6 ms·
3 Tesla Execs Dead In Palo Alto Plane Crash
- jazzychad 17y agoI wish I didn't get karma for submitting this :(
- btipling 17y agoNews organizations make a ton of money when lots of people die in some horrific way. You're not profiting from the bad news, you're gaining from informing others.
- maurycy 17y agoFuc^W My deepest condolences to their families. I'm suspicious it is somehow related to the oil overlords. Big money, big risks.
- djb_hackernews 17y agoSad News. This reminds me of the time I was working at a startup and the office admin booked a flight for the three founders to attend a conference or some such. Same flight for all three, seemed reasonable to me, but after some stern discussion that never happened again.
- diego 17y agoIt's interesting how some people do this, yet don't give a second thought to driving together all the time.
- jamesbkel 17y agoTrue, I imagine a plane crash is very much an all or nothing venture (major and few survivors vs. minor with just injuries). Perhaps not so much with driving. Right now just speculating, but I'd be curious to if anyone's created a breakdown of traffic fatalities by # of passengers in each vehicle and # passenger fatalities. I've seen that sort of thing before, but almost always in the context of teen/new drivers. Couldn't find anything quickly, will look after work.
- deleted 17y ago[deleted]
- neurotech1 17y agoFrom experience As somebody who lost their flight status after a car wreck, driving is much more dangerous. At least in an aircraft, theres always the possibility of ejecting out, bailing out, or using a "ballistic parachute" (Cirrus makes them)to recover the plane - the problem is when the pilot doesn't realize they're in trouble until its too late. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cirrus_Aircraft_Parachute_System http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cirrus_Aircraft_Parachute_Syste... Bailout options do exist for GA/Light Aircraft.
- paulgerhardt 17y agoYes but those options aren't exactly practical for the most common types of incidents: power failure (especially during take-off and landing) and collisions with terrain due to inclement weather. From the limited amount of technical details available, I would guess that a combination of the two happened here. While small duel engine aircraft may be able to sustain cruising altitude under significant strain on one engine, they are notorious for not being able to climb, and particular take off with only half power - certainly not with 3 people and baggage. This is speculation, but by the looks of the location of the crash, and given that Palo Alto airport has a left hand pattern on runway 31 (that is, they fly counter-clockwise around the airport after taking off in the magnetic direction of 310 degrees) they most likely experienced a power failure during or very shortly after take off on one engine (but maybe both) and attempted to turn back to the airport to land. Interestingly +100ft transmission towers east of the airport are mentioned in FAA notices. These may or may not refer to the ~200ft power lines in the neighborhood. Without of a power failure they should have been +500ft before turning crosswind. http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?hl=en&ie=UTF8&msa=0&msid=102777535042488518720.00047fce4d030d352edd3&source=embed&ll=37.464912,-122.1172&spn=0.022958,0.042872&z=15 http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?hl=en&ie=UTF8&msa=0&#... The reality of the situation is that, like medicine, reactive measures like Bailout mechanisms will always be less successful than preventive treatments which maintain good health, here in the form of thorough annual maintenances, preflight inspections, and run-ups (testing the full operation of the engine before leaving the ground.)
- neurotech1 17y agoYou are likely correct on most of that, except that the cirrus chute is good down to 500 ft. That said, there are other systems that can help in accidents like this. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TAWS http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TAWS Another option is NavFLIR / EVS which is basically a IR camera to give enhanced visibility during bad weather. If they did have an engine failure after take-off, NavFLIR could have aided a forced landing. The cause of this crash are not yet known. Feel free to email me if you want.
- timdorr 17y agoThe same thing happened to Atlanta's arts community. Most of the benefactors from the area were in Paris for an event of some sort. They flew back on the same plane and it crashed, and with it went Atlanta's funding for arts. The community died the instant the benefactors did. It's really a horrible story :(
- gte910h 17y agoDo you have a link to a story about this? (Concerned Atlantean here)
- idlewords 17y agoIt was perfectly reasonable, assuming you weren't flying a regional airline. Commercial air travel via large jets is orders of magnitude safer than civil aviation.
- ryanwaggoner 17y agohttp://philip.greenspun.com/flying/safety http://philip.greenspun.com/flying/safety
- elblanco 17y agoI was just on a conference call today with some coworkers out in the area when the power went out. Had no idea why. This is truly sad news.
- staunch 17y agohttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cessna_310 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cessna_310
- JshWright 17y agoSo, it's at least a 30 year old plane. I'm not connected at all with the private aviation industry... What is the useful (safe?) lifespan of an aircraft like this?
- masonry 17y agoThis may be useful: http://www.ntsb.gov/NTSB/Query.asp http://www.ntsb.gov/NTSB/Query.asp
- noodle 17y agoif you take care of a plane well, especially a small one not being used heavily, it'll last. for reference, most of the big commercial airlines have an average fleet age in the range of 15-20 years.
- evgen 17y agoAirline fleets get a lot more usage than GA planes, but they are also maintained at a much higher rigor than GA planes. With GA planes I would be less concerned with the airframe and more interested in the tach-hours on the engine since the last overhaul.
- pc 17y agoIt's common. GA aircraft have quite rigorous maintenance schedules, with inspection and overhaul every 50 or 100 hours, which (mostly) keeps even old planes airworthy. Almost all airfields will have plenty of 30 or 40 year old planes.
- lisper 17y agoMuch more likely than the age of the airplane was the visibility. PAO has been foggy in the mornings of the last few days, and the photo in the story makes it look like it was foggy when the crash happened.
- luminary 17y agoInside job, anyone?
- tbgvi 17y agoHow much karma do I need before I can down vote someone? This seemed like a good place to ask.
- jazzychad 17y ago200, in my experience. Interestingly, you cannot downvote top-level comments on stories that you submit, however you can downvote the children comments.
- philwelch 17y agoYou can't downvote any comment that's an immediate child of an item you posted, whether that item is a comment or a submission. For the general sense of "you".
- luminary 17y agoIrrespective of the down-votes, I do see another user expressing something similar. "I'm suspicious it is somehow related to the oil overlords. Big money, big risks."
- fnid2 17y agoc'mon, get real. Do you really think there are people out there looking for Cessnas flying around shooting them down if there are EV execs on board? What did they do? Shoot a missile through the fog? Take it down with a privately owned F14? Plant a bomb on it before it took off? It's a ridiculous hypothesis.
- natrius 17y agoI don't know anything about planes, but my hunch is that sabotaging an airplane, especially a private one, is easier than you're making it sound.
- volomike 17y agoStill no report yet on which 3 it was. They're probably talking to family members, first. Sad, none the less.
- fnid2 17y agoThis is tragic. Very sorry to hear it. As an intern, I worked for a company and found in the employee manual that there were explicit restrictions on the number of execs who could be on the same plane or even in the same car! I thought it was a silly clause and asked about it and the execs said, "Yes, the probability is small, but multiplied by the damage that would occur gives a very big risk of damage." That made a lot of sense. It doesn't cost much to avoid the risk, just take different flights.
- maukdaddy 17y agoMost companies have a similar policy actually. I've come across this several times while developing information security policies.
- dschobel 17y agoI knew plenty of kids growing up whose parents traveled separately when the kids were not with them. It's morbid stuff being responsible for other people...
- fnid2 17y agoIt is. When I started a company and got customers who depend on me, I started driving slower. I stopped taking the kinds of risks I used to take. I even worry, briefly, when I go skiing.
- markbao 17y agoIt was confirmed that Elon Musk was not on board. Source: http://twitter.com/kensweet/status/9247008924 http://twitter.com/kensweet/status/9247008924 (guy is a reporter for FOX Business)
- bprater 17y agoMy first thought was about Elon. Anyone passing away is tremendously sad. But in that sadness, I think it is good to acknowledge we didn't lose a great visionary today. We need them.
- mingdingo 17y agoSpeaking of lost visionaries, check out Daniel Lewin (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_M._Lewin http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_M._Lewin). He co-founded Akamai and was killed on American Airlines Flight 11, possibly while trying to stop a hijacker. A very smart and influential guy who died tragically.
- volomike 17y agoWow. Didn't know that one. I guess you never know who you might be sitting with on a flight these days. I would not have guessed Daniel in a million years as formerly working for IDF.
- fjabre 17y agoTragic... It's seems like once every other month you hear about a small passenger jet crashing like this. This one happening yesterday: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/17/nyregion/17plane.html http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/17/nyregion/17plane.html Anyone know if it's certain types of small aircraft that are prone to this or is it just small civilian operated aircraft in general? Don't think I'll by getting on one of these anytime soon in any case.
- gwern 17y agoIn general. Small civilian aircraft are death traps (although maybe not as bad as cars); https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/General_aviation#Regulation_and_safety https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/General_aviat... > According to the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board, in 2005 general aviation in the United States (excluding charter) suffered 1.31 fatal accidents for every 100,000 hours of flying in that country, compared to 0.016 for scheduled airline flights. (One can imagine many reasons for this; more professional maintenance, more professional pilots, more redundancy in the systems of big airplanes; whatever. But the safety differential is not imaginary.)
- humbledrone 17y agoWhat a crazy coincidence -- the CEO of the first software company I worked for was a pilot, and he also flew his personal aircraft into some power lines.
- wakeupthedawn 17y agoIt was crazy foggy in Palo Alto this morning and has been for the past of couple of mornings. I'm really surprised they tried to fly in those conditions. The report suggests that the power outage in Palo Alto may have been caused by the plane crash. I find this hard to believe because the traffics lights were only down in the area near Stanford and downtown PA; as you drove closer to East Palo Alto, the lights were working. Of course maybe there was a larger outage earlier, and they just restored it in this pattern.
- mmastrac 17y agoThere's a picture somewhere on the web (sorry, no link) of a severed high-voltage power line linked to this crash.
- pavel_lishin 17y agoI recall reading a list of the top 10 ways to live a longer life somewhere, and pretty high up on the list was "Do not get a pilot's license." Apparently, CEOs, doctors and the like assume that competence in one area of life implies that they're competent to do anything, like flying a plane.
- dschobel 17y agoWhile that sounds like great advice to trot out every time a small craft crashes, in the absence of data it is functionally worthless.
- jrockway 17y agoExactly. "Don't get a driver's license" or "don't go outside" are just as valid. My thought is, if I die or become horribly brain-damaged, I won't really care, because the capacity to care is gone. Existence only goes as far as you can interpret it.
- gridspy 17y agoIsn't there someone else in your life who would care?
- pavel_lishin 17y agoSo your point is that avoiding danger is pointless, because once danger kills you, you don't care? Race you across the interstate! Go!
- mrkurt 17y agoIt's true. General aviation is reasonably dangerous, approaching motorcycle levels. A link mentioned earlier in this discussion cites some statistics: > If the average speed of car travel is 50 miles per hour, those 1.7 deaths occur in 2 million hours of driving. This makes general aviation, with 16 deaths per 1 million hours, roughly 20 times as dangerous per hour than driving. http://philip.greenspun.com/flying/safety http://philip.greenspun.com/flying/safety If you look at "danger per mile", GA is only ~10x as dangerous as driving. I prefer the "per hour" statistic, though, but not for any good reason. Of note: every insurance company I've ever dealt with for life and property insurance has asked if I'm a private pilot. My last renter's insurance policy had a rider exempting me from coverage when flying. Insurance companies are historically pretty good at assessing risk. Profitable ones, anyway.
- brown9-2 17y agoDoes anyone else find the editorializing in this article disturbing? This is the second paragraph of the article: Employees at the electric carmaker — a company that has done everything but paint its logo green in a bid to sell itself as environmentally-friendly — have always had a penchant for gas-guzzling private airplanes. But that's sort of been the Tesla way. An electric car without compromising speed or style. The roadster's perfect for the Hollywood and Silicon Valley elite — environmental credibility without having to give up your private plane. 3 people just died. Is it really necessary to slam the type of people that buy electric cars in an article reporting on their deaths?
- staunch 17y agoBan worthy IMHO. I think the whole Gawker network should be banned here though, all bottom feeders.
- idlewords 17y agoThat's what voting is supposed to be for. I find this site disturbingly ban-happy.
- zackattack 17y agoWe can't downvote articles.
- pvg 17y agoYou can not-vote. And if warranted, flag.
- pkaler 17y agoI flagged the story. Injecting vitriolic editorializing into a breaking story about the death of 3 people is unclassy and flat out poor journalism.
- dandelany 17y agoI couldn't agree with you more... I found this paragraph and the one following it to be in terrible taste. Any journalist who thinks that someone's death is a good opportunity to slip in some snide "toldjaso" comment like this should find a new profession.
- MikeCapone 17y agoElon Musk has written this note on the Tesla Website: "Three Tesla employees were on board a plane that crashed in East Palo Alto early this morning. We are withholding their identities as we work with the relevant authorities to notify the families. Our thoughts and prayers are with them. Tesla is a small, tightly-knit company, and this is a tragic day for us." - Elon Musk, CEO
- dasht 17y agoFYI, and hopefully not just morbid: Local TV news (sorry, no link) reports that planes taking off from that run-way must turn 10 degrees left or 10 degrees right after take-off. They can't go straight because of a nearby field (Moffet field) - a former naval air base currently owned by NASA and famous for being where the Google guys park their jet. This plane was planned (or instructed, I'm not sure) to go right - they went left. That they went left AND that they failed to gain enough altitude to avoid the power lines is tentatively speculated to be indicative of a left engine failure. They took out three high-tension power lines which, the plane geek quoted on the news pointed out, is "likely to seriously interfere with the forward progress of the plane". They came down in a very dense residential neighborhood with debris hitting a nearby day-care center. A consolation is that as of this report, the pilot and passengers appear to be the only victims. The plane mostly came down in the middle of a street. Nearby residents report that they tried but could not get anywhere close to the plane because of the intensity of the heat from the fuel flame. It was the resident's impression that post-crash fuel explosions scattered debris which is what led to the structure fires. The thought that occurs to me is that I wonder if the pilot retained enough control that he aimed for the street on purpose either hoping for a survivable crash landing or (shudder) in a heroic last act to save others knowing he had no chance, personally.