Free Seconds to Disaster: US Edition by Ray Ronan

Renslow
replied.
    “I've never seen icing
conditions. I've never de-iced. I've never seen any....I've never experienced
any of that. I don't want to have to experience that and make those kinds of
calls. You know I'd have freaked out. I'd have like, seen this much ice and
thought, oh my gosh we were going to crash.” Shaw then answered a radio call
from Buffalo Approach who continued to vector them towards the localizer for
their approach on runway 23.
    At 10:15 p.m. Captain Renslow
reduced the engine power and called for gear down as they were told to contact
Buffalo Tower. “Colgan thirty four zero seven, contact tower one two zero point
five. Have a good night.”
    Along with the ice threat, winds
buffeted the aircraft but these conditions were not exceptional. Level at 2400
feet now, the autopilot was still engaged and the crew had their approach
clearance. The aircraft was on a typical flight path with the flaps set at 5
degrees.
    Immersed in murky cloud, the
Q400's landing lights illuminated moisture that flashed by either side at 180
knots as they headed towards runway 23. Everything was in place for a normal
approach and landing, except for one important detail—the speed was dropping.
The Q400 requires 20 knots of airspeed to be added to the approach speed in the
event of icing but this standard item had not been done.
    A double chime sounded,
indicating the landing gear was now down and locked. “Gear's down,” confirmed
Shaw.
    The combination of landing
gear along with the flatter pitch of the propellers turned the aircraft from
less than clean, due to some ice, to “dirty”. These items added drag and the
speed reduced rapidly from 170 knots to 149 knots, a slow speed for the flaps set
only to five at that point.
    Captain Renslow called, “Flaps
fifteen, before landing checklist.”
    At this point Shaw paused for
three seconds and only put the flaps to ten. Perhaps she noticed the already
ominous speed reduction as she began to say , “Uhhh” before both control
columns began to judder—a mechanism fitted in some aircraft and called a
“stick-shaker” that warns pilots they are flying at a dangerously slow speed.
    The automation reached the
point where it could no longer cope and the autopilot-disconnect horn sounded.
The horn continued to blare out a warning for the remainder of the flight.
    The flaps were still on their
way out and were only passing 6.7 degrees as the speed dropped to a dangerously
low 126 knots. Then, for reasons that will never be known, Captain Renshaw
pulled back on the control column: an act in itself that decreased the speed
further as he increased the pitch of the aircraft, up to 30 degrees and so now
the wing's angle of attack came even closer to the stalling angle. He did
increase the power a little to 70 percent of total torque power; however, the
Bombardier Q400 could go to 130 percent of total torque in an emergency, so it
had plenty of power remaining to help take it away from a stall situation.
    Nevertheless, Captain Renshaw
never demanded more than 80 of that 130 percent.
    The automatic stick-pusher
physically pushed against the control column in an attempt to increase the aircraft’s
speed. Captain Renslow overrode it by increasing his backward pull on the
stick. The Airspeed now dropped to 100 knots. Only seven seconds had passed
since the stick shaker indicated an imminent stall.
    The aircraft was now pitched
up at an angle of 23 degrees. The nose fell and they rolled right to a bank of
110 degrees. Captain Renslow uttered, “Jesus Christ”  and Shaw put the
flaps handle back to zero and said, “I put the flaps up.” She then asked: “Should
the gear be up?”
    “Gear up, oh shit.” There was
an increase in the ambient noise in the cockpit. In a chilling moment, Captain
Renslow realized it was over. “We're down.”
    Rebecca Shaw's microphone
relayed to the voice recorder her last words at 10:16 p.m. and 51 seconds—only
25 seconds had passed since the