinking about just how often this kind of thing happens and they were perhaps disappointed by the response from the NTSB. It keeps no such records because this wasn't an "accident," according to the NTSB's Peter Knudson. "There was no person on board the aircraft so it would not meet the definition of 'accident' for our purposes," he said. "We do investigate accidents involving unmanned aircraft systems, but this was not one of those."

Ouch! And this is why we have checklists.

Double ouch...

On a side note I hate hand propping.

Like I mentioned earlier in another thread, hand-cranking a vintage auto is much like hand-propping an aircraft.
You MUST do a thorough check prior to even thinking about starting the engine on either machine - or else bad things will happen.

vikingBerserker said:

Ouch! And this is why we have checklists.

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And tail tie down rings. My Ercoupe nearly got away from me one day when I hand propped it. But fortunately, in addition to setting the throttle a little more open than I normally would I had also tied the tail ring down, Thank God. By the way, that A&P likely will have his license suspended for at least a while. Solo hand propping is VERBOTEN!

The first time I ever hand propped my Ercoupe I did so as an experiment. I had it chocked and tied down three places. I did not prime the engine or push the throttle in, nor did I give the prop a mighty swing but just pulled it through, "flip." On the third "flip": ROARRRR! Now, do you think it has ever started that easily when I had to prop it?

Back just before WWII the first Ercoupe 415C's lacked an electrical system and all had to be started by hand propping. An Ercoupe owner settled his wife in the airplane and then hand propped it - and was nearly run over. His wife knew just what to do, cut the power. But while many automobiles had hand throttles back then, to shut down a can engine you PUSHED IN the throttle. She did that and the Ercoupe took off. She slid over into the pilot's seat and managed to get the airplane turned around. Then she noted some landmarks and realized where the airport was. She touched down on the runway just fine and then proceeded to shut down the engine by PUSHING IN the throttle. The Ercoupe took off again. She came back around and decided that the problem the first time must have been that she did not put it on the ground firmly enough. The next landing was firm, all right; the nosegear collapsed. She was unhurt and was told that they had seen licensed pilots do far worse.

Ooops!

MIflyer said:

Solo hand propping is VERBOTEN!

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Unless you're flying solo in an aircraft without an electrical system. But, everything gets double-checked - TWICE!

gumbyk said:

Unless you're flying solo in an aircraft without an electrical system. But, everything gets double-checked - TWICE!

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And even then, you find someone to help - never do it alone.

GrauGeist said:

And even then, you find someone to help - never do it alone.

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I'd rather an empty cockpit than someone with no experience. That way I'm only risking an aircraft, not an aircraft and a person...

I did once get some one with no experience to sit in my airplane while I propped it. He only had to hold the brake pedal down; I did not trust the parking brake. I'd rather he propped it while I was in the cockpit, but figured he'd be more likely to agree if I handled the prop.

On WWI airplanes like the SE5A they had to have three men. the pilot in the cockpit, a man on the prop, and a third man to crank the little booster magneto in a compartment behind the seat.

I've often wished that we had continued development of the inertia starter used in the Liberty. Some of the airplanes had starters that were both electric and an inertia starter. You cranked it by pushing a button to wind up the starter and then after it got up to speed pushed another to engage the engine. Optionally, a crank could be inserted in the stater to wind it up manually.

MIflyer said:

I did once get some one with no experience to sit in my airplane while I propped it. He only had to hold the brake pedal down; I did not trust the parking brake. I'd rather he propped it while I was in the cockpit, but figured he'd be more likely to agree if I handled the prop.

On WWI airplanes like the SE5A they had to have three men. the pilot in the cockpit, a man on the prop, and a third man to crank the little booster magneto in a compartment behind the seat.

I've often wished that we had continued development of the inertia starter used in the Liberty. Some of the airplanes had starters that were both electric and an inertia starter. You cranked it by pushing a button to wind up the starter and then after it got up to speed pushed another to engage the engine. Optionally, a crank could be inserted in the stater to wind it up manually.

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From a pilot's report: "

Starting is rather easy once the system is learned and as always every aircraft seems to have its own process. In this case, once primed we simply select both magnetos and also select the booster magneto on and keep clear of the prop. Then the pilot winds the booster magneto and if we are lucky the engine comes to life on its own without the need to swing the propeller!
If it doesn't, we must resort to the usual "Armstrong" starter, where the engineer must swing the prop by hand. "

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The booster mag was in the cockpit, and often didn't need anyone on the prop.

The initial message appears to be a verbatim copy of this story by Russ Niles on the Avweb site. The words had a familiar ring since I read them just a couple hours earlier. I think it's only fair to give the author credit.

Of course if the originator of this thread really is Russ, he has the right to spread his own product around as he pleases. And I did get a laugh out of his article on the French AF newbie who was tied to a gunnery range target and "strafed" as a prank.

A more exciting story of one that got away.

https://hars.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Runaway-Auster.pdf

Joe Broady said:

The initial message appears to be a verbatim copy of this story by Russ Niles on the Avweb site. The words had a familiar ring since I read them just a couple hours earlier. I think it's only fair to give the author credit.

Of course if the originator of this thread really is Russ, he has the right to spread his own product around as he pleases. And I did get a laugh out of his article on the French AF newbie who was tied to a gunnery range target and "strafed" as a prank.

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Joe, the originator of this thread provided a link to the article in their post and is not taking credit for the words.