Light plane forced landing on Sunshine Coast

[Jabawocky]

Any body have any info on a very good effort on a forced landing today.

I missed the news, but apparently a job well done after an engone stoped for whatever reason.

J

[gas-chamber]

Not sure if it was the same one but yesterday a Debonair (or may have been a straight tail Bonanza) was put down in a paddock alongside Obi Obi Road near Kenilworth.

Apparently he was lined up for the road but at last minute was baulked by vehicles, so went over one set of wires and under another to lob into a field that looked to me to be about 400 metres long. Stopped just short of a fence. The approach was over some fairly high trees as well, so it was a neat job to get it in where he did. Plenty of potential around there to get hurt.

Today they took down a couple of fences and cleared a longer area and he got off again, just as I was arriving to take photos (I was 2 minutes too late). So it can't have been as a result of any major engine damage, but I guess if you only have one and it stops, it feels pretty major at the time..

[Horatio Leafblower]

Somebody pleas assure me is was NOT a PA-28-200R with re/silver stripes... please. :uhoh:

:rolleyes:

[Jabawocky]

Well found a link with a pic!

Apart from some journo BS, interesting article.

Now if the Beech has been flown out already, one starts to assume there was something fairly simple wrong with it. An over supply of air in a tank perhaps?:hmm:

http://www.thedaily.com.au/news/2007/dec/23/planes-plunge-paddock/

J:ok:

[Capt Wally]

.......merry xmas to all that are here on PPRUNE xmas morning..............how sad is that, some of us have no lives !:bored:

One fortunate pilot there, glad to read a happy outcome for all.
7500ft gave the guy some options, & to think I used to fly SE at night over the city & rough ground !......ohhhhh that gives me shudders !:bored:

Ho Ho Ho to you:)

CW

[TLAW]

I was going to post some of the best quotes from the article, but I'm spoilt for choice! They are uniformly alarmistic, speculative, misinformed and hilarious!
Nevertheless, well played that man, good job! :ok:

EDIT: Simulpost with Capt Wally. I'm working, working, working, but obviously not very hard - Christmas is postponed until later this evening...

[Capt Wally]

..............keep working TLAW but not too long, the big red fat guy is about to depart for the Nth pole !!:}., you might miss out:)........he's been delayed 'cause some baggage/toy handlers have gone on strike so poor santa has gotta sweat it out laoding the toys that the snoty nosed kids refused..such as bikes, puzzles & the likes (you see electronic games & toys that keep 'em glued to their seats are the go now):)
I too was tempted to mention the poor choice of words describing the event of the crash Ldg but realised that some words/statements where 'quoted' from the pilot !:bored:
....still nobody hurt, that's all that matters:)

CW

[ules]

good to see he had time to get a photo with the plane. :}

[Miraz]

He was lucky it was the 23rd - the weather on the 24th would have made a forced landing from 7500' a little trickier.

This was the view I had approaching Gympie from Longreach on the 24th....

http://www.miraz.com/gallery/d/6876-1/IMGP3424.JPG

[TLAW]

Miraz,

I'm not familiar with the area - what is that rather striking landmark?

[Jabawocky]

A big rock:}

Best avoided:uhoh:

J

[BEACH KING]

I could be shot down in flames here, but may I venture from my uninformed perch in the bush that that that landmark is possibly a glass house mountain, being a singular of the famed plural Glass House Mountains???? perhaps. (Looks like one I saw up close anyhow)

By the way, I am very interested to know the cause of Old mates vibration which caused the forced landing.(I'm thinking maybe a lost prop tip, or maybe a blocked or broken injector line to fly it out so soon after). For sure he did a tremendous job to put it down in that area:ok:

[ForkTailedDrKiller]

Taint no Glass House Mountain on the Longreach - Gympie track!

Mt Corella? (to the north of Gympie)

Dr :8

PS: Beachy, I think the "Glass Houses" are the group just north of Caboolture. If this one is near Gympie then it is a bit far north. However, I think they are all similar in origin, ie volcanic plugs - The Glasshouse Mountains (Mts Miketeebumulgrai, Elimbah, Beerburum, Tibberoowuccum, Coonowrin, Ngungun, Beerwah, Tibrogargan, Coochin, Dularcha?, Jowarra?, Wild Horse?), Mt Coolum, Mt Cooroy, Mt Corella.

Likewise, I am curious to know the cause of the "vibration" that led to the forced landing.

[Chimbu chuckles]

Hmm....forced landing on 23rd and departs paddock on 24th.

Chances of getting anything fixed day before xmas=0

Chances of getting some tins of avgas= excellent.

I am gonna suggest fuel contaminated...with air.

Now far be it from me to cast the first stone if that is the case...when I ran a tank dry 15 years back or so in a C185 I hit a power pole support cable at 50 agl while landing on a road in Sunday afternoon traffic and still pulled off a decent landing...although quite how escapes me...the DCA investigation was carried out at the Moresby Dero Club bar an hour or so later where boss of DCA handed me a beer and said "Chuck, promise me you won't do that again" and the boss of ATSB just said, smiling over his white wine, "Nice bit of flying...you fecking IDIOT":}

So I'll just say "Nice bit of flying":ok:

[ForkTailedDrKiller]

CC - I had the same thought, but it seems difficult to run a tank dry Archerfield to Gin Gin - hour and a bit trip!

Can't say I have ever had to carry out a forced landing cause I ran a tank dry - but I did carry out a precautionary landing on a dirt road west of Charters Towers when I thought I was going to run both tanks dry in a Hawk XP!

I taxied down the road until I got to a homestead. Fortunately they had had a chopper working there a few days earlier and had half a drum of Avgas left over. A quick refill and I was on my way. Been my little secret for the last 15 years or so.

So I'll just say "Nice bit of flying" also, but I would still like to know what was behind it!

If faced with that situation in the Bo, the big question for me would be do you drop the gear - and risk folding the nose wheel and maybe ending up on your back - or put it in gear up?

Dr :8

[Miraz]

Mt Corella sounds about right - I have to confess I was more focused on reading spot heights than place names off the map at the time.

[Atlas Shrugged]

the propeller cut out mid-air.

plane began to wobble and shudder and plunged towards the ground.


Sorry, but I couldn't resist! :E :E

[poteroo]

One amazing piece of flying - and with only 100hrs?
There are not many places to go from near the Maleny VOR. When the place was less subdivided, there was a reasonable strip about 1nm to the W of the Witta 'settlement' - but that was it for the whole top of the range. Friend had a C180 there for many years.
From the position he claimed to be at...2nm to the W of the Maleny VOR.... the more obvious choice might have been to head W/NW again, along the Elamon Ck towards Conondale, then N over the Mary valley, which runs N from there towards Kenilworth. There are several largish paddocks on that track, cleared and cultivated back in the 50's and 60's, and now more often running perennial grass pasture.
What I can't understand is how he managed to get into the Obi Obi valley below the Baroon Pocket dam, ie, to the W of Mapleton. That would have entailed a white knuckle glide over the Curramore spur of the main Maleny range, which is 1600-1800 ft in that area. I think the area he reportedly landed is actually called Kidaman, or maybe Obi Obi - but it has only very small areas of river flats.
Whatever the story, it will make an interesting read in the future.
happy days,

[tipsy2]

tipsy resides on the Sunshine Coast and is entertained by what is really nothing more than an 'egg timer' for a local newspaper. The article /report we are discussing here reads like it was written by a 14 year old work experience student. Statements like the plane began to wobble and shudder and plunged towards the ground demonstrates a total lack of even the simplest of aviation understanding. Unfortunately the entire article is laced with similar OOOOOOH AAAAAAAAAR emotive newspaper selling tidbits enough to make the article virtually unintelligable.

The really sad thing is that the public actually believe as the truth such rubbish, certainly makes you wonder what other rubbish is being dumped on us regarding things we do not know as intimately as we know aviation.

This particular newspaper is not even worth putting on the bottom of a cockies cage.

tipsy

[carbon]

certainly makes you wonder what other rubbish is being dumped on us regarding things we do not know as intimately as we know aviation.


Scary isn't it Tipsy! With the power journalists have, I believe they should be held to account over false assumptions and information. They tend to assume an awful lot, without acknowledging the fact that they are doing so.

[KRUSTY 34]

More than 20 years ago a good mate of mine attempted to fly his new girlfriend's father and his business associates from Sydney to Mildura. The only aircraft available was a PA28 Archer. It was winter, the weather was clear but the westerlies were ferocious. Due to a combination of inexperience and pressure the noise stopped just short of Robinvale!

The ensuring forced landing on a dirt road was sucessful, and the next day, after a much needed top up of the tanks, he suceeded in taking off with the only damage a very bruised ego and a new found realisation that-"it can happen to me"!

I'm not making light of this incident for one minute, but this guy is now a 777 Captain with Emirates, and having known him for all these years, I would have no hesitation in putting my family in the back of his aircraft. Now!

Whether or not this incident was the result of fuel starvation or exhaustion will remain to be seen. But like all things aviation, if a mistake was made you can bet your life that this pilot would be very unlikely to make such a mistake again. Happily in this case because of a lesson learnt, rather than the other more permanent option.

[OzExpat]

poteroo said that the pilot had only about 100 hours - I must've missed this tidbit in that dreadful newspaper report (I stopped reading when it became clear that the journo had no idea of the subject matter). Still, he's not the only one of us to have survived a dangerous situation while still low on hours and experience and, like us, is likely to take some valuable lessons from it. No matter what the original cause of the problem, at least he didn't make it worse by killing anyone so I join the chorus of "a nice bit of flying". :ok:

[Jabawocky]

Myself and two infamous ppruners were conducting an "official" pprune investigation last night on how this might have happened.

I suggested the fuel selector may have not been fully turned into its detent.......could be done knowing you had heaps of fuel on board.

The two experts of the panel, with much Beech experience both agreed that it may have been recieving fuel in such a restricted quantity that it did start coughing and shuddering, as one had been subjected to this on the ground and the other had a student do it in flight in a twin.

Does anyone know the bloke concerned? Its always good to learn from those who have made mistakes, and lived to tell the tale!

He should buy a lotto ticket, may have been skill involved, but also a large slice of luck it was able to be flown out the next day!:ok:

J

[VH-XXX]

So you think your weather is bad up there? Try this!

http://users.netconnect.com.au/~njah1/cloud.jpg

[Capt Fathom]

If only the 'holes' in PNG had been that big! Luxury :E

[VH-XXX]

Perhaps this is more your style Capt?

http://users.netconnect.com.au/~njah1/cloud2.jpg

[Jamair]

This was my wx yesterday at DKI...........

http://i130.photobucket.com/albums/p271/jamair_photos/DKI.jpg

[Brian Abraham]

Scary isn't it Tipsy! With the power journalists have, I believe they should be held to account over false assumptions and information. They tend to assume an awful lot, without acknowledging the fact that they are doing so.

Looks like the forth estate hasn't advanced too far.

It appears we have appointed our worst generals to command forces, and our most gifted and brilliant to edit newspapers! In fact, I discovered by reading newspapers that these editor/geniuses plainly saw all my strategic defects from the start, yet failed to inform me until it was too late. Accordingly, I'm readily willing to yield my command to these obviously superior intellects, and I'll, in turn, do my best for the cause by writing editorials - after the fact.
Robert E. Lee, 1863