This is an excerpt from a report made to the Aviation Safety Reporting System. The narrative is written by the pilot, rather than FAA or NTSB officials. To maintain anonymity, many details, such as aircraft model or airport, are often scrubbed from the reports.
A near miss occurred between a Piper PA-25 Comanche and a Gravity Defiant Paramotor (Ultralight). The incident occurred 2.7 nm west of ZZZ, about 4 minutes prior to sunset.
The ultralight was on a heading of 104 at 46 mph approaching ZZZ at a GPS altitude of 820 feet, when the PA-25 overflew the centerline of the ultralight from directly astern at a GPS altitude of 975 feet. The separation at the closest point of approach was 155 feet, with a closing velocity of 120 mph, based on review of ADS-B data.
The PA-25 was not maneuvering prior to the merge nor after the merge, implying that the PA-25 pilot did not see the ultralight.
Immediately after the merge the ultralight made a diving right hand turn, losing 400 feet of altitude and developing lateral separation from the PA-25’s flight path in order to clear the wake turbulence, before returning to stable flight and landing at ZZZ.
Contributing Factors:
- The PA-25 pilot was heads down at the time of the incident and did not “see and avoid.”
- It was about 4 minutes prior to sunset.
- The ultralight has a blind spot to the rear of the aircraft.
- The ultralight’s wing is predominantly black with neon green and white striping.
- The ultralight does not have ADS-B.
- The ultralight was not on CTAF/UNICOM at the time of the incident.
During maintenance on the ultralight the day prior, the two strobes located on opposing sides of the ultralight were removed. They were not re-installed prior to flight. The SOP for strobe usage is to turn the strobes on 30 minutes prior to sunset or when in the vicinity of ZZZ.
Primary Problem: Human Factors
ACN: 1921728
If I flew an ultralight, I would never fly it around big airplanes that could not see me, I value my life to much to play high school stink finger with rules and regs. to say, it says here I can fly in the pattern if I want too. Not good for nothing, except to get killed. End of story. If you want to play, you got to pay.. Go fly your ultralight somewhere where their is no traffic, thats what I would do, life is to preshes .
if ultralight had no adsb how was it tracked to determine closest distance
Self reporting. The ultralight knew where it was. Of course everyone else ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Ever notice how the police cars have gotten to look like Christmas trees when they want to be seen? While I would not fly without markers and strobes, there are some aircraft with no electrical systems that are legal, which gets to the point of Pawnee Pilot: Look out of your windows, especially in close, you might see something you don’t want to hit!
Let’s see no working strobes why would I fly. That flight should have waited until strobes installed back in.
Agree. You’re quite right
Agree. You’re quite right
Bad light, no lights. What could possible go wrong?
“Heads down”, what could possibly go wrong?
A Comanche is a PA-24
PA-25 is a Pawnee
I was wondering if anyone else was going to catch that