Cirrus Crash near Dubbo
 

Lucky escape after their light plane crashed near Gilgandra | Aviation Inspector

Let the discussions begin on whether we would have pulled the chute handle versus landing in what looks like a perfectly good paddock near Dubbo!

From my experience, 95% of the terrain out there is suitable for an outlanding there.

VH-WYH

Pull the handle, that's what's its there for.

I Don't think it's so easy to predict the firmness of a field from the air, although the pictures do indicate the ground was quite good once it was back on earth.

We'll all end us paying for it eventually thru our insurance premiums. Pulling the chute on a Cirrus is not cheap.

The field looks great for a dead stick landing!

I reckon have seen that machine before out there. Local Dubbo one?

And it is the SR22 with the TNIO550, they are the pick of the Cirrus fleet. :{

Waste of an airframe. Nothing Half a Million won't replace, fortunately the folk on board survived.

And another one.....how many in how many weeks. :sad:

I see the Air Traffic Safety Bureau is investigating again.

How about a discussion about why he didn't land at Gilgandra after he'd declared to ATC he was losing oil pressure some time before arriving overhead there. Would the same decision be made if he wasn't carrying a BRS chute.

There does seem to be some eagerness to fire off the chute.

It should be used as a last resort, ie. if you don't use it, you will die!

If you do elect to use the chute and it malfunctions, there is no coming back.

:uhoh:

That's the bit that scares me. It would be my luck to pull the chute, have it wrap around the tail and end my passenger and my lives abruptly when it could have in all probability deadsticked in. It wouldn't be the first time that has happened either!

Clearly this guy didn't learn to fly in a 2 stroke drifter, and he's a local :confused:

Registration holder as of 27 August 2012
MAAS AVIATION PTY LTD
PO Box 332
DUBBO NSW 2830
AUSTRALIA
Registered operator as of 27 August 2012
MAAS AVIATION PTY LTD
PO Box 332
DUBBO NSW 2830
AUSTRALIA

From the news report:

?? You mean open the door and get out like normal?

Harry

Do you know who was flying it? Or did you just here it unfold on the radio?

I would be interested in talking to those involved as to what caused the loss of oil. And get a data download from the engine monitor.

PM me with anything helpful.

Parachute instructor at Williamtown said to our course, "anyone who would jump out of a serviceable aircraft is mad.

The aircraft only becomes unserviceable after it has crashed". Same WO picked me up after a night jump out of a $hithook into Port Stevens and said I had confirmed his theory.

Gilgandra.... well I would have taken the most obvious and least dangerous course of action. As such I will give the benefit of the doubt to the pilot.

Doesn't that usually happen to aircraft already tumbling out of control? Don't know of any "straight and slowly descending" deployments that ended up that way.

Tough call, but I still rate the walking away chances higher with the chute. (Though not as high as a precautionary landing at a nearby ALA after you notice problems)

News Flash: The Occupants are OK. They got to have breakfast with their Families this morning.

End of story...

Safe Flying out there.

Modesetter, Landing with the chute fully deployed is said to feel like falling off a 2 storey building. Its like the old mushroom parachutes, if you dont roll properly on landing you break legs. The undercarriage is designed to take some of the impact along with the honeycomb structure within the seats. I reckon the airbags would be as useful as big saggy ones on a bull, but there you go.


The only reason it has a chute is to increase sales. You can still glide the thing and land successfully, however like most aircraft if you do not maintain the correct attitude/speed, you will fall out of the sky like a stone.

As to whether they did the right thing by pulling the chute, look, at the end of the day they survived. Perhaps if they attempted a forced landing without the chute the result might be different. I may of done things differently but that doesn't mean they have done the wrong thing.

What will be more interesting is why the low oil pressure. Why did the ol 550 give up the ghost. We will have to wait and see for that.

If they had dead sticked the arcraft in and it ended up in the same state it is now, I reckon the insurance company might have asked "why didn't you pull the chute?:ooh:

Damned if you do and damned if you don't! ;)

RFG, good to hear.

What they had bought was a Ballistic Recovery System that just happened to have a very nice aircraft attached.

Why people sometimes sacrifice their lives to save bending a hunk of metal has always escaped me.

If you need to, sure, pull the handle, go have brekkie with the family, which BTW is priceless.
The insurance company now owns the Aircraft and after breakfast, you then go order anothery. :D:ok:

I can hear the distant thunder of hooves already:E

No Hooves gaunty,

But, the chute landing is not a soft fluffy drop into a bundle of pillows. It has risks too.

If you look at the choices of landing area in the photo, and assuming they were high enough to be in the cruise noticing an oil pressure problem, I would have thought that a landing in a dead flat field would have carried less risk.

Just a guess is all. One is uncontrolled, one is controlled.

I read a pilot report recently about the SR22 and its safety features, which are pretty impressive. The FCOM / POH cautions the crew regarding its use. It warns use may result in death or serious injury. Looking at the pics of the "landing site" it may have been a case of land the aircraft rather than deploy the chute. Maybe this case could be used in pilot conversion training once the investigation has been completed.

I wonder if one bought an aircraft that cost say......$100,000:00 less than a Cirrus (because it didn't have a ballistic parachute thingy) and then spent that $100,000:00 on pilot training if the out come would have been any different?

Ways to spend the $100,000:00 on pilot training:

Learn to fly a glider
An aerobatics endorsement
All sorts of Flight Safety courses
A couple of Lycoming engine courses
Old mate in Omaha's engine course

Not second guessing the dood, wasn't there but maybe money could be better allocated than a ballistic parachute thingy (there but for the grace of God go I!!)