[QUOTE=greenthumb]This is the preliminary german AAIB report:
Narrative: Short after take-off the helicopter tumbled and plummeted into a building. The helicopter was immediately consumed by fire.[QUOTE]
posted on 29th.January.
=cheesaburger on 31st January.'The Sudanese CAA have already ruled out mechanical failure as a cause of the accident'
Pardon me-only 7 days have elapsed since the accident which occurred on Wednesday 25th.January. Lufthansa do not have a daily schedule to Khartoum & I doubt that the Sudanese CAA got out of bed to travel to Jebel Marra on Thursday when Thursday/Friday is the Moslem weekend. These reports must be treated with caution. The UK AAIB would take weeks to re-assemble a wreck on the hangar floor at Farnborough before reaching a conclusion as to the causes.The UN have a known track record for brushing accidents to their contract fleet under the carpet, the Sudanese landscape being littered with crashed/wrecked Antonovs, not all belonging to the UN fleet though. This accident is a great pity-Helog were brought in as I understood it for it's adherence to European safety standards, the opposite seems to have occurred. (vorsprung durch technik seems to have lost a wheel between Ingolstadt & Salzburg!) For those on site it will be very easy for UNMIS to restrict access to the outside world although there's always the mobile phone network,when it's switched on. I fear that it will take a concerted effort to unearth details of this accident but intrepid PPRUNERS could try the following avenues:Contact Mr.Patrick Goudou, Executive Director of EASA(European Safety Agency) which has a remit to oversee all relevant european safety agencies for compliance with EU/ICAO regs both within & without european borders.He can be contacted by 'e' mail:
[email protected] or alternatively
www.easa.eu.int/home
Alternatively the German BFU(Bundestelle fur(umlaut over u) Flugunfalluntersuchung) on
www.bfu-wed.de (german equivalent of the UK AAIB)
If you're still reading this, 10/10 for stamina & lastly it could be worth an 'e'mail to the Editor of the 'Salzburg Times' at
www.salzburg.qv.and asking whether he intends to publish details of this accident locally, when or if, they are published by the BFU?
Yours ever, airspeed alive