The preliminary investigation of the Clutha helicopter crash revealed …
95 liters left in the police helicopter
no evidence of engine failure
no evidence of gearbox failure
all significant components were present
all rotor grades were attached at the time of the crash
neither main blades nor tail blades were rotating
Other than ruling out what is not the cause, investigators may be no closer to determining the reason the helicopter fell out of the air. The report says there was “no evidence of major mechanical disruption of either engine” of the Eurocopter EC135 as it returned from a police operation in Dalkeith, Midlothian, on the night of the crash.
There were no flight recorders, but there is radar data and radio communications. The pilot had 5,500 hours, 646 in type.
The wreckage is at AAIB’s headquarters, and the investigation continues.
A fund has been opened for the victims. Donations can be made to the fund by calling 0141 287 7878 and paying by debit or credit card. Cash or cheques can be handed in to the council’s service desk at 45 John Street, Glasgow G1 1JE and bank payments can be made to Clutha Appeal Fund, sort code 83-44-00, account 10804129.
On an October 30, 2013 training flight, a Centro de Capacitacion Aereo Michoacan Cessna 152 out of Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla International Airport lost power over Cajititian lake.
The pilot made a crash landing beside the lake. The pilot Andres Gonzalez, 20, tried to land in an unpopulated area when the plane developed a mechanical problem in the engine.
Emergency responders included firefighters and paramedics from Tiajomulco and El Salto. Gonzalez suffered only minor injuries.
la Dirección General de Aeronáutica Civil (Civil Aviation Directorate) will be investigating the incident in Cajititlán, Jalisco, Mexico.
On October 29, 2013, a Windsor Flying Club Cessna 172R Skyhawk crash landed at Nashville International Airport, killing the pilot. There was dense fog early Tuesday morning when the crash occurred, and the airport was closed. The crash occurred some time between 2:00 a.m. (the final sweep of the runways) and its discovery at 8:45 a.m. by a taxiing jet pilot.
The plane is one of three belonging to Canada’s Windsor Flying Club school fleet.
National Transportation Safety Board spokesman Peter Knudson said that the plane sat on the runway for hours before it was discovered Tuesday morning. The crash apparently occurred Monday night. Metro Police, Metro Fire and Metro OEM, the medical examiner, and an accident investigator from National Transportation Safety Board responded belatedly. The accident occurred on Runway 2, which was closed on discovery of the wreckage. Operations at the rest of the airport continued as usual.
The FAA is on the scene. The pilot was in his mid forties, was night-rated but not instrument-rated (i.e. he was not cleared to fly in low visibility like the dense fog that blanketed Nashville.) His name has not been released. He rented the plane from Monday 8.pm. to Tuesday noon.
The investigation has not yet determined if the pilot made the required contact with ATC. The plane as no flight data recorder but it does have gps and current instrumentation.
As reported yesterday by Metropolitan Nashville Airport Authority (MNAA), a small single-engine Cessna-172 crashed at Nashville International Airport on Tuesday, October 29, 2013. The Airport Emergency Plan requires MNAA to notify the National Transportation Safety Board in the event of an accident and the NTSB begins an investigation to determine the probable cause of the accident and other facts related to it. This investigation is now underway and the NTSB will issue a preliminary report in 10 days and a final report in 9 – 12 months.
Importantly, the time of the crash has not been determined and reports to the contrary are not factual. These facts will be determined as part of the NTSB investigation.
Following is a statement from MNAA:
“The MNAA’s top priority is the safety and security of all operations at the airport. As an FAA certificated airport, MNAA is required to comply with the FAA’s safety standards. MNAA has long maintained a strong record of safety and follows stringent federal safety regulations. We are inspected annually by FAA safety inspectors to ensure compliance. We uphold these regulations every day, including yesterday. We have inspectors and crash, fire and rescue personnel on duty 24 hours per day, 365 days per year to respond in the event of any emergency.
“MNAA is working collaboratively with the FAA and NTSB as they investigate the accident and determine the facts. It would be premature to comment about any facts involving this accident until the NTSB completes its investigation. All of us at the airport express heartfelt condolences to the family of the pilot involved in this accident.”
Around noon on Oct 28, a Bell Jet Ranger helicopter carrying two Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife employees who were conducting fish counts (counting spawning nests, also called redds) crashed in the South Umpqua River near Days Creek. Both passengers and the pilot were conscious.
Power lines were damaged, and the plane was leaking fuel. Three hundred twenty people lost electricity. The FAA and the NTSB will be on hand to check out the accident. A hazmat team handled the fuel leak.
Two passengers, Holly Huchko, 34 and Eric Himmelreich, 35 were taken to Mercy Hospital in Roseburg, and the pilot to Sacred Heart at Riverbend. Huchko broke her back, Himmelreich broke a vertebra and the pilot, Fred Wittlake, broke an arm and some ribs.
The Umpqua Fish District office counts fish to help determine fishing regulation.
On landing on Oct 24, 2013 at Hamilton Airport, a training flight in a Waikato Aero Club Tecnam P2008 struck a parked Cessna 172. The twenty-five year old student pilot, parked vehicle and training vehicle all suffered injury. The parked Cessna sustained the most damage.
Witnesses say that the pilot managed to get the plane under control as he was landing, reducing the severity of the incident. Impact occurred at low speed.
The plane came down hard, damaging the Tecnam’s undercarriage, and the pilot’s nose and back. The pilot is suffering from shock.
This is the first incident in the year old plane the student was flying. He was hospitalized at Waikato Hospital.
On July 14, 2013, a privately owned Rans S-6 en route from an airfield near Tywcross Zoo to Stoke Golding airfield crashed in Fenn Lane, Fenny Drayton, Leicestershire with two aboard.
The Rans plane crashed in a field in Leicestershire. Witnesses heard a bang from the aircraft, the engine quit. The plane glided along, banked right and left, then crashed.
The plane was located at Fenny Drayton at about 18:45 BST on Sunday. The man and woman aboard were confirmed dead at the scene, found by emergency responders.
The Air Accident Investigations Branch is investigating.
The fatalities were informally identified as Bob and Olive.
On July 15, 2013, at about 0930 hours, a vintage MiG-21 Bison fighter aircraft of IAF crashed on Monday while landing at Uttarlai Airbase in western Rajasthan. The pilot who was flying the plane died in the crash.
The Indian Air Force fighter crashed while landing at Uttarlai Air Base, Rajasthan. The pilot had been on a routine training flight. The pilot failed to eject from the plane.
The National Transportation Safety Board will lead a team to assist the Afghanistan Ministry of Transportation and Commercial Aviation in the investigation of a cargo plane crash at Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan.
NTSB Senior Air Safety Investigator Tim LeBaron will be the U.S. accredited representative. He will lead a team of three additional investigators from the NTSB as well as representatives from the Federal Aviation Administration and The Boeing Company.
The private cargo plane, a Boeing 747-400 operated by National Air Cargo, crashed just after takeoff from the U.S.-operated air base at 11:20 a.m. local time Monday. All seven crewmembers onboard were killed and the airplane destroyed. The seven crew members were all American citizens. The accident site is within the perimeter of Bagram Air Base.
The international cargo flight was destined for Dubai World Central – Al Maktoum International Airport, Dubai, United Arab Emirates.
The Afghanistan Ministry of Transportation and Commercial Aviation is leading the investigation and will be the sole source of information regarding the investigation. According to the International Civil Aviation Organization, they can be reached at (873) 68 2341450 / 49 or by fax at (873) 68 1280784.
A Cessna 172 and a Cessna 172RG Cutlass collided over Westlake Village eight miles east northeast of Ventura.
The Cutlass, registered to Ameriflyers of Florida LLC made an emergency landing on the Westlake Golf Course, Westlake Village, California. Three aboard sustained minor injuries in a belly landing at 2:15 p.m. near the third hole. They were hospitalized with minor injuries.
The second plane crashed in the Santa Monica Mountains, sparking a brush fire and a search and rescue effort. The pilot was found under the wreckage.
One of the planes had left Santa Monica Airport on an engine test flight and was heading east when it collided with the other.
On April 28, 2013, a Wizz Air Airbus A320-232 took off from Warsaw then descended rapidly from about 11000ft.
Passengers smelled smoke. A passenger named Barbara was quoted (machine translation) “Zachybota?o plane dropped like a machine. Then I felt a burning smell. Other passengers can feel it. After a while we went to the employee. Were informed that there was a failure”
Pilots notified ATC and turned around to return to Chopin Airport. The airport said that Pilots said this was not an emergency landing.
There were 161 passengers aboard. They disembarked without any problem, and were provided a later Wizz flight to London.
Two gliders, one of which was a Let L-13A1 Blaník, collided in New South Wales in a rural area in Carrick, near Goulburn. The incoming glider clipped the tail of the two-seater which nose-dived to the ground.
One 72-year-old pilot, a member of Southern Tablelands Gliding Club, landed his glider safely.
The fifty year old pilot of the other glider died on impact with the ground. His 70 year-old passenger had to be extricated from the back seat of the aircraft. He sustained major injuries and was airlifted to Liverpool Hospital.
The accident occurred at 3.40pm on April 27, 2013.
Emergency services, including Ambulance, Police, Towrang RFS and Police Rescue responded.
The pilots were experienced. The ground crew including the winch operator and pilots of both gliders were on the same radio network but the club is “mystified” why the accident occurred.
With aviation safety issues buzzing in the US because of the widespread tower closures, I was surprised to find US safety being held as a higher standard in a critique of Brazilian aviation by pilot Antônio Carlos Cruzeta.
But I cannot but wonder if even as this pilot pushes for progress in Brazil, we in the US are bound to be falling back. Will it take an aviation disaster here to wake up our government that we need to maintain our current standards of safety?
A Brazilian pilot can ask that question, and so can we. How can pilots continue to fly millions of passengers millions of flights in state-of-the-art planes when losing so many towers? And now there are lawsuits piling up as localities begin legal battles to keep their towers. Should tower support be withdrawn, leaving pilots to “fly by the seat of their pants?” What do US pilots think of this withdrawal of support? DO pilots consider towers extraneous?
Three hours or so from home the ride from Rio was unusually turbulent. Though I slept all the way to Houston this time, will I be so confident in the future? I worry for the state aviation safety as thousands of pilots converge flying to and from airports where tower support was once but is no longer.
Coinciding with the announced scheduled closure of the Fullerton Air Traffic Control Tower, a seminar of the “non-tower operations procedures review” is scheduled at Fullerton airport on Sunday, April 7, 2013 at 7:00 PM at the Aviation Facilities, Inc at 4119 West Commonwealth Avenue, Fullerton, CA 92833.
At the US Chamber of Commerce’s aviation summit, Jim McNerney, the CEO of Boeing, said the expects the technical solution being tested now will resolve the 787’s battery system’s problem and return to flying soon.
On March 27, a Sriwijaya Air Boeing 737-500 en route from Medan to Padang had a runway overrun when landing at Padang at 18:00.
The plane came to rest past the end of the (8860 feet) pavement.
The Sriwijaya Boeing that skidded and closed the runway at Minangkabau International Airport on Wednesday 3/27/2013 has been successfully evacuated and moved across the airport apron.
Minangkabau Airport flight activity is now running normally.
There were no injuries when the aircraft registered as PK-CLJ skidded off the runway.
While a Germanwings Airbus A319-112 was en route from Moscow to Stuttgart, the plane issued warnings. Pilots diverted to Prague-Vaclav Havel (Ruzyne) Airport in the Czech Republic.
Airport fire and rescue services responded to the scene according to the airport air crash consultant spokesperson
THere were 144 passengers and five crew aboard the Airbus A320. There were no injuries reported on landing.
Re: Preliminary findings regarding the Sunwing Flight 326 at 6:32 from Ottawa to Varadero with 170 passengers
The smoke passengers saw coming from the air vents of the Boeing 737 was vapor from excess de-icing fluid. The smell described by the passengers was similar to engine coolant. Oxygen masks did not deploy.
The pilot returned to the runway at 7:00 a.m. No smoke or fire was found (obviously) because the vapor was not smoke at all, but evaporating coolant that had gotten into the plane via a vent.
A news agency has reported about the clean up of the plane crash in South Bend on March 13, 2013.
The Indiana Department of Environmental Management has observed the scene and is part of the team assessing the damage. NTSB said that the clean-up process generally “falls on the source that caused the contamination. Since the damage came from that private jet, its owner and/or insurance company would be responsible.”
Firemen who are working the scene will be paid by the South Bend Fire Dept, but the insurance company will probably repay the SBFD.
Insurance companies are also key in providing compensation to families, especially when there is a traceable failure.
The two aboard the flight, Wes Caves and Steve Davis were ejected from the plane and were found inside one of the houses that was damaged in the crash. Caves owned 7700 ENTERPRISES OF MONTANA LLC which is the plane’s owner of record.
The cause of the HAWKER BEECHCRAFT CORP Premier jet #N26DK crash has not yet been determined.
The FAA report says only that the…AIRCRAFT CRASHED OFF THE DEPARTURE END OF THE RUNWAY INTO A RESIDENTIAL AREA, THERE WERE 4 PERSONS ON BOARD, 2 WERE FATALLY INJURED, 2 SUSTAINED UNKNOWN INJURIES, DAMAGE: DESTROYED, SOUTH BEND, IN Survivor Video
Didn’t mention this all together yesterday but it was a bad day (or two) for helicopters.
On Mar 19
Bristow Academy Inc Schweitzer 269C-1 training flight; chopper lost power and crash-landed Highway US-1 near Titusville, FL. Two aboard, no injuries
On Mar 21
Bundespolizei Aérospatiale AS 332L1 Super Puma was in a training exercise in snowy conditions at Berlin’s Olympic Stadium. The Super Puma struck the EC-155 while landing, and fell. THe EC-155 pilot died on the scene, and three were injured.
Bundespolizei Eurocopter EC 155B-1 (AS 365N4) (see above incident at Berlin’s Olympic Stadium)
On March 21, 2013 at about 1215 Eastern daylight-saving time, a Bankstown Heliport Robinson R44 on a private flight from Bankstown to Bulli Tops, New South Wales with four aboard suffered a terrain collision near Panorama House in Bulli Tops near Wollongong in NSW.
Emergency services arrived on the scene around 1:43 pm. After the crash, the helicopter burned. Thirty units responded to the scene.
On March 19, 2013, an Aeroclub de Muchamiel Piper PA-28-161 Cherokee Warrior en route from Spain’s MUTXAMEL airport had three people aboard when it suffered some kind of mechanical problem, possibly engine failure.
A fourteen year old girl, Belen, along with her father, Jose Antonio Perez, and uncle Ricardo died in the crash at 12: 37.
The uncle was the pilot and flight instructor.
The plane crashed in Paraeta Espí, in an olive grove 500 meters from the town called Ibi. On impact, the cabin broke in two, and left a debris field with a hundred yard radius.
Local residents reported the crash to authorities. The Guardia Civil (local police) arrived on the scene. The bodies were removed by four in the afternoon and taken to the Forensic Anatomical Institute of Alicante for autopsies.
Eyewitnesses say the plane had been circling and flying very low as if looking for somewhere to land, and the pilot dodged cottages when it came down.
Two people survived a crash three miles from Stafford Regional Airport, Virginia. They impacted in a wooded area about 3 miles southeast of the runway.
The Total Security Products Corp Piper PA32-301FT 6X en route from Hummel Field to Stafford Regional Airport crashed on approach to Stafford, injuring the two people aboard the plane, the pilot and the owner of Total Security Products Corp.
The sixty-three year old pilot was flying the 51 year old owner of the plane. The pilot, Daniel H. Hoyt, 63, of White Stone and Alberto Luis Toledo, 51, of Irvington were hospitalized at Mary Washington Hospital for their injuries.
Southwest Airlines Boeing 737-700 Flight 481 from Las Vegas to Tulsa made an emergency landing at McCarran International Airport.
The flight diverted back after a cargo hold fire-alert alerted the crew. The flight had left at 1:20, and returned at 2:45. Passengers indicated turbulence as they were returning to Las Vegas. The crew did not explain the situation to the passengers until after landing.
136 passengers and four crew were aboard. No one was injured. THe problem was an indication alert error. Passengers were rebooked on alternative flights.
