C210 down near Lake Cowan (South of Kalgoorlie)

[Another Number]

Just heard two are trapped in wreckage.

Don't know which aircraft. Various rescuers enroute.

[onetrack]

The crash area would be in the region of Higginsville, an area with which I'm very familiar, as I spent numerous years in the region, from Kalgoorlie to Norseman. There's a lot of big trees in that area, and they will be in pretty bad shape, I'd say.
I trust the rescue people find them before dark, it's just gone sundown, as of right now. If they don't, they might be spending a long, cold night in that rough country.

Plane crashes in Kalgoorlie, two trapped - The West Australian (http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/national/7579413/plane-crashes-in-kalgoorlie-two-trapped/)

[Hasherucf]

From what I have heard its upside down in the salt lake, with one person trapped. Hopefully they can get to them as its cold in Kal this time of the year and I doubt you can drive a car on the lake as its been raining heavy in the region

[onetrack]

Seemingly accurate update, even with nautical miles included .. :)

1930 local time makes it another hour before the two are reached. 14 kms from Higginsville would most certainly make the crash site, the Lake.

They might have avoided vegetation on that basis, but the lake is treacherous and can hardly be walked on for the depth and stickiness of the mud. It most certainly can't be driven on, except by specialised tracked vehicles.

Pilot and passenger injured in plane crash (http://www.watoday.com.au/wa-news/pilot-and-passenger-injured-in-plane-crash-20100713-10993.html)

[solowflyer]

I'm about 200 odd km away it is bloody freezing outside. Hope they all ok.

[onetrack]

The RAC chopper reached the site at 2005 hrs local time, and it is reported that the C210 was doing mineral surveying when it was forced down and flipped when it hit the lake surface (as would be expected for a surface that equates with tidal salt flats). The pilot and his passenger are aged in their early 50's and early 60's, and both are injured; but one of them was able to use a satphone to call for help. No information is available yet, as to the extent of their injuries. Overnight temperatures are down around 5-6°C, but the wind is near calm.

The lake surface is extremely treacherous soft mud of varying depth, and I doubt very much if the RAC chopper would have been able to land at the crash site. Around 15mm of rain has fallen in the area in the 7 days, and the lake will be virtually impossible to traverse on foot or with any vehicle. The lake is usually only traversed by lightweight specialist tracked vehicles or quad bikes. The only other usual method of access out onto the lake is to build a causeway.

I would imagine that an attempt will be made to land medics on site with the chopper, and to try and move the injured out by air, despite rescuers approaching by land. The mine rescue team and the Norsemen SES will not be able to traverse any of the lake with regular vehicles, although the local mining operations are likely to have something like quad bikes or specialised lake-traversing equipment. Back in the early 1970's, a French company called Union Miniere used Landrovers specially fitted with Cuthbertson tracks to traverse the lake.

[solowflyer]

I'm guessing Fugro plane they the only ones I know of that do survey 2 crew on 210

[onetrack]

The good news is that both pilot and passenger have been found safe and well, and had freed themselves from the wreckage, and were sitting on the planes wing.
They have been airlifted to Kalgoorlie, with both parties suffering nothing more than minor injuries. They have been admitted to Kalgoorlie hospital for treatment. It's nice to be able to report a good ending.

[Ex FSO GRIFFO]

From Radio 6PR Perth at 1020WST,

Both survived and are on way to KG hospital.:ok:
One person aged 52 and the other 67 is all details released at this stage.

Good Luck to them both, and a job well done to the chopper crews.
Polair and RAC choppers both involved apparently.

p.s.
OOps sorry 'Onetrack' - I guess we were both typing together......

[Kulwin Park]

Good Ending :ok:
Couldn't the rescuers use a "Hoverboat" or something to reach the plane???? In America they use them to get everywhere, as well as swamp boats to reach stuff on muddy sites...

Cheers, KP

[solowflyer]

Not too many boats available out in the desert

[Lasiorhinus]

http://www.exploroz.com/images/Places/41297_1__TN800x600.jpg


Was the aircraft actually doing surveying, or was it just a survey aircraft? There's a bit of survey work going on across the Nullarbor these days - and Kalgoorlie would be a good place to fly to get to a supermarket.
Thomson's and Fugro are both in the area.

[TunaBum]

VH-TIJ

TB :ok:

[Ex FSO GRIFFO]

Thanks 'TB',

I see from the register that its a 'L' model 210.

Any photos available, and is it salvageable I wonder?

The pilot is reported to have sustained spinal injuries and is 'stable'.

An excellent job & A BIG "WELL DONE" to the RAC Chopper guys, and ALL CONCERNED...:D:D:ok::ok:

[BMJ_Geophysics]

Well, I never thought I would see it in print, but the media and a "talking head" has justified low level flying as safer, less to fall! Wow! So all A380's at 50m from now on!

Pilot and passenger survive but trapped for hours - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) (http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/07/14/2952895.htm?section=justin)

[Jabawocky]

Clearly the police do not require much in the way of physics for entry requirements

Sergeant Murray Guerin says the fact the men were flying so close to the ground probably saved their lives.
"The thing that probably has saved them is that they were flying at 50 metres," he said.
"They were pretty close to the ground so it's not that far to fall. Obviously, if you're flying at a couple of hundred feet the impact's going to be greater."



Mate...if they were higher they may have made it to better ground than the lake! :ugh:

[Ultralights]

seams to me the law, The angle Of arrival, is directly proportional to the chances of survival, is true! :hmm:

[Hasherucf]

Any truth to the rumour that the engine seperated from the airframe in flight ?

[Wally Mk2]

Okay I guess to those of us that are aviation savy such statements are mind boggling but we must remember that the uneducated (as in anyone who knows zip about flying) truly believes that the the further ya fall the worse it is & this is true off a ladder for Eg.These people don't know that height is a pilots friend in these situations so even though I too shake my head I can in some ways understand such statements right or wrong. What the Media ought to have learnt by now is to find out from someone suitably qualified BEFORE they speak & that goes for any controlling body (cops) outside of aviation.
As long as the 2 involved will be okay only a laugh or two is left here to be had:)

As for the engine separating in flight? Gee then perhaps just perhaps being that low was indeed a bonus as having that amount of balance change with 1000's of ft to fall means only one nasty ending. Hypothetical of course:ok:
P.S.....'jaba' ya can't get high enuf as far as I am concerned when in a SE:E

Wmk2

[onetrack]

Mate...if they were higher they may have made it to better ground than the lake!

Those of us who weren't there, will never know what quick choices they were presented with; only the pilot will be able to tell us. As for being higher; within 5nm you are presented with heavily treed vegetation, a flat salt lake or a satisfactorily wide highway - albeit with up to 800 cars and trucks a day on it. I'd guess their choice was pretty limited, and the middle choice looked good. No telling how good or bad the surface is, sometimes you can strike sections of salt lake surfaces that will support vehicles/planes. The highway is risky, despite looking good.
A business partner had a fuel tank transfer switch failure in his Cherokee in the early 1980's, and landed on the highway between Coolgardie and Kalgoorlie. All went well with the dead stick landing, until he struck a roadside signpost. The signpost nearly took the wing off the Cherokee, and made a very messy finish to what he thought was going to be a copybook dead stick landing.

[onetrack]

Hasherucf - The engine separated, yes.. but in flight? I think not. Contact with a salt lake bed as the C210 flipped, at a WAG, at somewhere between 100-140kts?, might have had something to do with it. :)

The company has been indentified as Aus-Air, and they WERE doing mineral survey at the time of the crash. The pilot has been identified as 67yr old Michael Nelson, and he is the more seriously injured of the two.
He is suffering from a "moderately severe back injury", with good prognosis for eventual recovery.

There is a thin sheet of water on the lake, as can be seen in the pics. This isn't uncommon after rain, as the mud is quite clayey and sticky, and largely impervious to water ingress.

Plane crash pilot taken to RPH - The West Australian (http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/mp/7579308/plane-crash-pilot-taken-to-rph/)


http://i31.tinypic.com/2mdj8sw.jpg

http://i28.tinypic.com/ivd82f.jpg

[Captain Nomad]

And a certain PPRUNEr transported said spinal injuries by RFDS to Perth today :)

[AirSic]

Looks like it's just a flesh wound! Nothing more than a prop strike. She'll fly again for sure.:}

Seriously though, I am curious...What would the RAC helicopter be sitting on? You can clearly see from the second photo that it is in-situ and that does look like water that the c-210 is lying in.

I didn't think the chopper had floats.

[onetrack]

AirSic - It appears that the part of the lake that the aircraft crashed on is firm enough to support walking and the weight of the chopper, despite the slick of water.
The water is rarely more than 50mm-75mm deep, except in periods of extended heavy rainfall, which are extremely rare in the region.
Many sections of the salt lakes of W.A. are actually firm enough to drive on, its just that you don't know what the surface is actually like, until you get out onto it.
You can drive along just fine for half a kilometre, then suddenly become mired in deep, gutless, sticky mud. The surface all appears the same, you can't tell the firm parts from the boggy parts.
Many an adventurous 4WD driver has found this out to their great chagrin. :\

[Pom Pax]

RAC helicopter pilot said on ABC local radio water was 30mm deep.

[Ex FSO GRIFFO]

I'm trying to examine the photo to see where the wheels are.

Can't see them in the wheel well due shadow, but no extended leg showing from fuse either...

I guess I'm trying to determine why it flipped.

When I was aviating out of Kal, we were advised to do it 'wheels up' if possible on those lakes in the area - a salt crust on top, and as has been said
by 'onetrack' - thick sticky mud underneath. And having driven on some, I can only confirm that the mud is very smelly!

I remember another 210 that came to similar grief on a similar lake just E of Kal, wheels down, following engine prob. - same result. Lake Yindarlgooda I think...(?)
That acft now rebuilt - long time ago - and currently earning an honest living in BME.

[onetrack]

Griffo - I'd fully expect a wheels-up landing would be most advisable on these salt lakes, but I'm no expert on that. I could well imagine that extending the undercarriage would be a guaranteed method of ensuring a flip, once the wheels dug into a bit of mud.
It's highly likely they flipped even though they were coming in wheels-up. The softness and stickiness of the mud would create a lot of drag, as compared to most firm surfaces.
There are also intermittent low rock outcrops in these lakes. Some of the outcrops are just barely visible, others comprise small "islands" in the lakes.
It's entirely feasible that the C210 may have hit one of these minor outcrops of rock, just after touchdown.
The 30mm depth of water would provide little cushioning, and water has a pretty high drag coefficient on hulls, hasn't it? The water in fact is brine, about 4-7 times saltier than the sea.
Back in the 1970's I used to construct drainage channels through Lake Lefroy (adjoining the crash site) on contract with a salt supply company that were based in Widgiemooltha.
The saline solution of the lake was so saturated, the brine would often crystallize into salt crystals in the channels, and refuse to flow.

[rioncentu]

Ex fso

Looks like an L model with main gear door mod and it appears the gear is is "up" to me.

[ForkTailedDrKiller]

Looks like an L model with main gear door mod and it appears the gear is is "up" to me.


Has it occurred to anyone that it may have hit the ground in "cruise"?

Wouldn't be the first time!

Dr :8

[onetrack]

Dr Fork - I'm sure the pilot will be able to answer all the questions the crash investigators put to him... :) .... and along with their inspection of the wreckage, I'm sure a reasonably swift conclusion will be reached, as to the precise reason/s for the crash.
At this point, very little by way of accurate evidence is available... and I believe it would be pointless and foolish to pontificate on the reason/s, without at least having the majority of the available evidence to peruse.
Flying at low levels is high in inherent risk, as I believe you all understand... and my understanding of aerial mineral surveying, is that flying at reasonably low levels is a big part of the job... :suspect:
Regardless of what went wrong, I'll wager two blokes are very happy they crash-landed on a salt lake bed, and not in the adjoining heavy vegetation... in which case, I think the outcome would have been very much worse, and we would be mourning loss of life.

[aileron_69]

and my understanding of aerial mineral surveying, is that flying at reasonably low levels is a big part of the job


Other than ferrying to and from the block, mag-spec survey is entirely flown at low level. The lower you fly, and the closer the lines are together, the higher the resolution of data you collect will be.

[Baldnfat]

Did a few small mag/spec jobs in that area in Oct/Nov. 08 after a bit of rain and it was great to see many 4WD tracks without a sticky end.
The most interesting tracks were made by camels, who when finding a bit of soggy claypan almost seemed to reverse out on the same track. I never knew that the old ship of the desert had a reverse gear.

No luck finding Lasseters Reef back then either. (I'm still looking and will post the waypoint just after my last semi load departs.)

I hope that after all the Insurance company, CASA, ATSB, Media spotlight etc...etc... dies down that the PIC feels like sharing the story of the (extra shallow ditching?) event.

The crew survived the scrape, the rescuers did an incredible job and took a great deal of risk to get the injured to medical care. We could all learn from the experience and become safer aviators.