From the ABC:
Authorities prepare to recover bodies from crash - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)
CASA investigate?

That's a very poorly crafted piece from the ABC,so I wouldn't bet my life on its accuracy

Flying - Spike # 118
 

It is always sad and usually speculative to discuss accidents.
In my opinion and I stress, opinion, Flying - Spike is closest to the truth. These days, information is available by the ton, but what you need is virtually inaccessable.
FS, FSO's and people (with knowledge) dispersed throughout the country were able to succinctley condense what you needed to know to make an informed decision. These days, if you telephone briefing you will wait endlessly for an operator to respond, you will be read what you ask for and only what you ask for and on the end of a phone in the bush you probably won't even understand your options unless very experienced. If you cart your computer around you almost invariably won't get reception at a bush airstrip and if you do you will be confronted with 99 pages of text in heiroglyphics a master of science could not understand.
Bureacracy cover their arse with no thought of useability.
Most pilots are very responsible. They do the best they can.
Unfortunately an emergency must exist before the rescources of the system are available to you. Often then - too late.
I understand cost pressures on Government departments but at the end of the day in Australia there are no longer any public servants - just bureacracies with CUSTOMERS or CLIENTS who must take or leave the options available. There simply is no "SERVICE" from any government instrumentality. The people who work for them are totaly hamstrung by internal rules and regulations. Every private flight flown, is made on the basis of the best you can do under the circumstances.The government view is fly at your own peril - our rules are rewritten by the hour, by our legal experts who can craft any situation into an edict which the paticipant should have forseen.
God help this country if we stay on the path we are being taken.

If you look on the bottom of an area forecast or in the ERSA, you will find a phone number which will give you a direct connection to an Aviation Meteorologist, who will answer the 'phone any time of the day or night and be more than happy to provide a 'technical elaboration' and discuss the vagaries of any forecast. They won't of course tell you to go or not go.

Well, morno, if you know it all, why don't you enlighten us?

In any case - RIP.

There are other 'specialist' forums suggesting that if it was a nosewheel aircraft it would have landed safely, where do people get this sh*t from ? :mad:

I totally agree with Jabawocky.

If not now, when is the right time to discuss these issues?

None of us know exactly what happened and whether there where other mitigating circumstances that contributed to this accident, however, commonsense tells us that the weather was one of the most significant factors.

I feel sad that Des and his passengers have died, but I also feel like it is THE PERFECT time to discuss flying in IMC without an instrument rating. And transiting from VFR to IMC.

It is not disrespectful to have this sort of discussion. This is being responsible.
These issues need to be discussed, because, aviators by accident or deliberately find themselves in these situations.

Many commercial and private pilots fly in IMC on a regular basis when they should only be VFR and the more they do it, they think they can get away with it. (I am no saying Des was like this, as I have no idea). But I do know many pilots like this.

The fact is: the weather around the Sunshine Coast hinterland was NOT suitable for VFR flight that day.

If you are VFR and the forecast indicates it is clearly not suitable, it is pretty simple to me - don't depart. It is not always that straight forward of course. But that day, how anyone thought they were going to get over the ranges VFR was not living in reality.

Weather forcasting/reporting in Australia is so bad that you would not fly much if you followed that rule!

Interestingly, in Alaska, FAA have set up webcams in numerous key locations - you can go online and take a look at the weather in realtime!

Dr :8

Thanks for agreeing with me :ok:

But we are going to disagree on a few points.

First of all, there was VFR all around the place, I mostly fly IFR, but that day, and at that exact time, while morn was in the hold at MLY I was about 20 miles east travelling back from up near Gladstone with a few friends, most with way more experience than me, and one with plenty of PNG time.

As we approached those ranges about an hour earlier within 10 miles of the crash site we had a choice to make, go west and through the gap at Woodford/kilcoy, or go east to Gympie, have a pie/sausage roll, coke/coffee, get some fuel, even though not needed, and rethink our attack.

The Airline Captain/PNG guy out front who was closer to the action made the right call, we all went to Gympie. I think we could have gone west and around the long way, we could have gone anywhere west.....I could see the hills around Nanango, it was that good.

The west and north-west is where Des came from. The weather was fine for VFR flight.

The cruddy stuff was on the coast, but, it claggs in on the ranges and VMC conditions existed all the way southbound down the VFR lane. Sure we left Gympie at about 1500AGL and at times were down to 500AGL, mainly due to those whispy drizzly bits, but from the VFR lane we could see YBSU, YCDR and apart from some yukky stuff right near YCAB, the viz was OK and as forecast.

Out to our right wing = UGLY REALLY UGLY, the whole ranges were socked in, from one end to the other.

If I went IFR that day it woud have been a classic hot steamy bumpy ride over those hills. not pleasant but flyable in the right machine etc. I dread the thought of doing it in a DH Dragon.

Des was not a risky cowboy. Having some knowledge of what transpired, I can only assume he got sucked in to seeing a gap and then running up the range, getting trapped and caught out.

It may seem harsh to say, about a mate, but I think he got sucked in, and stuffed up.

Plenty of others have and will, none of us expected someone like him to be in that situation. It makes some of us wonder .....if he can, what about me!

be vigilant folks..... It is easy to fool people, and the easiest to fool is ourself!

Welcome to Victorian weather!

How much of that type of weather do you get up there like that, it is rarely, some days or often? Just interested really.

Not that much, well not since the 3 years of wet season have eased off.

We do normally enjoy better on average, than you Victorians, who are much braver, tougher and all that

Because I don't think a public forum that is trawled by media is the correct place to be discussing my recall of the radio calls during the event.

morno

Getting out of the soup
 

That's a great description of the conditions on the day Jaba; gives a really good overview of how easily one can get caught out.

It's very easy to say "if it's not VFR just don't go", that's a statement that would seem to suggest there are two weather states, one okay for VFR flight and one that requires IFR and IFR only. Of course, as your post indicates, things can start out very well and deteriorate around you on the way. And what appears to be a situation you can deal with can then turn nasty without you realising just how bad it is. The other factor is the pressure Des would have been under (which I've referred to in a previous post). They were already a day late with, I believe, a plan to have come back on the Sunday afternoon, and it no doubt may have seemed like it wasn't going to be too difficult to get around the bad weather as he approached it.

I was once flying VFR coastal around Eastern Victoria (somewhere near Mallacoota) just on 500 feet AGL travelling north along the beach in a Beechcraft Sundowner (not a fast machine, we had a 20 knot headwind...cars on the road below appeared to be going faster than us...) The weather was marginal with low ceiling just above me. The forecast was for improving conditions further to the north so I was believing better weather was not too far ahead. I kept seeing patches of blue above me until I (incorrectly) surmised the cloud was breaking up. I decided to climb believing I'd be able to get up a little higher and be free of the low ceiling that appeared to be breaking up above me. I pushed the throttle forward and climbed thinking I'll be above 7/8 or better in no time. I went into cloud (I'm not IFR rated) and I didn't come out until 3800 feet. In brilliant sunshine and crystal clear air I was then flying above a sloping cloud deck, which could have been a disaster in and of itself but I'd read about such things, knew my A/H was working fine and decided I needed to believe the instruments (but clearly I was in an environment I very much knew I shouldn't have been in).

After breaking into the clear I decided the most sensible thing to do was point the aircraft due east (knowing there was no land or mountains until at least NZ) and descend back down at around 400 ft/min until I popped out over water, which I successfully did about 15 miles offshore. I then did a 180 degree turn and headed back to the coast to continue my trip at 500 feet under the ceiling.

It was a defining moment in my flying experience. Fortunately I'd only just recently done a BFR where I'd done about 30 min under the hood so my instrument scanning skills were recent. It taught me a big lesson about believing cloud above you is breaking up or that it's not thick. What I think I did well though was kept climbing after I went into the cloud rather than trying to come back down again when I was near headlands and hills along the coastal stretch and already so low, maintained good instrument scan & control, pointed the a/c away from high ground using very gradual movements and used a low rate of descent to let down back out of it.

It pays to have a plan on what to do if you do go into cloud suddenly and find yourself not breaking out within a few seconds and I'd encourage all VFR pilots to really think about it.

Ren

Fair enough. It's just that I - and from what I read many here - would like to learn from sad events like this one. IOW: how does an experienced pilot paint himself into such a corner...

Very easily....if your flight plan and planned contingencies prove to be inadequate for the situation in which you find yourself then you are well on the path to corner country - and it is very easy to be sucked into a situation that falls outside your contingency plans.

Most of us have pushed on into marginal conditions in the unsubstantiated belief that conditions will improve at some point in our careers...sometimes you get away with it, sometimes you scare yourself and, unfortunately sometimes you get it catastrophically wrong.

Unplanned low level departure from VMC is not a good place to find yourself, no matter how much experience you have in your flight bag.

C1317/12 review c1312/12 tempo restricted area act wi 2nm rad of psn s26 27.2 e152 27.19 5nm se manumbar ala (ymub) queensland (qld) no flight permitted without prior approval from controlling authority ctc: Qld police tel: 0438 200 705 sfc to 4000ft amsl from 10 040119 to 10 090000 est

Good story RenegageMan. I know a pilot who shall remain nameless that popped into some cloud at circa 500ft after seeing blue above and didn't come out until 7,450ft, right under a 7,500ft class C boundary. Cloud is a beast that is difficult to predict at the best of times.

How many of us as VFR pilots have ventured into that 178 second realm and been fortunate enough to return.?



I know that I have been there and the three things that came together to bring me and my passengers back were an AH, sufficient fuel and recent simulator time. Without any one of those essentials and a very large dose of luck the last 235 years of the joys and the sorrows of life shared by the seven of us on board would never have been.

What follows is what I wrote of those events for a one of the flying magazines.

One Monday in March some years back, saw me pacing the early morning dew at Bathurst airfield. Our driver, desperate to get back to open his business was looking at his watch as often as was the passenger who had a shop to open in Melbourne. Neither of them understood nor wanted to understand the problem. They could see that the field was clear of storm, gale and fog so why the delay?

Days earlier on the outward journey storms over Katoomba had forced us to abandon the rented Cessna 210 at Bathurst and finish the journey by taxi.
When making plans for a family reunion and celebration weekend in the Blue Mountains this level of stress, uncertainty and delay was not anticipated. On the morning that we were all due back at our various workplaces everyone was stuck at Bathurst while I struggled with the go/no go decision.

So much for a relaxed weekend and for my reputation as someone who gets thing done - on time and on budget. My credibility was eroding fast, while the cloud, with tantalizing slowness , was just barely eroding from the ridge tops.
To balance the briefing office’s gloomy predictions, I obtained an actual weather from and aircraft at Canowindra. Since he was reporting CAVOK below high cloud I decided to take off and check the cloud/ridge interface from up close.

The passengers were loaded and advised that we would be returning to Bathurst if a clear path could not be found.
Viewed from the sky the gaps were larger; the horizontal visibility was definitely an improvement on the slant view from the ground. Not good, but not too bad; & I did have that actual report. Another decision made and VH-BEV rolled onto a track up the most open valley.
There was plenty of width between fingers of wispy cloud that barely reached down to the peaks. Straight ahead of us was a tunnel large enough to turn the QE2 . All I had to do was pop through that tunnel and then it would be smooth flying all the way home. One small obstacle to clear before I would get everyone home with all obligations and promises honoured.

Minutes later those wispy fingers became hands, hands gathering the land up into the cloud. The valley was narrower, and all ahead was grayish white down to the green of the trees. Or was it? Surely it was just another slant line illusion? And if only we were low enough it would again reveal that clear path up the valley. It had after, been clearly visible mere seconds ago.

Gently carefully, I eased the first millimeter off the throttle,. The pasture was now streaming past. A view abruptly punctured by a clump of trees, the mates of whom, I suddenly realized were a bout to obliterate two families.

It was time to stop laying the odds and to seriously aviate. Throttle forward, wings level, ease the trim towards climb. A wisp of mist swiped at the windshield as I checked the power. Then the view completely disappeared. The abruptness was a shock, as was the glaring white blackness.
Glaring white blackness?
That’s the very question that I asked myself. But I saw what I saw.

The engine note changed in step with my reflex snap back on the column and with the passengers’ silence. They were not pilots, but had been oft regaled by pilots’ stories. Do pilots ever tell stories that are not about being disoriented in cloud, stall and spin or other disasters?

I forced myself to focus on the AH. It showed winds level and the nose slightly up – we were climbing straight ahead.
What next?
Something about scan?
Yes Attitude, altitude, speed and direction.
Attitude? Climbing straight ahead, wings level – good.
Altitude? 3500 and climbing at 400 fpm.
Speeds MP? and airspeed OK for climb.
Direction? What direction ? I’d been chasing valleys wherever they led. All sense of direction was well lost.

Fossicking for the charts I remembered Scan!
Scan scan, scan., forget the charts.

I looked out to where there was no wing to see, merely water streaming along the Perspex. Beyond that , nothing, absolutely nothing; just more of that glaring white blackness.
Attitude, altitude, speed and direction
Attitude, altitude, speed and direction
Attitude, altitude, speed and direction
Good training , earlier ignored, asserted itself. The memorized litanies returned. Aviate, communicate, navigate.

Communicate! My God, communicate!. I had so far avoided the rocks in those clouds but what about speeding aluminium rocks?

“Canberra this is Cessna Bravo Echo Victor , VFR to the south of Bathurst seven POB. Passing through seven thousand VFR in solid cloud. Request assistance”.
“ Bravo Echo Victor , say again VFR in cloud?”
“Affirmative VFR in cloud”
“ Bravo Echo Victor, stand by….. Bravo Echo Victor remain this frequency and keep wings level on AH”.
“ Bravo Echo Victor”

” Bravo Echo Victor say again POB? And do you have an instrument rating?”
“Seven POB, no rating”
“ Bravo Echo Victor I am clearing this frequency of all other traffic.
Maintain wings level 0on AH. I repeat keep wings level on AH”
“ Bravo Echo Victor”.
“ Bravo Echo Victor keepings wings level can you advise your present position”.
“Maintaining heading two zero zero leaving 8500 feet on climb.
location unsure”.
“ Bravo Echo Victor, concentrate on wings level on AH. If possible maintain climb. We do not have you on radar at this time”.
“ Bravo Echo Victor”
Attitude, altitude, speed and direction
Attitude, altitude, speed and direction
Attitude, altitude, speed and direction
A tense 40 mins after we had entered cloud and as suddenly as we had originally been engulfed, we were spat out into brilliant light. Clear unblemished blue above and a solid froth of white below.

“Canberra, Bravo Echo Victor is maintaining 11200 on top of solid cloud, heading one eight zero”.
“ Bravo Echo Victor, keep wings level on AH and, if possible, maintain heading and remain clear of cloud”.
‘ Bravo Echo Victor”
“ Bravo Echo Victor your you are radar identified. Can you come onto a heading of one five eight, remaining clear of cloud?”
“One five eight Bravo Echo Victor”.
“Canberra Bravo Echo Victor is visual, ten thousand over Lake George”.
“ Bravo Echo Victor, remaining clear of cloud, descend to 5500. At 5500 contact Canberra approach on 124.5
“124.5 Bravo Echo Victor”

What else to say?
No one factor created the situation. Just the usual story of a cascading sequence of small deviations from best practice. Thankfully good training eventually did take over. On the ground, an excellent service shepherded two vulnerable babies and their families to safety.
Thank-you is so little to offer for such a big service. So little in exchange for seven lives. But thank you ATC was all that I had to offer then and all that I have today.

Calm, assured and professional guidance brought us safely home. That and the instructor who in supervising my transfer from a New Zealand PPL to an Australian one had insisted on a couple of hours of real IFR training in IFR conditions.

Today both of those infants have children of their own . Children who, we can only hope will grow up p forever protected from that subtle cascading sequence of small deviations. That killer cascade that converts people into statistics.
And, I wonder, VH-BEV where are you today?.

Good description Jaba, and thanks for that appreciation of the conditions in that area.

A long time ago, about halfway through my first 10 years without a instrument rating, I was in one of Don Milroy's Cherokee 6's on the way fom Rocky to Brisbane to pick up a load of Telegraphs. The weather over the hills west of Maleny and at Kilcoy was all storms and rain so much so that I couldn't get though the valley to the Glasshouses, and I went back to Kingaroy and rang the boss. The papers were run out to me there ( the van driver got a smashed windscreen on the way out, so he wasn't happy either....)
When going from here almost due south to Watts Bridge sometimes, my track goes just west of Borumba Dam, over the Amamoor forest where the Gympie Muster is held, and the Tiger Country that is the headwaters of the Mary. Its very timbered, rugged, and gets a high rainfall that helps give the river some flow. Not many clearings for a place to go should my only motor fail. I stay a little higher unless there is something of particular interest, and give it a wide berth with any weather. That said, I don't feel officialdom should get in the act and declare it a no-low-fly area like Carnarvon Gorge.
On the Monday, a local young RAA Instructor who also has a Private licence, hired a 172 that had been IFR, left with two girl friends to drop them over to Toowoomba, but came back because of weather on his track. Good call. He drove them over later. I offered to IFR charter them over in the Navajo but it was declined because he wouldn't be flying and because of the cost.

Experience is not only about weather type, but learning where it can affect you the most, and learning where the Tiger areas are is a big part of that. A little extra fuel (without going overboard) to bypass them can be a boon for an easier flight.

Been almost caught myself and I didn't even realise the danger I was in until a few days later.

"Get home itis" heading back to Melbourne from Swan Hill. Just North of Bendigo the ceiling started to descend towards 1000AGL. I had the brilliant idea of pushing on and decided to head for Bacchus Marsh, overflying Daylesford.

As I approached Daylesford, I could see the ceiling over the mountains ahead dropped to a little over 500AGL by my estimate.

"Thats OK" I said to myself, "I'll just squeeze under and then fly down the Lerderderg Gorge" to Bacchus Marsh, then an easy coastal back to YMMB".

.....And I did exactly that....

..and found myself over tiger country, the gorge is very rough....with a very very low ceiling that was descending, not rising.

The next Ten minutes were exciting, and nowhere to go except forward. Luckily I just had room enough to descend a little faster than the cloud.

I should have either returned to Bendigo or gone further West to Ballarat and either landed or followed the freeway down.

Lesson : Unless you can actually see your destination, don't try and squeeze through.

And that's one of the dangers Sunny, you made it through that time. Next time will you say to yourself:

'I made it through last time, I'll give it a shot'

or will you say to yourself:

'That was **** last time, I'm not trying that again'

?

Every picture tells a story, and in the Courier Mail on-line there's a picture of the three ladies that were on board the last flight. What particularly caught my attention was the amount of luggage in the foreground, and I can see at least 12 items.

While I'm not aware of the load carrying ability of the aircraft, my immediate thought was W+B may have been a contributing factor.

The stories in the last couple of pages are exactly the info that is invaluable to come out of these events. The common and consistent cause of accidents is us particularly around the getthereitis and she'll be right mate..

Thanks renegade man sunfish and others for the stories

I think there is nothing better than us all detailing our brushes with these sorts of experiences. Hihosland, your story is incredible and one that I'm sure many have been through. Thanks for taking the time to write it and bare all (and especially note the emotion around what it's meant to you all these years later re family and the help you were given that day....congratulations, you did well getting on the radio and asking for help).

What's such an important factor in all of this are the human dynamics around management of passenger expectations and your reputation. Just like hihosland has pointed out, most of us are 'get the job done' 'always deliver' type of people. Our passengers know us this way too and the mix of this personality type, get-there-itis, bad weather and VFR-only capability is a recipe for disaster. I long ago learnt that taking family and friends on weekends away or to a wedding or must-get-there event is a distinct no no.

We all love flying, we all love to share flying with our family and friends, but within that love and passion we must be prepared to disappoint or have to cancel a trip and cause a whole lot of difficulty when we can't get people home. That's part of what comes with the territory; the ability to be real and genuine and keep yourself safe. As I've noted before, I think Des ended up under too much pressure to get back from Monto and probably did exactly what we've all done; pushed on when he should have just turned around and gone back.

When oh when will we tackle this human factors issue!!!??? So much work has been done on cockpit resource management in professional flying and getting pilots to check their "personal minimums" but teaching people about how to avoid high pressure/reputation loss/got-to-get-there situations is still (in my opinion) in its infancy and needs a whole lot more work.

Ren

flying-spike what happened to your post about getting caught out on a flight out of Cairns? It seems to have disappeared. It was a good story and may help some young student save their life. Please repost. We need all the stories we can get to get everyone sharing this stuff to stop these VFR into IMC accidents happening.

In 2005 CASA ran a safety workshop around the country that looked at the problem of VMC into IMC. One of the stats was that most of the accidents occurred in the second half of the journey. The other stat was that most of the pilots that did a PSL survived but the aircraft did not. The workshop was considered to be that good that the Canadians adopted the format and charged $400 to attend. The point being that work has been done in trying to educate pilots, (try and download 178seconds to live) but as others have stated the desire to get home can sometimes override sound decision making. Might be worth having a read of this .General Aviation Pilot Behaviours in the Face of Adverse Weather

I'll add another story.....had my PPL for all of about a month and took a shiny G1000 equipped C182 away for a week over the Xmas break with my fiancee..3rd leg was from Maroochydore to Young.

The weather was poor on the Sunshine coast, 1500-1800ft cloud base 5-6km of viz with localised heavy showers but the forecast was for clear conditions south of the the NSW border and west of the ranges. We set off and followed the beaches down the coast with occasional deviations to avoid the heaviest showers, by the time we past Coolangatta we were clear of the rain and the cloud had lifted - a thin layer of 2/8 at around 3000 and 3-4/8 at around 7000.

I spent the next few minutes on the radio confirming the weather on the western side of the ranges hadn't changed, requested flight following from the controller and somewhere around Tweed Heads changed course to track directly to Young and climb to 9000ft, confident that we would be well clear of cloud, maintain a clear view of the ground and that the cloud cover would continue to thin out as we progressed south.

The plan seemed to be good, we crossed the Border ranges to Kyogle without incident and it looked like we had made the right call. However somewhere between Mt Belmore the cloud started to fill in again, and the top of the upper cloud layer had risen up to 9000ft and it was becoming harder to stay clear of the upper cloud layer and maintain a clear view of the ground. So I decided to drop down to 5-6000 ft to get below the upper cloud layer whilst there were still larger openings in the upper cloud layer. So I found a nice big opening, advised the controller that I would be descending below cloud and made a descending turn at around 1500ft/min in clear air.

Within a few minutes of starting the descent, the folly of my decisions started to become painfully apparent. There were no longer two layers of cloud - it was solid murk all the way down. The hole through which I was descending that had been a good 4 miles across at the start of the descent closed up on me - the blue sky overhead went first, then the ground began to disappear too.

I pressed on with the descent, searching for the clear air that I had seen only a few minutes ago as we climbed up through it - as we passed through 5000ft the controller started to ask for assurances that I was in clear air and had a good view of the ground and that I was well below LSALT. The controller's intervention forced me to get my head back inside the cockpit and re-assess the situation....I was deep inside the Gibraltar Range at 4,000ft, no horizontal visibility and occasional glimpses of tree covered slopes if I looked down past the gear.....****! How had my day turned to custard in just a few minutes?

I set the GPS display to colour code the terrain by relative height...any terrain close to my altitude turned red, clear air turned black...there was a lot of red. I used the autopilot to maintain wings-level, best angle of climb and altered course with the heading bug to follow the black bits of the GPS display out to the south east towards Grafton.

Reasonable visibility returned as we left the range and we were able to breathe again and confirm that we were no longer in any immediate danger.

Many valuable lessons learnt that day.....I have been quite happy to go a long way to avoid revisiting those lessons ever since.

vme
Interesting, the lat long on my charts unless I have done this wrong is about 1.5 - 2.0 NM SW on Manumbar or less (too lazy to measure it.

I wonder what is correct? If you flew the YCAB - YMTO track today would you be in the TRA or not? :confused:

Someone in the know might want to get the Notam guys to check this out.

My post
 

Unfortunately I deleted it by mistake so I will rewrite it:
I put myself (and my pax) in a similar situation flying from Mt. Isa to Cairns for a Dire Straits concert. We just managed to squeeze under the overcast and above the ridges north of Cairns. It was typical S.E. stream weather and not unlike weather near the Sunshine Coast earlier this week. We were in heavy rain and I will say no more than 500" above the ridge. I was fortunate in that I new exactly where I was and I was hearing VFR arrivals into Cairns from the north. I gave myself the proverbial kick in @rse when we landed.
My previous brush with that sort of Wx was south of Cairns on my first solo nav. The plan was a departure to the north then via Biboohra to Mt. Garnet then Innisfail coastal back to Cairns. Turning east after Mt. Garnet I was faced with a wall of grey with fractocumulus and heavy showers. I turned back and landed at Mt.Garnet and re-planned on the reciprocal flight plan.
It is very easy to put yourself in that sort of situation, very important to have an exit strategy but that should never include going into IMC especially in a day VFR aircraft.
In an effort to check my spelling I came across this. Revisiting this may help others understand what they are approaching and why they should avoid it.
Forms

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi.../220px-Ns1.jpg http://bits.wikimedia.org/static-1.2...gnify-clip.png
A nimbostratus cloud in the background with a stratus fractus in the middle of the upper half of the image.


Fractus are accessory clouds, named for the type of cloud from which they were sheared. The two principal forms are cumulus fractus (formerly, fractocumulus) and stratus fractus (formerly, fractostratus). Fractus clouds may develop into cumulus if the ground heats enough to start convection. Stratus fractus is distinguishable from cumulus fractus by its smaller vertical extent, darker color, and by the greater dispersion of its particles.
Cumulus fractus clouds actually look like ragged cumulus clouds.[1] They may originate from dissipated cumulus clouds, appearing in this case as white ragged clouds located at significant distances from each other. Cumulus fractus in particular form on the leading and trailing edges of summer storms in warm and humid conditions.[2] Observing fractus gives an indication of wind movements under the parent cloud.
Masses of multiple fractus clouds, located under a main cloud, are called pannus.
Fractonimbus are a form of stratus fractus, developing under precipitation clouds due to turbulent air movement. They are dark-gray and ragged in appearance. Fractonimbus exist only under precipitation clouds (such as nimbostratus, altostratus or cumulonimbus), and don't produce precipitation themselves. Fractonimbus may eventually merge completely with overlying nimbostratus clouds.
Significance in thunderstorms

In rainstorms, scud often form in the updraft area where the air has been cooled by precipitation from the downdraft, thus condensation occurs below the ambient cloud deck. If scud are rising and moving towards the main updraft, sometimes marked by a rain-free base (RFB) or wall cloud, then the thunderstorm is still developing. Scud are common and are usually insignificant. However, scud precede wall clouds, which often form from rising scud.
In addition to forming in inflow, fractus also form in outflow. Scud are very common on the leading edge of a thunderstorm where warm, moist air is lifted by the gust front. Scud are usually found under shelf clouds.[3]

Jabawocky - Tempo Restricted Area
 

I agree Jabawocky. I measured this on Google Earth and got 1.3 nm SW of YMUB. I think the lat/long is more or less correct as it shows a cleared area 300m SE from the crash site as detailed on the map on the CourierMail's website where I presume a chopper could land. It also agrees with the initial information at the first press conference after finding the crash site on Wednesday when it was stated that it is located 14km NW from the Borumba Dam wall.

some interesting stories. but i noticed a lack of the 4 words that could save ones lives...."precautionary search and landings"

Hi Brian

Can you please clarify this:

I'm not sure what you're saying exactly. I've been following the Norfolk thread and the overarching theme seems to be that the PIC was under all sorts of pressures (commercial, employment, potentially not wanting to look unsure....) but at the end of day he was the PIC and shouldn't have let the no-alternative/Norfolk-or-bust situation to have occurred. But you're also saying the human factors issue in that situation was squashed? It would seem the "PIC is PIC and needs to behave like a PIC" concept got away from James there in conducting that flight but the operator and regulator aren't going to acknowledge the unreasonable levels of pressure the PIC was under either.

One of the key points I'm trying to raise awareness of is that we (PICs) can get ourselves into a 'corner' with ourselves, our passengers and others who see us as so very capable way before we've even taken off and made our way to the "VFR into IMC corner" that this accident and the stories many are writing on here involves.

(PS - those two stories of yours are examples of people that were millimetres away from fatal crashes, thanks for sharing)

Ren

Thanks flying-spike, Dire Straits indeed. I was coming into Cairns from the north one day a long time ago on a special VFR clearance when I realised I'd strayed off the runway centre line and was heading for that big hill on the western side of the field that had suddenly loomed out of the mist. It wasn't overly serious and I corrected pretty quickly but it was just another example of marginal Wx conditions creating risk for the VFR pilot.

A reminder about fractus is always a good thing too. You see that stuff going past and you're very much in the wrong place at the wrong time...

I'm not surprised that you are confused by Brians post as it was a cheap shot at me.Any attempt to link the Norfolk thread with this tragedy is pathetic.

Mmmm....You're right Brian....extremely difficult. But we all need to talk about it. The cost to everyone when one of these accidents happens is so enormous. That they're so unnecessary is what's so galling and utterly tragic too.

(Thanks for your story too Miraz....glad you're still here to be able to tell us all about the G1000's blaring red screens after you'd dipped your toe into hell for a moment!)

Not sure if this might be a factor, AIRAC H27/12 effective next month has a correction for YMUB re name and location indicating its currently depicted wrong on the charts? As already mentioned, the NOTAM gets it wrong in terms of the restricted areas location referenced back to YMUB as far as its true bearing and distance.

It is not correct on the Bundy VNC, I found this out about last Sunday as I flew over it.

OzRunways is a marvellous thing. So I compared this to the ERC/WAC and sure enough the VNC was wrong.

With all due respect to all here and the deceased, can we please stop referring to Australian terrain as " tiger country". The fact is that every coutntry around us contains Pilots who operate every day at low level among terrain that makes ours look like a billiard table, and whom dream of our relatively benign weather.

Jabawocky - Markis10 re Ymub
 

The Brisbane/Sunshine Coast VTC does have an ala named Manumbar Homestead in the correct place. The ala marked on the Bundaberg VNC would appear to be the Sawmill/logging camp of the same name but you are right - there is no evidence of any ala there.

But about 7 nm to the SE, there is the above mentioned airstrip, a one-way airstrip of about 700m in length and clearly visible on the VTC, Google Maps or Google Earth and about 1.3nm from the crash site.

My, Oh, My....
Its all relative.. Just a figure of speech..Or are you an elitist?
No doubt there are Demure and Mundane areas in PNG and in the Himalayas as well....

What do we call your Location - 'ever spinning within the wheel' ?