KingAir crash near Chigwell?
 

Have heard a Kingair 200 has crashed in flames near Chigwell Essex ? Was also told an LEA aircraft

Heard it on the radio as well, the emergency services stated that the aircraft was engulfed when they got there and don't know how many were on board or if any walked away.

Chigwell.
 

It is Chigwell, Essex.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-essex-34433340

Two killed unfortunately. RIP.

Is it LEA ? Been a bad year ((

There's certainly a track for one of their aircraft leaving LTN and terminating very close to the location of the crash on Flight Radar. The times don't match however but FR24 is not the most accurate. Very sad loss.

BBC sais the aircraft took off from Stapleford Airfield and came down near Chigwell, which is about 10 NM to the SW of Stapleford.

The crash site is only a mile or two from the field.

Unfortunately it is a Kingair 200 from LEA.

Very sad in deed

There is a link to a press-release on LEA's website with the a/c reg and all details known so far.

Thoughts are with the families of those involved.

PZ

They have a press release in the Lonex Facebook page. Seems it came down shortly after departure. So sorry to all the guys there, and the families.

LEA are a excellent organisation with very good pilots I cannot imagine what went wrong makes us think of our own vulnerability ( very sad

Apparently, on it's way to pick up the West Ham owners for the trip to Sunderland for today's game.

No it was not due to do a flight to Newcastle ,but to Stornaway

Stapleford Tawney, 3 October 2015 – London Executive Aviation (‘LEA’) regrets to
confirm that one of its executive turboprop aircraft (registration number G‐BYCP), flying
from Stapleford Airport in Essex to Brize Norton in Oxfordshire, was involved in an
accident today.

The accident occurred around 10:20am, almost immediately after take‐off, when the
aircraft came down in a field close to Stapleford Airport.

The only people aboard the aircraft were two crew members. Essex Police has
confirmed that both crew died as a result of the accident. No passengers were on‐board
and no parties were harmed on the ground.

The aircraft involved is a Beechcraft King Air 200 executive turboprop which is owned
and operated by London Executive Aviation. The aircraft was manufactured in 1981 and
had its most recent scheduled maintenance inspection on 12 June 2015.

Both crew were highly experienced professional pilots. The captain had extensive
experience of flying King Air aircraft and was a CAA flying examiner.

London Executive Aviation’s managing director George Galanopoulos went immediately
to the accident site. He said: “Everybody at London Executive Aviation is shocked and
deeply saddened by this tragic accident. Our hearts go out to the families and friends of
our colleagues who lost their lives. We will do everything possible to support them at
this difficult time. We will also co‐operate fully with the authorities charged with
investigating the causes of the accident.”

Accidents like this - good crew, good weather, good twin aircraft and immediatly after takeoff - are very very rare. I have to wonder if it had been topped up with the wrong fuel.

I'm not sure that the weather in the area could have been described as good. There had certainly been a lot of fog around since dawn in most of the East London area.
FR24 has a trace on G-CIJW responding to the site; G-JW was at very low level for most of it's flight to the scene.

From memory, the METARs for Stansted either side of the time of the crash gave a met vis of 700m then 1600m and a cloud ceiling of overcast at 100ft. Stansted had been foggy since first light with RVRs down to 250m and the weather was just starting to improve.

Thoughts are with the family of the crew and their friends and colleagues.

I used to fly from Stapleford until recently and I would have thought of it as highly unlikely with AvGas only available via pumps and Jet A1 (for King Airs) only available from the bowser. But who knows?



/h88

Not wishing to 'speculate', but wouldn't "the wrong fuel" float to the the top of the tank?

(Presuming they didn't add coal or split logs as "wrong" fuel).

means close to Vmca. I´d guess a OEI scenario is the most likely.

correct and the limit is for the engine driven fuel pump only (150hrs between overhauls)

metar egss 030920z auto 35004kt 0600 r04/0750 fg vv/// 11/10
q1015=

rip

Frankly, I'm very disappointed in John Farley's post. As much respect as I have for John, this kind of random speculation does nobody any good.

A PT6 will run on 100LL with time and altitude limitations.

This is a tragic event, losing a Kingair is very rare. Can we just leave it alone until the AAIB have done their thing.

RIP boys 😢

I can't believe Avgas is the cause!

EIO, auto-feather issue, VMCA, is far more likely but only speculation.

You find yourself loosing an engine shortly after VR close to vmca , auto-feather may or may not work in time and having to pull the other power level, lowering the nose to stop the roll only means you're going to sink, poor vis and a lack of altitude and I fear you can do everything by the book and it may still not be enough..

A very sad day and brings home how fragile life is...

RIP

Stapleford is the home base for LEA's King Airs.

It's inconceivable that anyone there would have refuelled the aircraft in question with AvGas.

Very sad.
Always bothered me how small ( relatively) GA companies on tight budgets ( far more so than airlines) can really maintain training, currency and maintenance standards when they are operating so many different aircraft types.
I believe this company operates no less than eight different types.....including just one of a particular type.

enroute check/training ?
 

Hope that it did not involve any training of emergency drills for a check or training - quite common on ferry/positioning flights in GA :(

Training en route? As one who's had a skipper feather an engine at night on a fully laden DC3 - at about 100', I hope today we're a little more cautious. However, to waste these sectors entirely would be such a lost opportunity as so much can be learned on empty sectors.



Tracking away after takeoff at very low level? Maybe reverting to MKI eyeball after instruments failed.

And yes, it's just more speculation.

Although any loss of life is tragic, coming down immediately after takeoff from my home Airfield, this one feels so close to home it is particularly heartbreaking. Thoughts and prayers with the families and friends of the crew.

As for the speculation of cause I leave it to others but the only avgas at stap is at the pumps and the KAs are always filled up from the Jet A1 bowser.

RIP

READ THIS
 

For the love of God, let the AVGAS theory go! It has been said multiple times that the PT6 will run on AVGAS or JET!

Shocking accident,

I've flown an 80's KA in and out of Stapleford before and know the airfield well so this feels all too close to home.
Good company , good crew , good airframe.
I can only imagine an engine failure at the worst possible moment, exasperated by fairly diabolical visibility yesterday.

'Birdstrike' is another unexplored possibility I suppose.
I certainly wouldn't fancy my chances in yesterdays vis with a double engine failure..

Deepest sympathies to all involved.

A previous accident to an aircraft of the same type immediately after take-off:

https://assets.digital.cabinet-offic...pdf_022814.pdf

RSN.

Anyone know if this aircraft had CVR and FDR?
(.....second fatal crash involving Luxaviation company in less than one year.)

Different companies.

Also i have wondered if anyone else who has flown the KA has questioned the prop lever design in not having a detent to stop the props going from max to min to feather in 1 go! Ive seen it in the sim where you pull the props back after takeoff and go to far and end up feathering the props. Other pt planes have stops or detents which you physically have pass to go to feather, KA just go straight there.. finding yourself with 2 feathered props in a climb isnt going to be much fun..

Highly unlikely that there was a FDR fitted. In my experience, any CVRs fitted on old King Airs aren't maintained in an operating condition.

Forget the wrong fuel issue. Water in the tanks could be a factor, but a good 'A' Check should have covered that possibility. The position of the crash could be close to the usual point of a reduction to climb power (+/- 500ft AGL) with the associated movement of the propeller levers as mentioned above.

But the met report from EGSS suggests that the flight would also have been IMC almost from the moment of rotation and it's not impossible that a crew hand flying it (unlikely to have engaged the autopilot this soon after departure) failed to manage the aircraft attitude to prevent a roll/pitch excursion with no visual clues and no chance to see the ground before hitting it. Isn't this usually/officially a single-crew operation?

No criticism of the poor souls intended. Just an observation.

Wx at EGSS was indeed grim yesterday.

For most of the early morning IRVR was between 200 and 250.

That said, it was improving by 0900 though the recently introduced automatic met observation system makes the later METAR reports worse than the actual observed weather.

If it's wings level impact on centreline, there's a prime candidate for that, although unlikely unless the fog was very thick.

If it's not on centreline, or at a steep bank, my suspicions would lead me to ask (rhetorically) what the certification requirements of a B200 with one engine going quiet at rotation are...?

@littgo: any KingAir I flew/fly needed an effort to go from low RPM to feather. (creeping from high to low rpm is another story)

OTOH, going fro 2000 Revs to 1600 quickly at T/O power could destroy the gears between engine and prop (overtorque). That would be fairly easy to find out from the wreckage I think...

Thats easy, its an FAR 23 airplane... this airplane from the pics I saw was not Raisbecked and equipped with the old 3 blade props - this means a significant worse OEI/higher VMCA performance compared to a Raisbeck version. The 3 bladers often do not have autofeather - that was an optional, is mandatory with the Raisbeck Hartzell 4 blades. (and IIRC with the standard McCauley 4 bladers of the newer aircraft)

King Air B200

Distance over 50 ft 3300 vs 2760 ft, Acc-Go 6370ft vs. 3990ft (or 4390 with high floatation gear with Raisbeck fully enclosing gear doors)

[QUOTE][Isn't this usually/officially a single-crew operation?/QUOTE]

That is my understanding. Apparently on this occasion the unfortunate co pilot who normaly flies Challenger but occasionaly Legacy equipment was acting as a pilot assistant.

As a more general point Id like to say that I think our turboprop GA brothers and sisters are vastly underrated, underpaid and put upon .....particularly those who operate single crew....when compared to those of us who have graduated to jets.

IMHO the skills required to handle an EFTAO in a prop twin, single crew are much more demanding than a "superior" two crew jet and I have to say nothing would induce me to go back to one.....but it seems this is a right of passage taken as for granted as a step to becoming a "real" pilot.

Maybe, just maybe this might serve as a wake up call ...In particular relating to recurrent training....is this being done properly in a simulator looking at all scenarios or just through bashing a few circuits with a trainer in the aircraft in good old flying club fashion????
Without prejudging the investigation in any way I do hope a long overdue light is shone into some rather dark corners with some appropriate recommendations resulting.

Sticking to facts only, it would appear the aircraft crashed in less than 5 miles/ 2 - 2.5 minutes at most, after becoming airborne. Which end of the tarmac was being used at the time and if both ends were available, then which end was used for t/o. Whatever went wrong could not have happened at the worst moment, particularly in a light twin, leaving very little time and height to recover. According to a PPL trainee who was in the vicinity of the crash, he reported hearing loud engine noise before hearing the noise of the impact and loud explosion.