Experimental plane crash in Gila Bend: What's the risk of these types of aircraft?
An experimental plane that crashed in Gila Bend over the weekend, killing a person on board, has people wondering how these planes are certified to fly.
The crash killed one person and another was flown to the hospital for treatment.
Jack Norris has decades of flying experience and says people get into experimental planes mainly because they want to fly something they’ve built. There's also a financial component.
Wings and a motor classify it as a plane, but anything experimental comes with a risk.
"There’s always risk in flying. Experimental planes now are much more sophisticated than 30 years ago," Norris said.
He has 25 years of flying under his belt and says what went down in Gila Bend was an open-air frame cockpit.
"It’s essentially what is known as a hang-glider that became sophisticated by attaching that hang-glide wing to a trike. They put a large motor on that," Norris explained.
Like anything, you get out what you put in.
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"It all comes down to the builder," he said.
Norris put it in terms of vehicles – comparing a motorcycle to a pick-up truck.
"If you're going fast, and you don’t have an envelope around you but the air and maybe a few pieces of steel, it’s more of a risk if you have to put an airplane down," Norris said.
He says it’s an extensive process to get an aircraft certified by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).
LEARN MORE ABOUT THE FAA'S "EXPERIMENTAL" CLASSIFICATION HERE
"It’s pass-fail. I probably have one terabyte of information on what it took to build this plane," Norris said, referring to a plane in a hangar.
For many, building a plane comes down to the cost.
"This one would be around $100,000," he said.
A similar plane from a manufacturer would cost nearly half a million dollars.
Norris says the term experimental plane has been around for almost 50 years, but there are so many different types of planes that fall into that category. So when one goes down like this one in Gila Bend, it brings speculation to all of them.