In-flight break-up involving Cessna 210B, VH-DBU, 30 km NW of Albany Airport, WA
 

The ATSB have just released the preliminary report into this C210 accident. Well worth a read.
Very sad event, shows you don't need bad weather to have an inflight breakup. It was a beautiful day for flying!
Va for the C210 is very low considering it's cruise speed.

Before some over enthusiastic keyboard warriors start banging on about how strutless C210 wings are somehow weak be aware the accident aircraft was a 210B. The B model has struts as do all 210s before the G model came out.

Airplanes don’t just simply break up on a beautiful day.
That airplane must have been overstressed sometime in its life.
Could be 15-20 years ago or more.
And on a nice day flying straight and level the wings come off.
Horrible.

Report says no apparent preexisting defects. But he could have used violent control input to avoid an eagle or Ibis.
That's what Va is about.

Knowing what i know about this accident and i have privilege invomation on it you are correct and an avenue that is being look at at present.
The outcome will be interesting on all cessnas with struts.

Possible Causes?

The birdstrike possibility has been discussed locally. It has been a particularly wet Spring this year, and there is open water still extending into paddocks 30nm inland from the south coast of WA. I have never seen so many large birds in flocks up to 50-60 - been here 20 years. They are particularly active up to about 0900 and then again after 1700 local. As I'm up nearly every day instructing, most of which is below 2000' agl, I've had many near misses. I sought a NOTAM with local YABA management on birds last month and it's probably still current.

The witnesses report a loud 'bang' before observing the aircraft in a steep descent. If it had been an actual (multiple?) birdstrike - then there would surely have been carcasses spread about the immediate area? If the breakup resulted from vigorous control inputs, (above Va)..... then what caused the loud noise? Was it the actual airframe breakage, or was it something else, eg, a propeller blade being thrown? The witness reports of unusual, high pitched engine noise might point toward this.

The Va discussion is probably important. The 210B has the same as a 182, (112 KIAS), whereas the strutless models from G onwards, had a Va of 118. Note, these numbers are based on MTOW, and it's unlikely this 210 was anywhere near that - so Va could have been down closer to 100-105. It was possibly cruising at 130-140, which makes the possibility of the control inputs, (during avoidance manoeuvring) directly leading to the airframe breakup.

This 210 accident is one with so many possible causes. And, it is confounded somewhat by the fact of a particularly high time aggie as PIC.

For what it's worth, that Ibis NOTAM served it's purpose in YABA today.

Saw three of them on finals RWY 14 and then on departure a whole flock passed under us, all well out of reach - but they're out and about at the moment.

Not the first C210 to have a wing breakup in flight. Check out the ATSB report on VH-DJT in 1976. The accident reports have a striking similarity and similar witness reports.
DJT was a strutless C210 while DBU was strutted but the outer wing panels could be very similar if not identical.

The propellor of DBU is in one bent piece and still at the crash site which suggests the ATSB do not consider it to be relevant to the accident or they would have taken it and the engine away with the wings, struts and carry though structures that they did take away.

Can't post the URL for the DJT report as PPrune says I have not made enough posts to do that??
Perhaps someone else could do that?

See if this works......

https://www.atsb.gov.au/publications...197600023.aspx

Cheers :ok:

"...assess the implications (if any) of this occurrence for the continuing airworthiness status of the aircraft type and ageing aircraft in general."

Is it just me, or does anyone else find this statement ominous? Another forthcoming vendetta against 210's and older aircraft in general?

When considering struts being inherently stronger I suggest you have a look at some of the findings from the SID inspections on the 100 and 200 series Cessna aircraft.

For the hard of reading, I am not suggesting that the struts had anything to do with this crash.

I hit a full sized Ibis or a Crane smack in the middle of the torso at 140 knots, 3,500 ft in the middle of nowhere and to be honest, it damaged the leading edge of the wing (Cirrus) but I really doubt it would take off a wing... it would certainly dint it though! To take off the wing it would have to hit the strut in a very specific way to achieve that. Not impossible I guess, but improbable. There's about an 8 inch crack in the front of this wing pictured along the leading edge horizontal (where you would join a top to a bottom half for example) The red marks are the birdy-blood.

http://members.iinet.net.au/~bc75/kinghit.jpg

Is the Cirrus not a composite aircraft wing? I am not sure never worked on one.

But if it is, it is not relevant to a 210 or 100 series Cessna.

Big birds just punch holes in ally even honeycomb.

Yes they do punch holes, but they generally don't tear wings off!

The reference to a bird being involved has nothing to do with the bird hitting and breaking off a wing. It has everything to do with the pilot seeing a bird a and taking violent evasive action (a natural reaction) at a speed way above Va where a C210 normally cruises.

My experience went LOOK F#*K BANG in about 3/10 th of a second. Because it was a small (relatively) bird and I was indicating about 155 knots I didn't have time to react (thank goodness) and the result was blood and guts all over the wing fuselage intersection but no damage. In sober moments I sometimes wonder what would have happened if I'd seen it sooner. Perhaps 2 dead people and one live bird?

They’re both made of sheet aluminium. That’s about where the similarity ends.

[QUOTE=megan;9997200]A Baron following a hit with a Goose.

Not quite, the Baron pictured hit a Cessna 180, the accident report can be found relatively easily but many websites incorrectly list it as a birdstrike.

Many thanks, deleted.

Had the accident aircraft been through the SIDs inspection?