The same article, via Babelfish:
The helicopter of Rajoy and Aguirre lost the tail in a wreck in Alicante in 1998
The pilot and the company attribute the fall of the airship to a "abrupt change" of the wind
JORGE To RODRIGUEZ - Madrid
THE COUNTRY - SPAIN - 03-12-2005
The helicopter that Thursday on board crashed in Móstoles (Madrid) with Mariano Rajoy and Esperanza Aguirre had undergone the 7 of 1998 July another wreck in whom it lost part of the tail, including the direction rotor. The incident happened during the extinction of a fire in Benimarfull (Alicante), when the apparatus not yet belonged to Helisureste and carried another matriculation. The pilot of the airship has presented/displayed a report in the Main directorate of Civil Aviation in which he attributes the "loss of lift" of the apparatus to "an abrupt change in the direction and intensity of the wind".
The Helisureste company, owner of the airship, has admitted that the apparatus underwent "an incident" (without victims) before it acquired it, in 1999 and rematriculase it with digits EC-HCT. The 7 of 1998 July, when the helicopter (then matriculation G-BXMP) participated in the extinction of a fire throwing water from a stock market bambi, the pilot ran into front with cables. In spite of the evasive maneuver, "he could not prevent to hit against cables the front part of the nose", according to the Commission of Investigation of Accidents and Civil Aircraft incidents of the Ministry of Public Works and the Economy.
"the pilot made a series of corrective maneuvers, that avoided the fall without control of the apparatus", just like Thursday next to the bullring of Móstoles. Due to the shock against the ground, "one took place the loosening of the tail cone and the deformation of the back inferior zone". One of the helicopter rotor blades "contacted with the superior part of the two fins of the horizontal stabilizer". The damages were "important". The apparatus was repaired, rematriculado and put under mandatory them inspection. At the present time, it had all the permissions in rule and it did not present/display you beat for the flight, according to the company and the Ministry of Public Works and the Economy. Previously, the helicopter had the N-58968 matriculations and the C-OCOP.
The hypothesis that breaks through on the wreck of Móstoles is the one of the "abrupt change in the direction and intensity of the wind", as they indicate to the pilot in his report and the Helisureste company in a press note, with the same phrase exactly. According to the National Institute of Meteorology, at the moment of the wreck the wind in Móstoles was of the northeast, and between 30 and 35 kilometers per hour. The turn or yaw that made the right airship before falling was in that sense.
Helisureste assures that the wind change only could feel when the airship rose and lost the defense of the enclosure for bullfighting. The election of the seat as lift-off point were of the own pilot, according to a report of the Municipal Police of Móstoles. Sources of Civil Aviation explained that the pilot of a helicopter is sovereign to choose, to accept or to reject to operate in a possible heliport.
The company affirms: "the helicopter took off of which technically confined zone is denominated, isolated of the wind by the walls of the bullring. The first information gather the impression that the wind change of direction and intensity, happening to be tailwind, and caused the loss of lift of the apparatus ". Jose Fonticova, one of the three pilots of dowry of the apparatus, declared yesterday to Efe that the enclosure for bullfighting is "a very feasible site to land and to take off".
Pilots of helicopters of the Forces of Security of the State think that the wind could be "fundamental" for the accident. Nevertheless, they consider that the apparatus went "to the limit of weight" or "very forced". This fact, of being certain, would take to that the helicopter took off to the maximum of its power and that the tailwind, shook vigorously it. The consulted sources assure that the authorized maximum weight for a takeoff in 206 Bell L4 Twin Ranger is of 2,063 kilos. In emptiness, the airship of North American manufacture weight 1,483 kilos (including the systems of communication and other incorporating, since without them weight 1,321 kilos).
"If six people went, the calculation is that between all a maximum of 480 weighed kilos, to which there is to add the weight to him of the fuel", they explain. If it went to the maximum, the weight of the fuel, according to the engineering specifications of the North American manufacturer, is of 250 kilos. The pilot assures in his report that took between 150 and 180 kilos of fuel. That is to say, the gross weight would surpass the 2,063 kilos (the maximum of takeoff) or was closely together.