Intersky Bombardier hits Power Cable
 

Swiss News are reporting that an Intersky Dash 8 en route from ZRH to EBA hit a power cable on final approach to Marina die Campo airport LIRJ on Elba Island in Italy.
The new managing director of Intersky blames the pilot,he is cited in the press saying "the plane must have been a few meters outside the glide path". (??)
Thanks God the plane landed safely.

Any experts here who have flown into LIRJ who can shed some light on the incident?

Only news-agency and newspaper publications so far.

The ANSV does not yet show the accident but then it was 1st of May and today is Sunday.

Airport and terrain charts here.
Selection of clips on YouTube.

Local newspapers report that aircraft has landed with prop damage, Me thinks that even on Dash's the landing gear length exceeds the prop dia:eek:

Easy fix. Use Crossair SB340, SB2000, & Avro RJ model: Lift carpet ... sweep under ... drop carpet! :}

As Basil mentioned, there are some videos on youtube, here is one with the same A/C type and airline involved in this incident.

If you look very very closely, perpendicular to the displaced threshold is a power line. That must be the one they hit.

If you scroll to 2:43 you see two poles below and behind the left wing.

Then at 2:59, much closer to the runway, you actually see a power line underneath the a/c.

There are also two separate power lines marked in the charts, but I am not sure if the one at 2:59 is the one referred to in the charts or not.

In one of the media reports the CEO of the airline (Bernatzik) was quoted in saying the power line was at "great height".

(I am a rotorhead and know nothing about flying planks)

Thank goodness for that. Would make ground operations very interesting otherwise :ok:

any pictures from the event or pictures of the damage(prop) ?

Elba
 

Couldn't find any historical Met data for LIRJ, prolly don't have a qualified observer, but checking LIRP/LIRF looks like a southerly wind component of between 10/15Kts, add to that the terrain to the S/E of the threshold plus the vis for those places has not been wonderful all day. LIRP 3000m in rain for instance

Flown there a few occasions in a B200, and it was certainly a challenge at the best of times.

Just happy that nobody was hurt.

A microlight pilot witness descibes rwy 16 in use, aeroplane arriving very uncoordinated, before hitting electric wires (8 metres high) had a 60° bank, entered airport area very unsettled, touched rwy halfway down and bounced 3 times.

if you check Incident: Intersky DH8C on May 1st 2010, touched power line on final approach

you will see where they hit the powerline: the powerline was 9 m:eek: (!!!) high and 1000 m(!!!!) :eek:from the threshold......also check the metar looking very similar to the tu154 accident recently....you wonder why they press on in this wx for a visual approach in mountainous terrain.......

LIRX 011555Z 18013KT 0200 0100S FG VV/// 15/10 Q1013 RMK VIS MIN 0100S VIS MAR 100 M
LIRX 011455Z 18012KT 0200 0100S FG OVC001 15/10 Q1013 RMK OVC VIS MIN 0100S VIS MAR 100 M

Visual approach, microlight witness - surely.

I think as long as the prop radius is less than the landing gear length (or threabouts - depends what you measure it from) you should be ok.

Glad to see nobody was hurt.

Am I misunderstanding something (I'm just a SLF), or was there a tailwind? Would this perhaps have led to a downdraft as the Dash crossed the high terrain on approach?

That would be the approach then, wouldn't it?
 

Following Aviation Herald: Saab 340 at Elba

Elba
 

hmmm if they were on runway 16, with a southerly, .. no tailwind.
Possibly some sink in the area downwind of the terrain, or just plain lumpy when you need it least !

It is a challenging approach in the best of conditions, the S340 video shows that rather well.

Oops, I should read more carefully - headwind not tailwind.:rolleyes:

(SLF retreats from forum with tail between legs...)

African Eagle
 

could you quote your source please ?

This may be a rumours & news website, but without foundation your comments are at best speculation.

A friend of mine knows the micropilot that owns the go-kart track situated under 16 final. He contacted him by phone and got the details that have been published on an Italian forum.

"
LIRX 011555Z 18013KT 0200 0100S FG VV/// 15/10 Q1013 RMK VIS MIN 0100S VIS MAR 100 M
LIRX 011455Z 18012KT 0200 0100S FG OVC001 15/10 Q1013 RMK OVC VIS MIN 0100S VIS MAR 100 M

Visual approach, microlight witness - surely."

Looks like groundfog, or fog in the lower few hundred feet. Could be very well seen by the witness if he is situated a bit higher up in the valley than the airport. question is why a professional pilot would continue an approach in this weather in mountainous terrain....Pressure from the company?

nobody any pictures from the event or prop damage?where are the spotters when you need them.......

Flight İnternational:

InterSky, however, describes the weather during the approach as "normal". It has not indicated the type of approach being conducted when the incident occurred.
But managing director Claus Bernatzik says: "The aircraft seems to have been located, on approach, a few metres off the intended flight path.:confused:

İf it is true they hit a 9m high powerline 1000 m from the runway,surely they where more than a few meters from the intended flight path.

either this guy bernantzik does not know what he is talking about or he is trying to cover the whole thing up with soft talk, or both.

if the wx was good according to the company it does not make sense why a pilot with "decades of experience" will make 60 degr bank turns and hit a powerline 1000 m before the runway. sounds more to me as a pilot trying to find the runway in fog conditions..........

luckily nobody hurt

could not open the pictures but the site is Marina di Campo (Isola d'Elba): Dash Intersky da ZRH trancia cavi elettricità - Pagina 3 - I forum di Aviazione Civile

halfway the page are the pics

hopefully the moderators will allow the adress as it clearly shows it was indeed very foggy.

Also important to note is that with a damaged prop but gear and fuselage intact the aircraft can only have hit the high voltage powerline in a very steep bank close to the ground.

the gpws must have sounded continiously or was it perhaps switched off as to avoid nuisance warnings:E like close by hills and terrain?

obviously the weather was not that bad. you can not fly an approach like this with 100m vis.
somewhere else I found that the met station should be around 8nm southeast of the airport, so not very reliable

bank angle of 60° ? not bad a manoeuver that close to terrain. I however dare not to believe that bank angle indication when hitting the cable.
If the power line is 9m above ground and you'd hit it with the prop at a bank angle of 60° then you'd probably touch the ground with the wingtip the very next second.

somehow lucky they hit the line with the prop, not with the wing or gear...

Maybe they should put a hook on Dash Eights, seems a shame to waste such a handy wire!

9 metres?
 

Well it seemed to me to be high ground all the way in, so the 9m would be just above ground height. Some trees looked in danger of getting wacked also, in the video. And the undercarrage length has nothing to do with anything in this context.

Flying a meter higher and - well if the prop had missed the line and the line would have tangled up in the wheels somehow... not a nice thought.

I once saw a Mooney M20 being entangled with a wire. It ended catastrophically for the Mooney. And yes I know a Dash 8 is a different set of plane. Still...

Hello Guys,

i think the distance is not true.

From what i know, the wire is somewhat 150-200 Meters away from the RWY.

Visibility was not bad, more than 10 Kilometers.

Pilot is called to be one of the experienced @ InterSky, with at least 30years flying and +20.000flthrs

You are all assuming it passed over the wire!


Mickjoebill

"From what i know, the wire is somewhat 150-200 Meters away from the RWY."

There is another wire as you can see on the airport diagram a page earlier

"Visibility was not bad, more than 10 Kilometers."

That does not agree with the pictures taken right after the accident, the hill tops are not even visible and the cloudbase is low

it does not make sense then that he hit a cable so far from the runway and banked 60 degr if the wx had been so great he?

"30000+ hours"

does not mean a thing.even with all the gadgets on board.

something smells not right about this accident...the facts do not add up.....unless the cable was raised 1000 ft up:ok: or the pilot was not wearing his glasses and the co pilot happened to look just the other way:bored:

or was he afraid to speak up or interfere? was he flying with a management pilot perhaps, intimidated by his experience:E?

an old pilot told me once:your priorities in flying should always be :Life-Licence-Job. that has and will not change.fly safe.

How many hours did the F/O have?

As written in the italian forum, from which the photos where taken, such photos where shot on 02/05/2010 while the accident happened the day before.

Hitting any sort of electric cable ( i.e with metal iside) at say 150 Kts will go through metal like a cord in butter. Hitting a propeller only and not have any fuselage colateral damage is very strange I would say.

I have some years ago seen pictures of a glassfiber glider cut in 2 ( unfortunately also the pilot ) by a small cow-fence electric wire during a attempted landing into a field , and the estimated landing speed of that glider was less than 60 Kts.

I have to agree I'm struggling to understand how the prop was damaged and nothing else. If the a/c was banked, the wing surely would have been damaged as well as the prop. If the a/c flew over the cable, the fuselage would have been damaged as it 'hangs' lower than the bottom of the prop disc.

At the risk of making an idiot of myself again, can I suggest that there may be evidence from the photos of minor fuselage damage adjacent to the prop?

Between the last 'w' int the 'www.t-city.de' marking and the window above, there is what looks like a dent. To the left and below the first 'w' is a liniar mark running down and back, and running from the lower end of this forward and down is what looks like more damage. Whether this was caused by the wire, by fragments from the prop, or indeed is just dirt, I don't know.

SomeGuyOnTheDeck-There is indeed some damage to the fuselage, just under the window and also about 4ft below that (and slightly aft), these dents are outside the re-inforced composite panels which are desigend to protect the fusealge from ice being shed from the props.

There is also a hefty dent on the front right hand side of the engine cowling, in the 8-9 O'clock position in relation to the prop... that's expensive.

Yes, Piece of Cake, I'd missed that. Possibly the spinner was lost in the incident too. At a guess, I'd say the wire was whipped round as it hit the prop, from the marks on the fuselage. Nasty...

Though the map seems to indicate power lines running roughly east-west across the flightpath, the photos also show other wires (possibly phonelines) running north-south. I wonder if it was one of these that was hit? This might explain how the prop got the worst of it, though it rather implies that there would have been a near-miss with a pole or two.

Edit ---
Looking at the map again, the power lines are more or less aligned with the flightpath at some points anyway, rather than perpendicular to it.

The right hand side windsheild wiper looks to be bent upwards at the inboard end.

I was parked next to this aircraft at ZRH on Saturday and and noted the Captain doing his walk around. Not that I have anything to say about that but I almost went over to ask what airline they were due to the hybrid colour scheme.

Very glad to be looking at a lightly damaged aircraft on the net rather than reading the headlines in the paper.

I think you have got it if you see the damage to the prop is at about the diameter that is about the distance to the top of the fuselage.

The airlines CEO yesterday estimated the damage to be 100k Euro, mostly for the rental of a replacement a/c.

Zwischenfall auf Elba: InterSky rechnet mit 100.000 Euro Schaden | Austrian Wings

He also told the press that visibility was 10km at the time of the incident.

.