PA-32 Cherokee Six/Lance/Saratoga/6X
Air Traffic Control Fully Certified
Air Traffic Control Time Certified In Pos 1 (yrs) 6
Communication Breakdown; Confusion; Distraction
ATC Issue All Types; Aircraft Equipment Problem Critical; Deviation - Altitude Excursion From Assigned Altitude; Inflight Event / Encounter Loss Of Aircraft Control; Inflight Event / Encounter CFTT / CFIT; Inflight Event / Encounter Weather / Turbulence
Air Traffic Control Issued Advisory / Alert; Air Traffic Control Provided Assistance; Flight Crew Became Reoriented; Flight Crew Regained Aircraft Control; Flight Crew Overcame Equipment Problem
Aircraft; Airspace Structure; Weather
Aircraft X was on route to ZZZ going northbound at 7;000 feet. I took the hand off. I called out to him and the aircraft was sitting on my frequency. I called the Moderate to Extreme Precipitation between him and his destination and he acknowledged. After a talking with a few other aircraft I went back to Aircraft X to call the weather again and told him it looked as though he was going to go through an area of moderate precipitation but here was extreme precipitation to the east and west. Again; the pilot just simply acknowledged me. It looked as though the aircraft climbed about 300 feet but leveled back off; I asked how the ride was; the pilot responded bumpy. Shortly after; the aircraft began losing altitude; I called the aircraft a few times; gave a low altitude alert; no response. It also appeared the aircraft was in a spiral. A VFR aircraft could hear Aircraft X but attempts to communicate failed. I took a handoff on an air carrier that I asked to help. At that moment I could finally hear Aircraft X and he informed me he lost his vacuum. I asked if he was in control of the aircraft and if he could see the ground; he said yes and that he was below the cloud layer in VFR conditions. Afterwards; I lost communication again. I tried all my transmitters (main/standby/Backups) but was unable to reestablish communications. We watched him proceed very low towards ZZZ and I learned afterwards he did land safely.
I was flying direct to ZZZ. I was IFR in clouds; rain; and turbulence at 7;000 feet approximately 35 miles from ZZZ. The plane started making turns to the right ; which I corrected a few times. I was trying to figure out why it was happening. Suddenly the plane did a hard right. I noticed the artificial horizon had 'tumbled' and the 'vacuum' warning light came on. I turned off the auto-pilot and attempted to level the wings with multiple left and right corrections. Also noticed I was now in a dive. I saw the ground through an opening in the clouds and aimed for that. I broke out of the clouds at approximately 3;000-3;500 feet. Once I regained control below the clouds I tried contacting ZZZ Center. They were very difficult to hear/with broken reception. I notified them I had a vacuum pump failure; was below the clouds in VFR conditions and would call when I landed in ZZZ. Not sure if they heard me. I maneuvered the plane as necessary to stay out of the clouds and rain showers to ZZZ. Once on the ground I called Approach and Center to notify them of what had happened. I guess you can never know when a vacuum pump may fail; but it sure does affect many crucial navigation equipment. My assumption would be to have a secondary vacuum pump or artificial horizon as a safety back-up. I will be checking into that.
A Center Controller; and a PA32 pilot flying through rain and experiencing turbulence reported the aircraft had a vacuum pump failure causing a temporary loss of control of the aircraft. The aircraft descended below the Minimum Vectoring Altitude but recovered and landed safely.