Dude, the twotter crash in Algeria may have had more to do with pilot competance or lack thereof, re the runway excursion, than the relative structural integrity of the aircraft.
I have only flown on the let as a pax , far more comfortable than a twotter however it didnt look like half as much fun to fly as the twotter.
Personaly I love having the two big power levers on the roof of the cockpit, it makes me feel like I'm flying a WWII bomber, especially at 50 foot over the Sahara in the late afternoon, (obviously with no pax onboard).
I also noted that the twotters semed to be less maintenance intensive than the let , IMHO
Someone mentioned that twotters are more tricky when it comes to landing in strong crosswinds, well if you have a 35 -40kt crosswind and a 20meter wide runway you can actually land across the runway at 90 degrees straight into the wind, as your landing forward ground speed will only be about 15 knots. (Normal twotter ops in Sudan). Try that with a let ?? or if you have the tundra tyre kit on the Twotter you dont even need to have a runway, just a clear open area.
And finaly just one last completely gratuitous stab at the matter, when AEA replaced the Tegentour Twotter with the Let, they had to bullsh1t the performance A numbers for take off out of REG strip, so that the client , a well known British petrolium company,would accept the Let for the contract.
Unless they extended he runway at REG (which was only 800 meters at the time) theres just no way that the Let complied with Perf A ( the clients requirement) in the middle of an Algerian Sahara'n summer at 50 deg ambient, I recall the lets graphs only went to 35 ambient temps.
Like you said the let was designed for flying in harsh conditions in Siberia possibly not at 55 deg midday temperaturs in the Sahara.
Have a bottle of Algerian Red for me,
Regards Max
