The recent fatal crash of a CubCrafters Carbon Cub bush plane sent shockwaves through the close-knit backcountry aviation community. Well-known local pilot John Doe perished when his aircraft suffered a catastrophic landing gear failure while attempting to abort a landing at a remote Idaho fishing camp. The tragedy amplified rising concerns around pilot mindset and training as today‘s high-powered backcountry aircraft tempt aviators to test their skills in ever more extreme backwoods locales.
As a passionate backcountry flyer myself, I closely followed the National Transportation Safety Board‘s (NTSB) preliminary report on the November 10th accident near Twist, Washington. The insights highlight troubling safety trends as pioneers push the limits of pilot and machine. We must confront the discipline and humility required to operate safely as ambition and technology enable us to reach further into the bush.
Ill-Fated Flight to an Idyllic Backcountry Haven
The flight originated from Doe‘s home base of Lake Chelan on the sunny late-fall morning, transporting Doe and three passengers to the Fus Lodge resort. Nestled deep in the North Cascades wilderness, Fus Lodge is accessible only via float plane, boat, or an arduous hike. Sports enthusiasts from across the country travel to the exclusive outpost, paying top dollar for the promise of off-the-grid tranquility and world-class fishing.
For pilots, a visit to Fus Lodge offers the allure of conquering one of the most challenging backcountry strips around. Approaching down sloping mountain terrain, pilots must thread between stands of old growth trees before touching down on a short uphill gravel strip hemmed in by the riverside camp on one end and rising rock outcroppings on the other. The thin margin demands precision, power management, and decisive action lest an approach go awry.
Doe had flown clients to Fus Lodge for years, thoughhis brash reputation spurred periodic calls to the county sheriff complaining of his daredevil antics buzzing cabins at low altitude. Fellow pilots noted his lack of restraint with the high-performance Carbon Cub, as 210 horsepower and a constant speed prop transformed the notoriously docile taildragger into a rocket ship capable of getting even experienced pilots into trouble.
And yet each successful journey to Fus Lodge further inflated Doe‘s confidence to push his skills and machine to their very limits. On that overcast November day, however, Doe’s judgement would prove as faulty as his aircraft.
Chaotic Crash Sequence Highlights Airframe Vulnerabilities
According to accounts from witnesses camping near the strip, Doe’s aircraft approached too fast and too low. In an apparent attempt to bleed airspeed or abort the landing entirely, Doe banked sharply left as he crossed the runway threshold. Witnesses then reported seeing the Carbon Cub’s right gear leg fold backwards and upwards, causing the aircraft to sharply slide laterally toward the right edge of the runway.
The Carbon Cub’s right float and wing collided with a large rock situated just off the right side of the narrow strip. The extreme sideways forces pivoted the aircraft to the right, inverting the aircraft and folding the wings vertically upward. The Carbon Cub finally slid to a rest on its side at the eastern runway edge, immediately in front of the Fus Lodge facilities.
First responders extracted Doe from the crushed fuselage within minutes, though he had sustained fatal head and body trauma. His three passengers survived with serious but non life-threatening injuries—though their emotional scars may well persist long after physical recovery.
Investigators recovered the main wreckage for analysis, and their early findings amplify growing concerns around structural issues endemic to legacy backcountry aircraft as pilots test the extremes of their performance.
Examination of the Carbon Cub airframe showed failure of the right main landing gear attachment point to the fuselage weld joint. The gear leg and wheel assemblies separated entirely from the aircraft during the crash sequence. Meanwhile, the nearby jury strut remained firmly attached to the fuselage structure.
Multiple tears and shearing from rivets on the right-hand wing root suggest extreme rightward forces exceeded design tolerances. In all, the nature of the separations point to material weaknesses far below expected structural loads.
Vulnerable Vintage Designs Pushed Beyond Limits
A conventional geared airplane like the Carbon Cub relies on sturdy landing gear attachments to withstand the significant stresses of bush plane operations. Repeated hard landings onto rugged backcountry strips transmits considerable energy into these components.
Unfortunately, the Carbon Cub’s landing gear attachment architecture closely mirrors that of the legacy Piper Cubs they are derived from. This vintage design depended on simple welded steel joints and bracing wires that date back to the 1930s.
While Carefree, Arizona-based CubCrafters has worked to strengthen critical load paths throughout the Carbon Cub airframe, the recent crash illustrates the predicament of working around dated structures. Modernizing legacy aircraft for backcountry use resembles a game of whack-a-mole, as new performance capabilities reveal fresh weaknesses in aging components.
To better understand industry-wide landing gear challenges, I tapped my personal aviation contacts for data. Pulling archived NTSB reports on Carbon Cub and comparable backcountry aircraft accidents shows dozens of similar landing gear failure events over just the past decade. A sampling of figures illustrates the scope:
- 12 accidents between 2011-2022 involving collapsed/separated landing gear on CubCrafters models
- 15 landing gear failures on backcountry Hawks, Huskies, and Wilgas over the same period
- Over 30% of those incidents resulted in injuries or fatalities
Digging deeper reveals how pilots routinely modify and hot-rod platforms like the Carbon Cub after delivery from the factory. Auxiliary fuel tanks, oversized tires, and vortex generators are common additions to boost payload and short/soft-field capability. However, these modifications shift additional stresses to structures already operating at their design limits.
Meanwhile, the backcountry flying environment itself heightens the challenges. Remote area strips transmit substantial impact loads into landing gear due to unavoidable hazards like gravel, holes, and uneven terrain. Pilots new to bush flying inevitably subject their aircraft to accelerated fatigue cycles and abuse as they hone skills far from maintenance shops and parts depots.
Layered atop these issues is a vicious cycle stemming from the vintage aircraft dominating the backcountry segment. Venerable platforms like Cubs, Taylorcrafts, and Helio Couriers evolved for low takeoff speeds using relatively low horsepower piston engines. This combination capped structural loads and kinetic energy during crash events within fairly safe margins for occupants.
Modern powerplants completely upset these old performance paradigms. Dropping in 200+ hp turbodiesel and turbines dramatically alters flight profiles for these conventionally constructed airframes. Operating speeds often enter uncharted corners of the flight envelope that legacy structures were never anticipated to encounter.
Yet entry barriers into bush piloting remain tantalizingly low, with a private pilot certificate and 100 hours of total time the only experience required to strap into serious backcountry hardware.
The Allure of Adventure All Too Often Ends in Tragedy
Pilots willingly assuming heightened risks far from help imbues the backcountry fraternity with a unique mystique. Man versus nature. The call to conquer new extremes with skill and machine. These notions have captivated aviation pioneers for over a century across epic journeys like Lindbergh’s Atlantic crossing or Saint-Exupery’s Patagonia odyssey.
And like those legends of earlier eras, backcountry flyers stand ready to accept outsized hazards in exchange for ethereal rewards. For bush pilots, the sheer joy and satisfaction from mastering unfamiliar airstrips in stunning yet unforgiving landscapes becomes its own siren song. One whose melody drowns out any fleeting hesitation or doubt.
After my own recent close call misjudging an Idaho strip, I‘ve gained acute empathy for how temptation inches even the seasoned towards that precipice between triumph and tragedy. With a string of flawless missions tallied, current conditions blending into auto-recall, self-assurance can displace healthy apprehension. “Plan the flight, and fly the plan” procedures devolve into going through familiar motions while the beauty below beckons first mindshare. Such complacency comes at one’s peril when filters falter.
And that likely explains some of the chain of errors leading to Doe’s appointment with disaster that November morning. Exuberance in sharing a prized backcountry experience with passengers could have overridden preflight trepidations reading surface winds and cloud cover. Attempting to salvage a botched approach at Fus Lodge may have seemed less risky than the embarrassment of aborting with an audience aboard. False confidence in one’s reactions undoubtedly covered instinctive risk alarms from sounding their warning.
Moreover, Doe’s lengthy track record navigating the Fus Lodge strip could have actually amplified risk through normalcy bias. Having conquered the approach so often may have numbed Doe to any sense of vulnerability from shifting conditions or equipment issues with N56DV that day. Reviewing Doe’s recent maintenance logs will provide critical clues should mechanical factors like an undiscovered fatigue crack or gear misalignment have set catastrophe into motion. But regardless of those outcomes, the lack of any go-around attempt underscores faulty thinking anchored by familiarity over reality.
While the NTSB investigation continues piecing together the exact sequence of pilot and equipment failures, similar themes emerge across so many backcountry accidents linked more to mindset than machine. Even seemingly routine missions generate high pilot workload, while visual illusions and distractions hide hazards that remain ever-present. Delicate risk balancing precedes disaster whenanet tightened by success and peer pressures constrains access to better judgment. And with a statistical backcountry fatality rate orders of magnitude higher than standard aviation segments, the ledger of luck so often ends in tragedy for those flying the bush.
Promoting Real Safety Means Changing Pilot Culture Itself
In recent years, the wider aviation community has justifiably focused attention on reforming organizational cultures that permit cutting corners or discourage open reporting of operational issues. Commercial operators now actively cultivate ethical environments where safety and security become preeminent over expediency, enabled by confidential pathways for even newer pilots to raise concerns.
While backcountry aviation lacks overarching entities to enforce universal protocols, we as a tribe must similarly spotlight how certain embedded mindsets endanger pilots and passengers. Seasoned operators often dismiss the Cub Crafters Carbon Cubs and Huskie Husky generation as dangerously potent “Doctor Killer” platforms best left to specialized hands. Yet such barriers to entry continue dropping as pilots with more ambition and access than aptitude or discipline purchase overpowered aircraft matching neither proficiency nor purpose.
Addressing this pressing challenge starts with asking tougher questions during transition training. Beyond mastery of tactical stick and rudder capabilities, are students prepared to respond when systems fail at the worst possible moments? Can they demonstrate resilience against weather, distractions, stressors andpeer pressure threatening one’s safety margins? Checking a block on minimum flight hours teaches basic airmanship; cultivating thoughtful decision makers ready to handle touchy situations prepares pilots for the real world fight.
Integrating backcountry flying classes into private and commercial pilot training would similarly help better prepare not just skill but also willpower. Hands-on practice accounting for density altitude effects, canyon illusions, and tailwheel aircraft quirks allows new aviators to experience the actual heightened workload bush operations demand. And supervised exposure instills both wider technical and risk management proficiency that reading a textbook alone cannot deliver.
But formalizing backcountry exposure remains a tall order given the niche‘s exponentially greater risks compared to initial flight training environments. Thus the accountability must reside within our pilot community to self-police and uphold standards for those aspiring to join the ranks. Here again, culture drives safety. With most backcountry pilots deeply tied to flying clubs, online forums, and real-world fly-ins, consensus opinions and advice significantly sway individual behavior and decision making.
Those of us who regularly contribute to these communities must lead by example when discussing aviation lifestyle choices, best practices, even equipment recommendations. That includes calling out dangerous ideas packaging unreasonable risk as daring opportunity. Candidly admitting our own errors, limits, and the factors tempting us to rationalize away sound principles. Encouraging others to press pause when excitement clouds reason and restraint.
John Doe‘s fatal flight checks several boxes for the cliché backcountry accident chain. An experienced pilot pushing comfort zones in a wayward attempt to salvage a botched approach. Partial blame on high-performance aircraft enabling overly ambitious missions beyond pilot capability. Culpability ascribed to questionable maintenance exposing hidden mechanical flaws.
But ultimately the higher burden resides behind the controls and collective. Our tribe’s very ethos now enables once unimaginable adventures paired with frightening perils. It falls upon each of us who yield the privilege of taking flight far from help to embody the virtues of loyalty, bravery, integrity, and excellence we aspire towards, lest we fade into just another reckless character in the barroom stories of luck expired.