RAF Hastings crash due multiple birdstrikes at Darwin in the Fifties
I may have asked this question on Pprune a very long time ago but the memory is a little dimmer than then. So please bear with me.
In the early or middle Fifties, I was based in Darwin on Lincolns when an RAF Hastings took off and had a multiple bird strike. I don't know if the bird strike happened while the Hastings was still on its take off run or after getting airborne. The end result was either the crew aborted the takeoff shortly after becoming airborne and in so doing over-ran the airstrip. Or the aircraft suffered a failure of all or some of its engines and belly landed. It was a write-off I believe.
In later years, I often wondered the exact sequence of events that culminated in the aircraft on its belly beyond the end of the very long runway. The Hastings carried a flight engineer whose main task was to handle the throttles and other ancilliary controls which were on his panel. I believe the pilot had throttles available as well.
It is difficult to understand how birds would stop all engines simultaneously especially as the Hastings had big radial engines. In a jet maybe - but in a propeller aircraft? On the other hand I can understand a multi bird strike just after getting airborne could cause confusion in the cockpit as to how many engines were affected and if one or more was delivering partial power, full power or no power and thus windmilling props. All within a few seconds. Who feathers the props in a Hastings? The F/E or the two pilots?
What really happened that caused such a near fatal accident? I know that a large pipe line paralled a road that was beyond the over-run area of the runway and that it was fortunate the aircraft did not hit the pipe line.