GA havari i USA - CNN / ASN

Date:	28-DEC-2019
Time:	c. 09:20 LT
Type:	Piper PA-31T Cheyenne II
Owner/operator:	Cheyenne Partners LLC
Registration:	N42CV
C/n / msn:	31T-8020067
Fatalities:	Fatalities: 5 / Occupants: 6
Other fatalities:	0
Aircraft damage:	Written off (damaged beyond repair)
Category:	Accident
Location:	SW of Lafayette Regional Airport (LFT), LA -    United States of America
Phase:	Initial climb
Nature:	Private
Departure airport:	Lafayette Regional Airport, LA (LFT/KLFT)
Destination airport:	Atlanta-DeKalb Peachtree Airport, GA (PDK/KPDK)
Investigating agency:	NTSB

Narrative:
The aircraft was destroyed by impact with a road and a post-crash fire southwest of SW of Lafayette Regional Airport (LFT/KLFT), Lafayette, Louisiana. Five occupants onboard sustained fatal injuries and one occupant sustained serious injuries.
The Piper PA-31T Cheyenne II had just taken off from runway 22L at Lafayette Regional Airport.

Five people died in a small plane crash near Louisiana airport, officials say

By Melissa Alonso, Dakin Andone and Steve Almasy, CNN

Updated 0238 GMT (1038 HKT) December 29, 2019 

(CNN)Five people died Saturday when a small plane that was headed to Atlanta for a college football playoff semifinal crashed near Lafayette Regional Airport in Louisiana, officials said.

A sixth person on board survived the crash, which occurred around 9:22 a.m. CT, Lafayette Fire Chief Robert Benoit Benoit said in a news conference.

One of the people killed was a sports reporter whose father-in-law is a coach for Louisiana State University's top-ranked football team.

Fire officials later identified the dead as:

• Ian E. Biggs, 51, pilot

• Robert Vaughn Crisp II, 59

• Carley Ann McCord, 30

• Gretchen D. Vincent, 51

• Michael Walker Vincent, 15

McCord was a sports reporter with WDSU television in New Orleans. She was the daughter-in-law of Louisiana State University Offensive Coordinator Steve Ensminger, according to WDSU. LSU is playing in Atlanta on Saturday in one of the NCAA's two national championship semifinals and Ensminger is in the LSU coaches' booth.

Sports journalist Carley Ann McCord was killed in the crash.

McCord was a former employee of 104.5 ESPN Baton Rouge. During a pregame show, 104.5 ESPN radio host Matt Moscona said on-air that McCord was on her way to Atlanta to watch the LSU game.

ESPN, which was televising the game, spoke to LSU head coach Ed Orgeron beforehand.

"Steve and his wife and his family are very distraught," Orgeron said.

Afterward, Orgeron said he learned of the crash by text message about 12:30 p.m. ET, then told Ensminger. Two LSU stars, Joe Burrow and Justin Jefferson, said they didn't find out about McCord's death until after the game, in which LSU players set several college football playoff records in winning 63-28.

Joel Vilmenay, the WDSU's president and general manager, said his staff was devastated. He called McCord an amazing talent.

"Carley's passion for sports journalism and her deep knowledge of Louisiana sports, from high school to the professional ranks, made her an exceptional journalist," he said. "As we reflect on her impressive body of work, we offer our deepest condolences to her family."

The injured passenger was identified as Stephen Wade Berzas, 37. He is in critical condition, Lafayette Fire Department spokesman Alton Trahan said in a news release.

The charred wreckage of a plane crash in Lafayette, Louisiana, Saturday, December 28, 2019.

Three people were injured on the ground, including a person who was in or near a car and two employees of a nearby post office, Benoit said. The postal workers were treated for smoke inhalation and are doing fine, he said.

The eight-passenger aircraft was taking off from the airport when it crashed, Benoit said. The crash site is about 4 miles from the airport. The NTSB identified the aircraft as a Piper PA-31T.

Officials arrived at the crash site at 9:30 a.m., Benoit said. Several local and state agencies were on the scene cooperating, and the FAA has done a preliminary investigation, he said. Authorities expect the NTSB to arrive later Saturday evening, Benoit said.

Weather conditions at Lafayette Regional Airport were listed as foggy throughout Saturday morning, with a visibility of 0.75 miles, according to the National Weather Service. At 7 a.m. local time, visibility was listed at 0.25 miles, which the weather service designates as "dense fog."

Lafayette is about 130 miles west of New Orleans.

CNN's Allison Chinchar, JIll Martin and Artemis Moshtaghian contributed to this report.

Hormuz Stredet kan være utfordrende - Tyler Rogoway

thedrive.com

Navy Confirms Boat Swarm Seen Alongside Carrier Group In This Satellite Image Was Iranian

The U.S. Navy has confirmed that "multiple" small Iranian boats running alongside the Nimitz class aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln and other ships from her strike group as she sailed through Strait of Hormuz into the Gulf of Oman earlier this month, as seen in commercial satellite imagery. The service has rejected reports that any of the Iranian craft harassed or otherwise acted provocatively toward the carrier, saying the activity was within "normal behavior patterns." Still, the image of 18 small boats in very close proximity to Lincoln and her escorts is eye-opening and a stark reminder of the inherent risks of each transit through the Strait.

Flyhistorie

Flyhistorie

Flyhistorie utgis av Norsk Luftfartsmuseum og kommer ut med 4 nummer per år. Magasinet distribueres hovedsaklig gjennom abonnement.

Om magasinet
Magasinets hovedformål er å vekke og opprettholde flyhistorisk interesse over det ganske land, dokumentere flyhistorien og å fortelle hverandre hva som skjer i de respektive flyhistoriske miljøer.
Flyhistorie dekker norsk sivil og militær luftfarts historie fra flyvningens barndom helt fram til i dag. Bladet omhandler historie om personer og hendelser tilknyttet luftfarten og om materiell som bl.a. fly, flytyper, bakkeutstyr osv.
Bladet ønsker å være et "treffpunkt" for alle typer fly- og luftfartshistoriske miljøer i hele Norge. Foreninger/institusjoner kan bruke bladet til å skrive om seg selv og sine aktiviteter, og på denne måten nå ut til sine medlemmer og andre interesserte i hele vårt langstrakte land. Gjennom dette håper vi å styrke rekruttering og motivasjon for å delta i de allerede etablerte museums- og flyhistoriske miljøene over hele landet.
Bladet er av en "inkluderende" natur. Det vil si at alle bidrag mottas med takk, fra enthusiaster i alle miljøer, med alle interesser og i alle aldre.

Dagens bilde via Twitter

F-35.....F-15 .....A-10.......F-16......F-22

Helikopterhavariet på Hawaiis Kauai - Blir ny oppvask, a la Alaska, etter mange ulykker på øygruppen - BBC

Six bodies found after Hawaii helicopter crash

• 4 hours ago

Image copyright Getty Images

Image caption Several tour companies make such helicopter visits to Kauai, much of which is a state park

Rescuers have found the remains of six people after a helicopter crashed at the top of a mountain on the Hawaiian island of Kauai, authorities said.

The helicopter was carrying seven people. Officials said there were no signs of survivors.
A search for the final passenger would resume in the morning, depending on the weather, authorities added.
Two of the passengers are believed to have been minors, the Coast Guard said.
The aircraft was touring Kauai's rugged Napali coast when it encountered showers and high gusts of wind, the agency said. It was reported missing by the operator, identified as Safari Helicopters, at 18:06 on Thursday (04:06 GMT Friday), 40 minutes after it was due to land.
Steep terrain, low visibility, choppy seas and rain hampered the search for the wreckage, the Coast Guard said.
Petty Officer 1st Class Robert Cox, of the Coast Guard Joint Rescue Command Centre in Honolulu, said that weather conditions had been challenging. Winds on Friday were reported to be about 28mph (45km/h).
No signals were recorded from the aircraft's electronic locator after it went missing.

An MH-65 Dolphin helicopter and the Coast Guard Cutter William Hart took part in the search.
Several tour companies make such helicopter visits to Kauai, much of which is a state park and which is 80% uninhabited.
In April, a tour helicopter crashed into a residential neighbourhood in Kailua, 12 miles (19km) outside of Honolulu, killing all three people on board. Earlier in the month, a helicopter crash landed in the Sacred Falls State Park after suffering apparent engine failure.

Droner - Mystisk aktivitet i avsides Colorado - Tyler Rogoway

TYLER ROGOWAYView Tyler Rogoway's Articles

twitter.com/Aviation_Intel

The sparse expanses of Northeast Colorado have become ground zero for a bizarre mystery surrounding sightings of nighttime coordinated flights of groups of drones. From roughly 7 pm to 10 pm every night last week, an estimated 17 drones with six-foot spans have flown "grid patterns" over Phillips County and near its border with neighboring Yuma County, according to Phillips County Sheriff Thomas Elliott. The drones operate at a few hundred feet in the air and were brightly lit with strobing colored and white lights, leaving local residents and those driving through the area baffled. 

The Denver Post was first to report on the string of strange sightings. Local law enforcement, the FAA, DEA, U.S. Army, and the Air Force have said they have no idea what these aircraft are or who they belong to.    

The Denver Post writes: 

The sheriff’s office can’t explain where the drones are coming from or who is flying them. The estimated size and number of drones makes it unlikely that they’re being flown by hobbyists, Undersheriff William Myers said.

On Friday, Myers said he watched eight of the large drones flying along the Yuma County border near the intersection of U.S. 385 and County Road 54. At the same time, a single drone hovered about 25 miles away over the town of Paoli — it didn’t move all night, just hovered over the town — and eight more drones flew over Haxtun, about 10 miles down the road from Paoli, Myers said.

“Overhead they were probably doing 30, 40 mph,” he said. “They weren’t racing or flying around with speed.”

One resident who spotted a drone last week gave chase, Elliott said, driving behind it at about 50 mph, but lost the drone when he ran out of gas in Washington County.

The machines fly too high to be heard from the ground but can be seen by their strobing white lights along with red, blue and green lights, Myers said.

“The way Colorado law is written, none of the statutes fit for harassment or trespassing,” Myers said. “Colorado hasn’t gotten on board with identifying the airspace around your property as the actual premises, so we don’t have anything we could charge.”

The FAA does have rules for drones that weigh less than 55 pounds and requires such aircraft to be flown during daylight hours, within sight of the pilot, no higher than 400 feet above the ground, and not over people, among other rules. However, pilots can apply for and receive waivers from the FAA that exempts the pilots from many of those rules.

It’s also not clear whether the drones over Phillips and Yuma counties would be governed by those regulations. A drone the size of the ones spotted over the counties likely would weigh more than 55 pounds, Moss said. That means the drone operator would be flying commercially and would likely need to be a “manned aviator” — an actual pilot, Moss said.

Elliott said Monday that the sheriff’s office has received nine calls about the drones since last week. He said residents no longer need to call to report a simple sighting of the drones.

“We just want to know if one lands, if we can get our hands on it, or if they see someone operating them, that’s what we’re looking for now,” he said. “We know they exist.”

I think people will wonder why there is no video that we know of these sightings. Most amateur video shot of lights in the sky at night has very little value, but regardless, you have to remember that this is happening in very sparsely populated areas after dark. If it was occurring near an urban area, I think the lack of video would be a bit troubling, but in this case, I don't find it to be, especially considering the level of law enforcement knowledge of these events.

People seeing lights in the sky that they don't understand the origin of happens often, but this case seems far more consistent over a short timespan than something that could be easily blown off. Once again, the fact that law enforcement is well aware of it and discussing it as fact is also telling. This all begs the question, what is going on in this remote section of Colorado?

Based strictly on the descriptions conveyed, it sounds like someone or some group is testing a broad-area surveillance capability with lower-end autonomous drones. This could include something as simple as having a group fly a series of planned routes and return with the information gathered via autopilot. By doing so, a group of small, relatively inexpensive drones can cover a large area quickly instead of single, far more expensive assets that could take more time and offer less redundancy. Such a capability could be used for search and rescue, mapping, and general intelligence gathering. This also doesn't require man-in-the-loop control that would necessitate line-of-sight connectivity. Still, it is really flat terrain with endless farmland in the area where the sightings occurred, which means line-of-sight connectivity could be maximized, especially with the help of a large aerial or small tower, but the grid pattern nature of these flights that the Sheriff describes point to a coordinated and automated flight plan for the drones.

The airspace where this is occurring is peculiarly desolate, as well, making it ideally suited for such a task, but the flights are not legally occurring, which makes the whole affair quite suspicious. The fact that the activity is happening after sundown is even more intriguing and adds to the notion that whoever is doing this knows it is outside the bounds of FAA regulations. 

In addition, it would be very challenging to trace these aircraft back to their place of origin or point of flight termination. The drones could fly the majority of their missions with lights on and turn them off during launch and recovery. With very little ambient light, they would be all but undetectable to the naked eye. Also, remember that drones this size can takeoff from very small areas, so it's not like a runway is needed or anything like that. As such, they can originate from nearly anywhere.

VFRMAP.COM

This is basically the area where the sightings are occurring. It's largely uncontrolled airspace with a very sparse population.

VFRMAP.COM

Here you can see the relationship of the area of activity in relation to Denver and nearby Nebraska.

The reality is that an individual or small group with some resources can do this. It doesn't need to be a federal agency, the military, or some defense or aviation contractor. Although it all sounds relatively innocuous, it is possibly yet another sign of the potential threats small, commercially available unmanned aircraft pose. If the grid pattern reports are accurate and autonomous waypoint navigation is being used by these drones, it can be posited that similar basic concepts of operation were used in the game-changing attack on Saudi oil facilities in September. Furthermore, drones of this size can carry a relevant payload of deadly explosives instead of surveillance or electronic warfare gear. 17 drones flying at once that can surveil a broad area could be re-roled by a nefarious actor to strike 17 pinpoint fixed targets near-simultaneously, or swarm against a single high value one from multiple directions. 

This is the same drum I have been beating for years, and eventually, this threat will materialize in the continental United States as it has overseas. With that in mind, this type of event—which we will only see more of in the future—shouldn't be treated as just some interesting curiosity. There is no need to panic, but the mystery behind these aircraft should be solved and whoever is doing it should receive some sort of penalty for executing these types of operations outside of FAA regulations, even if there isn't a dark agenda behind the activity.

Some will say this is an overreaction, but those are probably the same people that laughed when some of us started warning of the potential threat of small drones being used unlawfully and for very negative purposes years ago. 

Regardless, a skyborne mystery is afoot in Colorado. It will be interesting to see if the flights continue and if the description of these sightings holds up. 

We will keep you updated as we find out more about these strange events. 

Update: 4:45pm PST—

It is worth noting that not far where these drones were sighted, F.E. Warren Air Force Base's intercontinental ballistic missile fields begin. Roughly 30 miles northwest of Haxtun. It is something to at least keep in mind as the story unfolds.

USAF

Contact the author: Tyler@thedrive.com

MiG-29 havarerte i Iran - ASN

Date:	25-DEC-2019
Time:	09:00 LT
Type:	MiG-29
Owner/operator:	Islamic Republic of Iran Air Force (IRIAF)
Registration:
C/n / msn:
Fatalities:	Fatalities: 1 / Occupants: 1
Other fatalities:	0
Aircraft damage:	Written off (damaged beyond repair)
Location:	near Mount Sabalan, Lesser Caucasus range -    Iran
Phase:	En route
Nature:	Military
Departure airport:	Tabriz Airport (TBZ/OITT)
Destination airport:	Tabriz Airport (TBZ/OITT)

Narrative:
The Iranian military fighter plane crashed under unknown circumstances into a mountain during a test flight after a major inspection.
The pilot died in the crash. His death was confirmed by Iranian authorities on Friday 27 December 2019.

The statement of the Iranian Army confirm that the fighter jet was piloted by Colonel Mohammad Reza Rahmani, an experienced pilot in the Air Forces service.
“Despite severe weather conditions and difficulty in navigating through the site of the crash, efforts to locate the pilot will continue by aerial and ground search and rescue teams,” adds the statement.