When Trevor Jacob parachuted out of his tiny airplane last fall above the Santa Barbara backcountry, he claimed in a widely viewed YouTube video he created about the incident that the engine had failed, and he had no choice but to bail out.
Jacob had outfitted the single-engine Taylorcraft BL-65 with video cameras on both the exterior and interior, and used a selfie-stick to chronicle his descent into the rugged terrain of Los Padres National Forest, and his hike back to civilization.
According to Jacob’s telling, he took off from the Lompoc Airport on Nov. 24, 2021, en route to Mammoth Lakes to scatter the ashes of his friend, Johnny Strange, a base jumper who died in 2015.
But not long into the flight, the video — which has been viewed nearly 1.9 million times — shows the propeller stop turning, and Jacob announcing that his engine is out. Moments later, he dives out of the plane.
Almost immediately, viewers of the video — entitled “I Crashed My Plane” — began to question the account provided by Jacob, a 28-year-old thrill-seeker and snowboarder who competed in the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia.
Critics and commenters asserted that Jacob’s story didn’t add up, and that the crash appeared to be a stunt by the daredevil to get views and likes on his YouTube channel.
They noted that Jacob, who has more than 134,000 YouTube subscribers, did not report his emergency to air traffic controllers, and made no attempt to restart the engine or glide the plane to any of several possible landing spots in the vicinity.
They also pointed out that he opened the pilot-side door of the plane before the engine cut out, and questioned why he was wearing a parachute.
Earlier this month, the Federal Aviation Administration came to the same conclusions, and issued an emergency order revoking Jacob’s private pilot certificate. The order was first reported by the New York Times.
“Your actions…were careless and reckless so as to endanger the life and property of another,” the FAA said in the April 11 letter signed by Kyle Lomazow, an attorney with the agency’s enforcement division.
The letter further states, “You demonstrated a lack of care, judgment, and responsibility by choosing to jump out of an aircraft solely so you could record the footage of the crash.”
The plane apparently slammed into the ground somewhere in the San Rafael Wilderness, possibly near the Manzana Schoolhouse, although neither the FAA nor the National Transportation Safety Board has been able to pinpoint the location for Noozhawk.
That may be because in the days after the crash, Jacob disposed of the plane’s wreckage by hiring a helicopter to remove it from the backcountry, and recovered the cameras that he used to record the incident, according to the FAA.
The NTSB previously confirmed to Noozhawk that it was investigating the crash, and the agency issued a preliminary report in early January that included few details.
However, the NTSB has not issued a final report on the incident, which can take months or even years to be completed and released.
Moreover, the FAA does not have the authority to bring criminal charges in such cases, but can suspend or revoke pilot licenses and issue fines.
Jacob’s revocation is for at least a year, and he faces potential fines of $1,644 per day if he does not surrender his pilot’s certificate.
Attempts to reach Jacob for comment for this story were unsuccessful.
— Noozhawk executive editor Tom Bolton can be reached at tbolton@noozhawk.com. Follow Noozhawk on Twitter: @noozhawk, @NoozhawkNews and @NoozhawkBiz. Connect with Noozhawk on Facebook.