Flight plan cited in crash report
| • | Hawai'i Air Ambulance provides lifeline to Neighbor Islands |
By Kevin Dayton
Advertiser Big Island Bureau
HILO, Hawai'i — The pilot of an air ambulance that crashed on the Big Island last month, killing three people, was operating in conditions that required instrument-guided flight, but the flight plan he filed indicated he would be flying mostly by sight, according to a preliminary report on the crash.
Pilot Ron Laubacher notified authorities he planned to fly under visual flight rules, meaning the pilot generally determines the altitude of the aircraft based on what can be seen out the windows. Those rules require pilots to avoid clouds and bad weather.
The Cessna 414A crashed at about 1:40 a.m. Jan. 31 in stormy weather 25 miles northwest of Hilo near 'Umikoa.
The preliminary report released over the weekend by the National Transportation Safety Board noted that when the crash occurred, "instrument meteorological conditions prevailed." Under those conditions, pilots are supposed to fly by instrument, and not primarily by visual cues.
The NTSB report also noted evidence suggesting the plane's engines were working when the Cessna 414A crashed in a forest of 80-foot-tall eucalyptus trees.
The Hawai'i Air Ambulance crash killed Laubacher, 38, and Honolulu paramedics Joseph Daniel Villiaros, 39, and Mandy Shiraki, 47. The crew was headed to Hilo Medical Center to evacuate a patient at the time of the crash.
Andrew Kluger, chairman and chief executive officer of Hawai'i Air Ambulance, said yesterday the preliminary NTSB report indicates the plane was maintained properly.
"That was very important to us, very significant to us, that there was no mechanical malfunction to cause the accident," he said. "Our fleet is maintained daily."
On the issue of Laubacher's visual flight plan, Kluger said Hawai'i Air Ambulance pilots fly by both visual and instrument rules. Which procedure to follow is a decision for the pilots to make, subject to review by the Federal Aviation Administration, he said.
The flight plans are filed with the FAA and approved before takeoff, Kluger said. If the FAA felt conditions warranted flight by instrument "they would have told him that," Kluger said. "But conditions change, especially in Hawai'i, climatically."
Kluger declined to speculate on the cause of the crash.
"It would be really not correct for any of us to speculate because we weren't sitting in the pilot's seat at the time with the conditions, with Ron and what he was facing," Kluger said.
The last confirmed radar contact with the plane was at 1:29 a.m. Saturday, when the Cessna passed three miles east of the Waimea-Kohala Airport outside Waimea.
Authorities have said the plane veered from the normal path for air ambulances on the journey to Hilo. Those flights usually follow the coast at about 9,500 feet, but the Cessna was last detected farther inland at about 5,900 feet.
Laubacher had radioed during the flight to ask about any thunderstorm activity in the Hilo area, but did not send out a distress call.
The wreckage of the plane was found by search crews Feb. 2 at the 3,600-foot elevation.
The final NTSB report on the crash likely will be released in about a year.
Reach Kevin Dayton at kdayton@honoluluadvertiser.com or (808) 935-3916.
