Plane Crash
Jonathan Leber
Audio: 911 call for help from Lake MichiganPosted on 04/26/2005 7:11:36 PM PDT by Jean S
A 20-year-old ministry student's rented single-engine plane ran out of gas and went down in Lake Michigan about five miles offshore, prompting him to make a frantic 911 call from his cell phone pleading for help.
| Plane Crash |
|
Jonathan Leber |
| 911 call |
| Audio: 911 call for help from Lake Michigan |
Rescue crews in boats, helicopters and planes spent much of Tuesday searching the choppy waters for Jonathan Leber before calling off the search late in the afternoon.
Leber told a dispatcher he had no flotation device and was planning to swim to shore.
"I need any help real fast," Leber of Springfield, Va., said in the call shortly before midnight Monday.
"My plane's going down real fast," he added as the dispatcher asked him questions.
He said, "I'm in the water" before the water could be heard in the background and the call cut off.
The Coast Guard estimated Leber could survive in the 44-degree water for about four hours, Lt.j.g. Boris Montasky said. Investigators don't believe the plane floated for long.
Leber, who was preparing for the ministry at Maranatha Baptist Bible College in Watertown, was flying west across the lake when he radioed he was low on fuel, Federal Aviation Administration spokeswoman Elizabeth Isham Cory said.
He ditched his plane in the lake a short time later.
Leber was flying under visual flight rules and was not required to file a flight plan, Cory said.
"He had gone for the weekend to New York. He had stopped in Michigan Sunday and was coming back from Michigan," said Darryl Sturgill, assistant to the college's president.
Leber had rented the plane from Wisconsin Aviation Four Lakes Inc. of Madison.
"It's tragic," said Jeff Baum, the company's president. "He was a young man with a promising life."
The National Transportation Safety Board would investigate the crash. The search included Coast Guard boats and helicopters, a C-130 plane from the Canadian Coast Guard and boats from the Milwaukee Police and Fire Departments.
Coast Guard Lt. Rolando Hernandez said the search would not resume unless investigators had new information that would lead them to think Leber could be alive.
Complete coverage of this story will appear online later tonight and in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel in the morning.
Something is not quite right about the audio. Anyone who ditched a plane, would show a bit more emotion from the physically draining and exhausting experience. This guy is like... well its just another day in the drink, just like yesterday. And most folks know, even novices, that seat cushions ARE flotation devices. There is a lot that just doesn't add up here.
That "Bush's fault" is, how can I say, getting a little lame.
Don't be ignorant. He didn't deserve to die.
John Denver didn't pre-flight either and he ran out of gas too.
How long have you had your ticket? I have had mine for 25 years. You don't fly over water with one engine at night. All pilots know that. You lose the engine you lose your life.
Yeah, I somehow missed that on the first read. I can't imagine that the plane wouldn't have been required to have a flotation device on board. At that temperature though, a life jacket would be useful for a few hours?
I know. I just wish there could be one thread sometime about somebody making a fatal error that didn't end up trashing the guy before he's even gotten a decent funeral.
Everybody makes mistakes. Some of them are fatal. Few of us know in advance which mistake we'll make... will be our last one.
People from outside the region always underestimate how big the Great Lakes are.
Novice pilots on extended cross country trips many times miscalculate fuel consumption when encountering head winds ... thus the empty fuel tank scenario short of destination. This is particularly vexing when you run out of fuel over the Great Lakes ... especially in early spring when water temperatures are only 45 degrees.
"I just wish there could be one thread sometime about somebody making a fatal error that didn't end up trashing the guy before he's even gotten a decent funeral." How about two threads with errors that did not turn out fatal?
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1391498/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1241693/posts
I reread my post and you had no reason to have it deleted. I hope you don't go to a fit of tears when the FAA comes out with their report.
I am sorry he died. He was not a well trained pilot and did not understand the incredible danger that he put himself in.
He was probably a great guy but he was a poor and inexperienced pilot.
Lack of fuel or not, you do not fly VFR at night in a single engine plane over Lake Michigan at midnight.
It's really special that you have your pilot license and can critique this kid, letting us know all the mistakes he made that you would never make. How about throwing in a prayer too?
I didn't have your post deleted. I don't know why it was.
You're absolutely right about everything you say. I would like to think you're just saying all that here because it is somewhat anonymous and distant, or would you get the same thrill about saying the same thing to the grieving wife and kids at the funeral?
I'd like to think that there's some here who might hold back from that. But I'm not so sure.
On small airplanes, the seats are just like in a car.
The cushions do not come off.
Running out of fuel is the most avoidable accident there is.
You are supposed to measure the fuel in the tanks with a measuring stick, before you take off. so you know exactly how much there is. (every time)
You know how many gallons an hour the engine burns, so you know exactly how long you can fly. You do not "accidently" run out of fuel.
It is a violation to land a plane with less than a half hour's fuel left. You can be fined for doing that.
I feal sorry for him, but he learned all that when he learned to fly.
And how cold they are right now.
There's no way anyone without the proper protective gear, if it exists, could hang on for very long in Lake Michigan at this time of year.
Prayers for sure.
Tragically you are very right. When I flew over water at night it was IFR only. I do not care what the visibility is, if you do not fly it IFR you can become a statistic. Your visual references are almost nil. The same can be said for flying at night in the Rocky Mountains. I would only fly an IFR approach into an airport in the mountains. You can not see mountains at night and they are very hard when you hit them.
Negative, you always have a floation device. The pants that your wearing work very good in a pinch. I know that he hasnt had some of the water survival training that I had but its really not that hard to make them into a floation device.
I also feel for his family. This is a sad event.
Prayers sent.
He may have flown off course and wasted precious fuel trying to find his way back.
Not quite. Based on NTSB findings and witnesses (he was just offshore at Monterey) Denver over-controlled his EZ while reaching back to change tanks; put his foot into the rudder and, at low altitude, flipped the plane over IIRC...
...he also didn't have a current medical certificate, i.e., wasn't legal to fly in the first place. Dumb.
Charles Lindburg
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