Robbie crash, Kroonstad South Africa June 2008
 

Look at this video of the Robbie crash.
http://www.news24.com/Die_Volksblad/...332994,00.html

Cheers
Frikkie
History of our once proud Forces:
http://www.samagte.co.za/phpbbs

What was he trying to do ?

Was he trying to land back or do a low flypast that went wrong....?

Blooming lucky to get out by the look of it and the guy on the bike was lucky too !

Listening to it, just after it had flown overhead, the engine changes sound, seems to be quierter than I would expect.

what do others think?

amazed it survived as much as it did, the damage to that car on the way down too!

glad everyone seemed ok.

Looked quite windy by the looks of the trees. Possible Vortex ring on the approach.
The approach looked very fast, possible downwind approach???
The tail kicks out to the left (Nose right) which seems to indicate an increase in power during the flare, maybe it was just a mis-judged approach with too much speed into an restricted area.

Lucky escapes all round.

HB

Wonder if the brain surgeon cameraman was smoking as he walked through the spilt fuel:confused::ugh::ugh:

Im sure it mentions in the POH that you should shut off the fuel and isolate the main battery after a heavy landing...

So why are the landing lights still on?:ugh:

seems to me that 4 inch High Heels would be too high off the ground for this guy :ugh: :=:D what a :mad:moron

I say "Good on the camera man". He showed he was more human than cameraman when he rushed to help out and ruined some of his immediate post-crash shots.

sounded like the blades slowed rapidly as it passed overhead the cameraman. Did it catch something? Had the engine quit? Nice of them to leave the battery on while avgas poured out. Looks like the pilot got out walking wounded, which is a good thing, watch how close the guy to the left of the a/c comes to buying the farm as the tail passes him.

Given the speed of the helicopter, Doppler shift would account for a considerable amount of the apparent slowing down of the blades as it passed overhear.

However it sounds as though the actual rpm decay was greater than Doppler could account for alone.

WWW
Quid pro quo

I'm only guessing, but I reckon the pilot and occupants are probably in a state of shock at this stage, probably also injured and not really thinking straight. I doubt there were any other pilots around so it is unlikely that anyone would even know what a master switch was, let alone find it and know it needed switching off. In an ideal world someone would have started moving everybody back to a safe distance but the ideal world doesn't exist just after such an accident - even bystanders find themselves in a state of shock and it takes a while for everyone to come to their senses.

I know that POH says to switch off the master battery switch and I'm sure we can all see the logic in that, however, if you call the gas board and tell them you smell gas in your house they tell you not to touch any switches either off or on for fear of causing a spark and therefore an explosion. Just wondered if anyone had any views, its a fairley big relay that clicks when you through that switch. Personally I think it would be better off but wouldn't fancy being the guy to do it with all those avgas fumes around.

Regardless of what caused the accident, the flying before hand was dreadful. Lucky no one was killed.

I thought I heard the pilot mutter "hydraulic failure".

Cheers

Whirls

For what it's worth, someone is repeatedly saying (in Afrikaans) that the hydraulics had malfunctioned.

I don't understand dutch, it may as well be double dutch to me, but someone mentioned 'hydraulic' when the occupants were being extracted from the wreck. Even so when I learned on the Bell 47 the instructor would regularly pull up the hydraulic off handle and I would have to fly it without hydraulics. The Robinson could easily be flown without hydraulics - with the correct training.

It just looked like it was going too fast and probably downwind as well to me.

Just a theory but how about over confident Pilot overpitched the a/c in windy conditions with a high auw,dumps the lever because the horn came on,hence the change in engine note(sounded alot like a machine in auto),then yanked in an armfull of pitch because he was so low,oh...and right over the top of a public area and about to hit a car! Overpitched again and crashed. Thats what it looks like to me,but then that's my opinion from looking at the video. Regarding not switching of power,fuel etc...I think thats called shock.
Hope the guy flying has got a decent excuse though because I think if that was the UK he'd be up there with `Nutter in Northern Ireland' but then atleast that guy didn't crash!

Well its one hell of an effort for a Darwin Award ! Well done that man:D

That has to be one of the more shocking crash videos i've seen, amazing behaviour in such a public place, and loads of lamp posts about!

MADY

:D good effort

Machine was an Astro so no hydraulics to fail unless it was one of the few that were retrofitted as an aftermarket modification?

As for the low rotor rpm horn coming on and the machine being at mauw who knows?

The temptation to bottom the lever when that horn goes is, however, great irrespective at what height you are at. That close to the ground and possibly downwind is a recipe for disaster.

Glad no one was killed and I hope the bakkie driver makes a quick recovery.

Glad everyone made it out ok!

Here is some more info

http://aviation-safety.net/wikibase/wiki.php?id=20267

http://www.planepictures.net/netshow.php?id=709895