Several pilots said the NTSB was just looking for scapegoats. "It is hard to believe that two experienced pilots would fail to monitor airspeed," one said.
He's an idiot. It happens all the time, esp. with a high workload. The NTSB accident files are LITTERED with them.
HairoftheDog: A just for the helluvit bump
Even experienced pilots sometimes forget that your inside wing will stall out quicker in a tight turn if you're careless with the rudder. Come in high and fast with the flaps extended, crank it around to make base leg, mess up your rudder coordination, and BINGO! that inside wing stalls out, not enough altitude for recovery, and you corkscrew into the ground.
My flight instructor was a real stickler for teaching "inadvertent spins" even though stall/spin recovery was no longer required on the private pilot flight test when I took it (back in the early 70s some time). We shook that Cessna 150 every which way but loose and did stall/spins from every possible configuration. And we had to go out with full fuel because he was a little skinny guy and I was a little skinny 16 year old kid - there wasn't enough weight to enter the spin otherwise.
And I seem to recall that Wellstone liked to fly with this pilot because he would get him to his destination no matter what - in other words tended to bust his minimums or at least push 'em pretty hard. Poor visibility and icing just make the likelihood of an inadvertent stall on approach that much greater. Me, I'm Chicken of the Sky -