Shoreham Incident.
 

Looks bad. :(

Plane crash at Shoreham recreation ground (From The Argus)

Not good at all.

BBC News - Shoreham airport: Two aircraft crash in mid-air

BREAKING NEWS: Eye witness reports seeing plane burst into flames after Shoreham crash - Local - Worthing Herald

Very bad news.

A mid-air on/near crosswind, apparently.

It's not that easy to collide on crosswind, partly because the aircraft joining has a great view of the airfield, and partly because there shouldn't be anybody else there - except another person also joining crosswind, or somebody who climbed up rapidly to circuit height.

Overhead joins are much worse.

Crosswind join
 

Sorry to hear about this incident, cross wind joins should be over the numbers at 1000'. Correct me if I am wrong, but it would require a fairly robust rate of climb to reach 1000', by the end of that runway. If that report were to be accurate, then it would appear someone got it very tragically wrong.

One of the reports say the planes collided over the beach, no where near the end of the numbers.....

This one says both DA40s, owned by Flying Time.

oh no that is sad. ..lets hope he did not die. How come they ever got that close without ATC noticing them?I was there yesterday afternoon and it was very busy as well. There were 5 lining up in the circuit when I landed.
If they collided over the sea could one of the pilot just been blinded by sea/sun?

ATC don't separate traffic in the circuit, usually.

IO540 - In that piece, Flying Time is quoted as saying that one of their aircraft was involved.

100 yards from my office & I didn't see or hear a thing. Thoughts with the pilots obviously but I feel luck was with me today.:(

Its just about exactly where you would turn downwind from a 20 departure into the circuit with the possibility of another aircraft joining into the downwind if the bbc reports of the other aircrafts direction are correct.

Sad news, very sad.

Which ATC would that be? Elsewhere, on a recent trip I asked for, and was given, a wrong-way base join, but as I couldn't see the aircraft on the right-way base join and they couldn't see me I was given an orbit by ATC (fair enough, I could have avoided this by asking for an overhead join). By the time I'd finished the orbit the othe aircraft was over the fence and I was given a land-after; that sounds like separation to me.

Yes; correct.

They also edit those news articles every few minutes, despite the time tag at the top.

I wonder who the other one was?

If you think that is an assurance of separation, better stay on the ground :) In the circuit, you have to keep a lookout. ATC help to sequence the traffic but for example how you fit into downwind traffic after a crosswind join is 100% down to you.

Sad to hear news of any incident of this nature.

But from the ATC perspective - for VFR flights in the circuit and the vicinity of the airport all ATC will do is give information and instructions intended to achieve 'safe, orderly and expeditions' flow of traffic. No separation involved, information and instructions to assist pilots to avoid collisions. If you think you're getting something else, you need to think again.

shoreham
 

if you were joining the circuit correctly,you should cross the upwind numbers at 90 degrees to the runway,having entered the zone at 1100', traffic in the circuit will have climbed out to 5-600' before turning left 90 degrees, climbing crosswind, to turn downwind at 1100' , therefore joining traffic will see circuit traffic at the same level, either left, right, or ahead of him, an error is for circuit training traffic to fly the climbing crosswind leg paralleling the coast. if you are coming from the west,at some point, say, littlehampton, well west of worthing, you should discontinue keeping the coast on your left, and position your aircraft so you join crosswind over the numbers,at 1100', nowhere near the crosswind climb out track of circuit traffic
http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/image..._propeller.jpg

Yes.

A crosswind join to Shoreham 20 should be flown from roughly north Worthing or, if you like, 2-3 miles north abeam Worthing Pier.

That way, one is flying a constant track of about 110, for 2-3 miles at least, ending up over the upwind numbers.

There is no good way to do that starting from the coast of Worthing. Well, it would be a severe dogleg, and you will be well over a built-up area with few engine failure options.

Whether this is what happened, I have no idea. The wreckage is a long way in from the coast.

From here, a comment near the bottom, it sounds like the crashed plane was an RV6. The poster is however still clue-less about the role of ATC.

My condolences go out to the pilots family and friends very sad day

The problem is with crosswind joins...IMHE...that many pilots think a "crosswind join" should be where the crosswind normally is (i.e. upwind of the numbers). I've flow with people who join like that and it makes my skin crawl as it is a recipe for disaster. Sticking OVER the upwind numbers gives greatest vis, clearance and least conflict. The only possible time there may be an issue is if someone goes around early and are back at circuit height by the end of the runway.

It baffles me why they didn't see each other though. The DA40 viz is pretty good.

Possibly pointless observation - Shoreham has a pretty long runway (depending on the wind direction), and there are some pretty pokey types hanging out there. Not saying it's so in this case, but I rather suspect something like an Extra 300 could comfortably make 1000agl by the upwind numbers. Whether it should is another matter.

Re: Shoreham accident
 

As could an RV-6A if doing a performance take off. Sadly it might have been the case.