Hey Centaurus, you piqued my interest so I did some various googling and found out that an article on the accident was published in the DCA Aviation Safety Digest March 1960 (issue 20).
Thanks for tip Magnum P1. I located ASD Issue 20 in the Civil Aviation Historical Society Museum at Essendon. The museum has all the Aviation Safety Digests. The report on the Fletcher accident was published at page 18.
It stated in part: "The pilot was familiar with the area at Armidale and commenced work at 0730 and the crash occurred at 1630. Up to this point the pilot had flown 73 separate sorties with rest breaks every to hours. The pilot had flown some 5700 hours and was the most experienced pilot in Australia on the FU24 type of aircraft.. on the last take off almost immediately after the left turn the noise increased and the aircraft was seen to be descending rapidly with superphosphate streaming from the hopper...The starboard wing struck a high tree, was torn off and the aircraft then rolled on its back and skidded along before coming to rest against another tree and a fence.
There is reliable evidence that at the time of the accident the gross weight of the aircraft was some 105 lbs in excess of the maximum permissible weight for the type. It was also evident that this pilot was in the habit of operating in an overload conditions and on many occasions the overload must have been considerably greater than in this instance. It has been reported that on numerous occasions this pilot had been forced to dump his load in order to avoid dangerous situations.
The pilot had frequently exceeded prescribed flight time limitations. In the seven days preceding this accident he had flown 37 hours and on this particular day he had been on duty for at least nine hours. Although the cause of this accident has not been firmly established it is evident the whole operation was being conducted with very small margins of safety.
In such circumstances, it requires one unexpected event or some slight miscalculation to put the aircraft where successful emergency measures must be taken if an accident is to be averted. Not always will the pilot's skill be equal to the occasion and the greater his exposure to these situations the greater his chances of failure.
There is every indication that this pilot had been allowing himself to go beyond reasonable limits all too frequently."
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When I and the other RAAF pilots flew for this Tamworth company in Tiger Moths, we were expected to take 400 lbs of load in the hopper which replaced the front seat of the Tiger Moth. The C of G was almost certainly over the limit as it was SOP to set the elevator trim fully back for take off and we often needed to maintain full throttle to fly level flight in the high density altitude around the Armidale hills.
When you consider that while instructing on Tiger Moths the instructor wore a parachute and his weight plus parachute was probably around 200 lbs, it makes me wonder how we ever got airborne with over 400lbs in the hopper of the crop-duster Tiger Moth. Especially as we were always very nose heavy. Lastly, the report said the pilot had flown 37 hours in seven days which was beyond the permissible limit. When my log book showed I had flown 79 hours in 11 days on crop dusting sorties, I realise how lucky I was to get away with it without DCA finding out.