[bill1952]

I was a flight instructor at the st lucie international airport at that time.
While not directly involved with his primary pilots certification, i did know him well, as his training was primarily in vero beach airport, 11 miles north.
Bluntly put, he was a poor pilot who didn’t take correction and guidance well
Few wanted to fly with him.
I was appalled when he bought an aircraft beyond what I considered his ability to control, and even more so when he took off in marginal VFR conditions in the evening and then flew at night - over water with no visible horizon while NOT IFR certified and with helpless passengers.
And people; that is how they all died...
Fact.

[wetgundog]

Yeah, and how much of taxpayer’s money was spent recovery his sorry ass of a body?

[tuffydoodle]

Wow, thank you for the personal insight. I’m friends with an older, retired jet pilot who flies private jets now. He didn’t know jr but I guess you pilots study the accidents pretty closely. His take on the accident is close to yours, without the personal knowledge.

[Kickaha]

That is fatal arrogance. His passengers died because of it and their own lack of discrimination.

[Controlling Legal Authority]

I flew right by that area the day before. When I got a weather brief all seemed well for a visual flight. And it was on the ground, but after about a thousand feet or so Above ground level the visibility was so poor due to haze that I would have turned around if I hadn’t been instrument rated.

[Alberta's Child]

There were a number of stories making the rounds here in New Jersey (the flight departed from here) -- allegedly from people who worked at the airport. They describe a scene of a JFK Jr. under a lot of stress and very concerned about the weather conditions, but harassed by his harridan wife and her sister to fly that night.

JFK and his wife were not flying to Martha's Vineyard. They were destined for Hyannis Port -- on the Massachusetts mainland -- but were headed to Martha's Vineyard to drop off the sister on the way.

[US_MilitaryRules]

Yep!

[Oldhunk]

I would imagine the Piper six seater he was flying had an autopilot. I owned a Beechcraft A-36 back in those days, which was pretty much the equivalent of the Piper Kennedy was flying. My aircraft had an autopilot and I would assume Kennedy’s plane had one also.

Even though he was not instrument rated, he certainly should have known how to use the autopilot and could have made a safe descent.

[Fla.Deporable]

You speak the truth. BTW, vero beach dodgertown bump. Still remember eastern airlines flying into vero a kid.