Benadryl, Cannabis & the FAA No-Fly List: Fatal Lessons for Pilots

SPEAKER_1 (0:02)

Welcome to NTSB News Talk where we talk about recent accidents from the past few weeks, newly released NTSB preliminary and final reports, and other safety related news.

The views expressed on this show are really just the opinions of the hosts and not the aviation news talk network. This podcast is not affiliated with or endorsed by the NTSB, the National Transportation Safety Board. This podcast is for entertainment and education and is not a replacement for flight instruction. Now here are your hosts, CFI and award-winning aviation journalist, Rob Mark and Max Trescott, CFI and author who's trained as an accident investigator.

Max Trescott (0:44)

Welcome to NTSB News Talk, Max Trescott.

Rob Mark (0:47)

Hey, and I'm Rob Mark.

Max Trescott (0:48)

Hey Rob, we have all kinds of accidents to report on today, and at the end, I've put a special group together of accidents that have come out that have one thing in common, and that is a lot of usage of drugs. So we're going to talk about both over-the-counter drugs, prescription medications. So I hope people will stick around for that, because I think for many of these over-the-counter medications, pilots are just not familiar with how they affect them during flight and how they are not allowed to use them for days after they take these drugs.

Rob Mark (1:20)

And I think another part of that is that when people drive cars with these meds, they think, well, I'm driving a car with this Benadryl or whatever in my system, how bad can it be? And it's much different in an airplane.

Max Trescott (1:37)

Yeah, it's getting pretty bad. The NTSB did a study a couple years ago that said that fully 40% of fatal accidents now involve one type of drug or another, and most of them are these over-the-counter medications. So, yeah, just because you can buy it over-the-counter doesn't mean that you can fly with it. Well, we'll get to our recent accidents in just a moment, but first let me mention Avemco. No agents, no brokers, just aviation underwriters who understand pilots. That's Avemco Insurance Company. Call 888-628-4636 or visit avemco.com/ntsbnewstalk and save 5% as an NTSB News Talk listener. Premium credits are subject to underwriting guidelines, including Avemco recognized training and memberships.

Rob, why don't you start us off with our first recent accident?

Rob Mark (2:24)

Well, our first accident comes to us from Canada, the Saskatchewan area actually, where on September the 18th, two private pilots lost their lives when the Canadian registered Cessna 172 they were flying. Charlie Golf Papa Tango Oscar departed controlled flights for an as yet unknown reason. The accident occurred on a moonless night at, are you ready for this? At approximately 425 a.m. in the Moose Mountain Provincial Park in Saskatchewan. A company called Harbs Air, the company to which the airplane was registered, said the flight was from Regina to Steinbach, Manitoba via a city called Carlisle, and it was meant as a night cross-country flight. Now the local terrain in the area shows an abrupt transition from roughly 2,000 foot planes into 2,300 to 2,700 foot rolling hills. The field elevation at Kisbee where the wreckage is located is at 1,980 feet MSL.

I looked up the data fields on ADS-B for this particular flight, and the 172 was level at 5,400 feet and 109 knots until the data transmission just simply stopped. And I doubt seriously that there was an obstacle at 5,400 feet because the ground simply wasn't that high. But we talked about it that, you know, maybe they had gone out of ADS-B coverage because everything appeared normal at that point and that it just stopped.

That said, the thing that really jumps out at me about this accident is the time stamp. What in the world were these two pilots doing, flying a cross-country flight in a 172 in the middle of the night? It was VFR, but if that had been one of my fleet of airplanes, I can't remember a time when we ever allowed people to come and go in an airplane they were checked out in in the middle of the night because as we all know, nothing good ever happens after midnight. Again, this one's a really strange one, Max.

Max Trescott (4:47)

Yeah, I agree. They took off at 2:30 AM and to me that's absolutely nuts. Now, both of them were private pilots. They weren't student pilots. They had some experience. No moon, that's bad, of course, unless you're instrument rated in an instrument capable aircraft. There was some indication that there may have been some weather in the area. So you put all these things together and it's just a recipe for disaster. So our condolences to the family and friends of these pilots.