A light airplane that crashed and burst into flames at Montgomery-Gibbs Executive Airport on Labor Day, killing the two men aboard, had been flying ‘very erratically’ prior to plunging to the ground, according to a preliminary report released Thursday.
Flight instructor Frederic Hewett, 37, and a student of his, Roger Shimizu, 45, were fatally injured when the Cessna 172 went down on a runway at the Serra Mesa general-aviation airport shortly before 5:30 p.m. on Sept. 7.
The two were taking part in an instructional flight at the time and had been airborne for a little over an hour, according to the National Transportation Safety Board.
They died at the scene of the accident.
Security-camera video footage captured images of the single-engine four-seat plane being flown through repeated “go-arounds,” a maneuver in which pilots begin and then abort a landing attempt on final approach or following touchdown, then circle around the airport to try again, the NTSB report states.
“Witnesses also observed the airplane and described (it) as flying very erratically during multiple go-around maneuvers, pitching upward steeply after the go-around was initiated, flying very slow and stalling before the airplane recovered,” according to the investigative document.
(PHOTO: KGTV)