On Saturday, March 23, 2019, a new airplane type was destroyed on its second test flight. Immediately after takeoff, the two-seater suffered pitch and roll oscillations. It climbed about 400 feet, then, still fluctuating in pitch and roll, crashed in a nearby field, killing the pilot, who was also the plane’s designer. Because it was a one-off aircraft, and an unusual one, at that, definitive aerodynamic or engineering answers are hard to establish. But the larger takeaways aren’t.
The designer of the plane, Richard Hogan, was born in 1956 in Fort Worth, Texas. His aviation passion ignited early, as he watched Air Force jets fly from the nearby base. He built paper planes and sketched futuristic-looking cars and aircraft. At 12, his grandfather told him his eyes weren’t good enough to be a pilot, suggesting instead a career in aircraft design. During high school, he developed the outlines of a cool-looking “personal commuter” plane that would be his lifelong dream. Hogan trained as an aeronautical engineer but told Plane & Pilot in a 2016 story that when he graduated at the end of the Vietnam War, “there were 10 aeronautical engineers for every job. I became a structural engineer but always stayed close to the aviation field and waited until I had the opportunity to get back into it.”
In 2011, now in his mid-50s with a wife and daughter, Hogan started a new kit aircraft company, Commuter Craft. Its first design was the Innovator. He told an Atlanta newspaper, “at some point in life, you say, ’This is who I am. I’ve got to do this.'” The goal was to sell kits to pilots, with a three-week assisted build at the factory and a three-month completion at home.
In 2015, the company flew a proof-of-concept prototype for about 60 hours, visited several airshows, and generated a lot of press interest. Orders were taken, investors found, and employees hired. It was a two-seat single-engine piston plane, with an aft pusher-propellor and twin-boom tail. Composite construction allowed for some smooth-looking curves. In that same 2016 article, we described the Innovator’s “wide and sleek” appearance as “attention-grabbing.” Friends said it looked just like the planes Hogan used to draw in high school.
Maybe the most striking design choice was making the Innovator a three-surface aircraft; it had canard, wing and tailplane. Most aircraft have two surfaces generating lift, the familiar wing and horizontal tail configuration. The tail surface provides a stabilizing balance force as well as angle of attack control.
Some two-surface aircraft have the smaller surface up front, where it’s called a canard. Examples include the Wright Flyer, Beechcraft Starship and Eurofighter Typhoon, among numerous others. Canards produce advantages in aerodynamic efficiency and control during aggressive maneuvering and how the aircraft behaves approaching a stall. A lifting canard is designed to stall before the wing, causing the nose to fall and thereby automatically preventing the wing from ever reaching its stall angle of attack.
“Maybe the most striking design choice was making the Innovator a three-surface aircraft; it had canard, wing and tailplane.”
Theoretical advantages of reducing total wetted surface area and duplicate lift by sharing downward balancing forces between the foreplane and tailplane are opposed in practice by the additional complexity. It’s an intriguing concept but requires complicated aerodynamic analysis. Commuter Craft often touted the stall-resistant advantages of the distinctive canard along with performance efficiencies and a predicted slow approach speed. The Innovator had no flaps on the main wing, but the canard had a movable trailing edge surface used for takeoff and landing.
If the company had survived, the plane’s design might have grown even more complex over time. Hogan’s plans for the Innovator included foldable wings and a roadable version, also known as a flying car. Based on impressive projected (but never proven) performance claims, Commuter Craft took 59 orders and grew to a dozen employees, with plans for an 82,000-square-foot factory.
The long-awaited second plane, internally called Ship2, was a pre-serial kit production model (kit production not to be confused with FAA Part 23 production). Three feet longer than the original prototype, Ship2 put the seats ahead of the wing. The original forward-hinged bubble canopy made it hard for people to get in and out of the cockpit, so it was replaced by large butterfly doors hinged on the A-pillar. Conventional control sticks replaced the small side-sticks used in the prototype. The main landing gear struts attached to the fuselage rather than the wings. The horizontal stabilizer was set lower on the twin booms.
Ship2 first flew on Feb. 26, 2019, and that flight nearly ended in disaster. The contracted pilot told the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) that “as soon as I came off the ground, the plane went into a wild oscillation of both pitch and roll. I ran out of elevator up trim within the first few seconds of that flight and then had a lot of control pressure involved to keep it flying around the pattern.” Details are scarce, as the single onboard camera lost its charge mid-flight, and the aircraft apparently wasn’t equipped with a lot of test instrumentation.
As weight came off the nose gear, the pilot said the rudders became mechanically locked. He “bumped off the elevator stop at least three times. I don’t know how many times during that flight the aircraft departed straight and level flight, all uncommanded; however, I would guess it to be around a dozen times. At one point, I considered bailing out.” With a reduction in engine power, he found the plane more controllable and quickly returned for a landing. The flight lasted 11 minutes.
Ship2 was disassembled, trucked to the factory and underwent three weeks of modifications. We know new, larger and redesigned canards were added. The nose steering cam lock and the ailerons were worked on. The powerplant’s thrust angle was adjusted by adding shims to the lower motor mounts, changing the angle by 3 degrees.
There were concerns with the workmanship. The NTSB docket contains claims that during taxi tests, the rudder pedals on the right side failed, and on another occasion, the control stick broke off. One pilot/A&P IA mechanic at the airport told the NTSB he noticed “a significant amount of improperly installed hardware!nuts that did not have the required exposed thread beyond the locking feature of the fastener and some fasteners with more than three washers to take up the extra shank on the bolts.” He discussed his concerns with Commuter Craft employees and warned two pilots who were considering flying the Innovator that he “did not believe it was a safe aircraft for many reasons.”
Taxi tests continued, and the plane readied for its second flight. A Commuter Craft executive assistant told the NTSB, “Hogan was under an extreme amount of pressure from the investor to have the plane flying before the Sun ‘n Fun Expo.” That show was only about one week away. The investor had texted that failure to fly meant “you will receive not another dime from me. Better get on the phone now and get Alpha builders to make their deposits. Figure out who you will fire. I initially anticipated spending [$1–$1.5 M] to get the plane flying, NOT $4M. It seemed like a good bet given the orders you have in hand, if they are real. Your order book has been stagnant due to NO RESULTS. I have little hope of ever seeing my money again.”
Commuter Craft didn’t have a test pilot on staff. As schedule pressures and weather delays increased, two employees counseled Hogan away from doing the flying himself. He’d never flown in the first prototype. He hadn’t held an FAA medical since 1999 nor ever completed a BasicMed course. His 334 total logged hours show no test pilot training or experience. And he wasn’t current, with just a couple of hours aloft back in 2018. Plus, he was getting sick.
The Commuter Craft Executive Assistant told the NTSB, “Hogan became so stressed that he wasn’t sleeping and became sick with a severe cough, head and chest congestion and fever on or around Wednesday.” His dream was becoming a nightmare, forcing long days and sleepless nights. On Friday, he “felt worse” and “spent” some time sleeping in his office.” The assistant told Hogan that he “looked [poorly] and needed to get some rest.” Hogan confided to her that the test pilot would not be available until after the Sun’n Fun event. That day, some employees saw Hogan lift off from the runway for a few moments during high-speed taxi tests.
Saturday, March 23, 2019, at the Tom B. David Field (KCZL), in Calhoun, Georgia, was an ideal day for flying. Sunshine, 71 degrees, clear skies with high, thin cirrus, unrestricted visibility, wind down the runway at 3 knots. But there was no test pilot. Hogan still looked unwell. Several people were told testing that day would be limited to taxiing.
But in the afternoon, an employee was tasked with flying a Grumman Cheetah chase plane. The plan was to get air-to-air photos of the Innovator at 3,000 feet—“in case it takes off.” Hogan told others he did not intend to fly but would if “he had no other choice.” Commuter Craft hired a commercial photographer from Atlanta to come out to the airport. They also placed a video camera on an inside window of the Innovator.
“The chase plane pilot radioed, ’The experimental just went down.’ The Innovator was destroyed by impact forces. Emergency services responded, but the crash was not survivable.”
After a normal taxi and runup, at 3:32 p.m., Hogan announced over the radio his intent to depart runway 35. Twenty seconds later, full power was applied, and another 20 seconds later, he was airborne. The NTSB has considerable insight into what happened next. The GoPro HERO7 Black camera filmed the pilot, including the control stick and a partial outside view. A recovered Dynon Avionics SV-HDX1100 cockpit display with internal air data and attitude heading reference system (ADAHRS) recorded attitude, g-load, engine data, airspeed, altitude and alerts.
Immediately, problems similar to those experienced in the first flight appeared. There were divergences in pitch and roll oscillations. But this time, it was worse than on the previous flight, rapidly pitching 12 degrees nose up, then 1 degree down. G loads of plus and minus 1 g. A handheld radio on the right-seat shoulder harness floated up every time the nose headed down. As the amplitude of the pitch phugoid progressively increased, the duration of weightlessness time also increased, with the pilot being lifted out of his seat. The NTSB says the pilot was making “pronounced movements of the control stick” in both pitch and roll axes.
The aircraft was alternating 20 degrees of bank left and right, while slowly, shallowly climbing ahead. Hogan transmitted on the radio, “Calhoun traffic, two five—two five seven alpha romeo—re-returning to three—runway three five—will be in the, uhh, downwind for three five. Calhoun.” He started a left turn, banking about 45 degrees. With the plane now maybe 300-400 feet above the ground, the turn continued to the downwind. The throttle was still set to full power, but the climb stopped. The fluctuations in roll reduced, but the pitch oscillations were unceasing. The pilot’s head hit the headliner a few times. An oil pressure audible warning was heard. The wild ride continued. Another pitch down, the pilot’s head again hitting the headliner. He reduced power slightly, but it was too late. The plane impacted a field close to the airport.
The chase plane pilot radioed, “The experimental just went down.” The Innovator was destroyed by impact forces. Emergency services responded, but the crash was not survivable.
After the accident, the Safety Board found no evidence of pre-impact issues with the engine. Momentary drops in oil pressure were recorded during the negative g accelerations, but power remained normal. Damage to the airplane was too severe to make judgments about the exact aerodynamic or control issues.
The Safety Board found the probable cause was “the pilot’s failure to maintain aircraft control during the airplane’s second test flight, which resulted in a collision with terrain.” Contributing to the accident was “the pilot allowing external pressures to guide his decision to fly the airplane when he possessed little total flight experience, no recent flight experience, and no experience in the accident airplane or similar airplane.” They found Hogan hadn’t held a medical in 20 years, he was feeling sick, the plane had problems on its first flight, and he had no flight-test plan. The NTSB report references FAA Advisory Circular 90-89B, Amateur-Built Aircraft and Ultralight Flight Testing Handbook. It says, “test flying an aircraft is a critical undertaking, which you should approach with thorough planning, skill, and common sense. The flight-test plan is the heart of all professional flight testing.”
At the November 2018 DeLand Sport Aviation Showcase, Hogan gave one of his last interviews. Asked when the Innovator would fly, he said, “One thing we won’t rush is flight test.”
