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It's been more than a year now and there is still no word about the crash investigation revealing what actually happened or even what might have happened to N221AG.
Apparently, they (UAE GCAA, FAA, and NTSB) also still haven't figured out that the TPE331 engines were not mfg'd by Pratt & Whitney (as they indicate in their preliminary report released last April.) They also still have not figured out that "Grumman" and "McKinnon" are not equally valid or interchangeable identifications for the aircraft. A "Grumman" Goose is one that is certified under TC 654 and a "McKinnon" Goose is one that is certified under TC 4A24; one airplane cannot be simultaneously certified under two different type certificates!
I'm pretty sure that every time that they refer to it as a "Grumman" (or worse a "Grumman 21T") although it was registered as a "McKinnon G-21G" it was actually out of ignorance and not because they really know the difference. The fact of the matter is that N221AG was NOT a "McKinnon" aircraft at all because McKinnon did not "build" it and it was not a model "G-21G" because it both never conformed to that model's type design and McKinnon never certified it as one.
Everybody seems to know that it was actually "built" (i.e. converted) by the Fish & Wildlife Service in Alaska but nobody seems to know the regs (especially pertaining to production under FAR 21 and also identification and registration under FAR 45) well enough to know that FWS has never had (or even could have) authority to build a "McKinnon" aircraft; they could build only "FWS" aircraft, regardless of who the supposed original TC or design holder was. That's the rule for production; you build it and it's yours. Nobody is allowed to build a "new" aircraft and then say it was built by someone else - especially when it is built by an amateur and he claims that it was built by the "factory" when it was not. But that's exactly what happened in the case of the Aleutian Goose.
If FWS had built an actual (i.e. conforming) model G-21G, it would have been registered (if done properly anyway) as a "McKinnon-Fish & Wildlife Service" G-21G because it would have been an "amateur-built" copy of a certificated type design not built actually by the factory and because it was built without a PC, APIS, or other FAR Part 21 quality system. FWS never had any FAA approval or status under FAR Part 21 as an OEM. As such, it would have been required to have a non-standard serial number - one that was specifically precluded from matching the format of a factory serial number so that it would NOT be confused with a factory-built aircraft.
The Aleutian Goose was not only built by the Fish & Wildlife Service, it was their own in-house design as well. They collaborated and consulted with McKinnon and his contract engineering firm, Strato Engineering Co. of Burbank, CA. They derived some of their engineering analyses and documentation from existing McKinnon data for the model G-21G. They even discussed having McKinnon get their design fully certified under McKinnon's TC as a model "G-21F" - but that never happened. In reality, it was a 90% new and unique design that shared very little in common with an actual McKinnon G-21G. In fact, on just the basis of numbers of engineering drawings used, it was more "Volpar" turbine Beech 18 than it was a "McKinnon G-21G." The vast majority of engineering drawings used to build it, however, were completely unique to it and were drawn by FWS people. As such, it would have been more properly identified and registered as a "Fish & Wildlife Service G-21F" but like other homebuilts, because the model G-21F was not a type-certificated design, it should have never had anything more than an Experimental certificate of airworthiness.
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“To invent the airplane is nothing. To build one is something. But to fly is everything!” - Otto Lilienthal
Natasha: "You got plan, darling?"
Boris: "I always got plan. They don't ever work, but I always got one!"
Remember, any dummy can be a dumb-ass...
In order to be a smart-ass, you first have to be "smart"
and to be a wise-ass, you actually have to be "wise"
Last edited by Rajay on Sat Nov 17, 2012 5:21 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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