Safeskiesabove
Below is a record of some of the Coroner's findings.. As you should know he is the final authority on what happened and the causes.
The only difference is that if this tragic event was attributed to a civillian operator I have no doubt the Chief Pilot, Op's manager and Operators would be facing criminal charges for negligence and in any event CASA would have closed them down.
Leave the emotion aside concentrate on the facts and issue at hand... please leave the rhetoric and expletives out of your posts/messages if you wish to receive a response.
Police air unit under fire 18/12/2002 West Aust Newspaper
By Minh Lam
CORONER Alastair Hope reprimanded the WA Police Service yesterday, saying it allowed air safety to be compromised through factors such as budgetary concerns, inadequate pilot training procedures and failure to follow an internal air operations manual.
He said regular safety audits of the police air support unit should be carried out and civilian pilots hired to ensure there was not a repeat of the Newman air crash which killed four officers in January last year.
Mr Hope was delivering his findings into the deaths of police pilot Sen. Const. Donald Everett, 49, and his passengers Sen. Const. Phillip Ruland, 32, First Class Const. David Dewar, 31, and Const. David Capes, 27.
The men were killed when their twin-engined Cessna 310R crashed just short of landing at Newman airport.
In finding the deaths arose by way of accident, Mr Hope said Sen. Const. Everett should never have piloted the plane because he did not have the necessary qualifications.
"There is a need for the air support unit to be a professional organisation comprising skilled and highly trained pilots and appropriate, well-maintained aircraft," he said.
"In my view the air support unit did not provide the deceased officers with a service of that quality."
Mr Hope said Sen. Const. Everett was the sole pilot whose responsibility was the entire Pilbara and Kimberley region when he was sent to Karratha at the beginning of January last year.
He was only a trainee line pilot and had not finished learning how to navigate using the plane's instruments, meaning he was breaching the unit's operations manual by flying on the night of the crash.
Family members of the men killed wept as Mr Hope delivered the findings and briefly mentioned personal details about each officer.
Outside the court, the families' lawyer, Alan Skinner, said they were very happy with the way the inquest was conducted and Mr Hope's recommendations.
"They are hopeful that those recommendations are carried out by the West Australian police force," Mr Skinner said.
Assistant Commissioner John Standing said after the finding: "This finding really portrays just how dangerous and how difficult policing is across the State.
"We also believe the coroner's verdict also highlights the maturity of the Western Australian Police Service in relation to its openness during the investigation and subsequently this inquest."
PIRG