Jersey Search and Rescue crash
 

Message from a local to me - the Channel Islands Search and Rescue Plane crashed yesterday evening on the north coast.
It was answering an emergency call to rescue two fishermen who had gone to secure their moorings on L` Ecrehous (a group of islands of Jersey's east coast and approx. 6 miles from the shore). They were actually sailing in a dinghy in gale force winds! One was found clinging to a rock and the other was still in the dinghy when they winched up by a helicopter.
There was the French helicopter, a UK helicopter, the Jersey lifeboat and the search and rescue plane involved. Both men were flown to Jersey Airport and taken by ambulance to the general Hospital in St Helier. One was hypothermic and the other was partly hypothermic -the latter was discharged from hospital but the other is stable in Intensive Care.

It is thought that the aeroplane suffered an engine failure (but not confirmed yet). Bearing in mind the weather conditions and that it was dark, it is amazing that none of the crew were killed ........... and I haven`t heard of any injuries either! The plane crashed close to the cliff edge and embedded itself in a tree; the emergency services were there within minutes.

As you can imagine it is the topic on everybody`s lips, here, today and we are in total praise of all the emergency services - they did a fantastic job.

The weather, thankfully, has abated now and it is sunshining.

engine out ops
 

having flown the islander both public transport and on CofA flight tests, I can assure you that ( with one engine feathered ) at max weight, it climbs very well. and the trislander will go up on two nearly as good as some with only two.

Indeed, the Islander is good at doing what it was designed for, island hopping.
Hot & high or overloaded is a different can of worms and not recommended.

The big question has to be: why a DOUBLE engine failure?

Sadly, Islanders fitted with tip tanks have previous form with regard to double engine failures:-

http://www.aaib.gov.uk/cms_resources...2%20G-BBRP.pdf
http://www.aaib.gov.uk/cms_resources...3%20G-BDNP.pdf

Repair or replace.
 

Jersey air search charity launches appeal for funds

BBC News - Jersey air search charity launches appeal for funds

Starboard engine now running.
 

GCIAS moved to safer position and STBD engine up and running without too much encouragement....maybe fuel mismanagement as suggested above.

Been reported the starboard was first to shut down.

It ran out of fuel....

Great footage of landing site from remote Helicopter camera
 

Hi

Irrespective of the circumstances, this shows how fortunate those on board were. I was out that night on the Lifeboat, the weather was WSW F9, almost zero vis at times...



This was taken a couple of days after the event when G-CIAS had been removed from the tree!

Give that man a medal!!! I can see why they retired to the pub; in fact, I think I'd still be there.

For running out of fuel? (if true), but something saved their a***** be it luck or skill. It was dark wasn't it?

.....superior judgment to avoid those situations where they might have to use their superior skills.

An extra 50-100 ft further on and I doubt there would have been 5 people making their way to the Pub. What a fortunate location for that tree!

AAIB
 

Link to the AAIB report released just now

Air Accidents Investigation: Special Bulletin S8/2013 - BN2B-21 Islander, G-CIAS

Tip tanks again.

We now have at least 3 accidents where 'operational procedures, training and safety management' have failed to prevent the accident.

Maybe a mod to the aircraft is required.

A mod the the aircraft... Really?! what do you imagine is on the check list?

I used to fly Islanders at Netheravon (and other places) for fun 30-odd years ago. We had two aircraft; G-AYRU which only had main wing tanks and G-BBRP which also had tip tanks (see AIIB report in Post #26).

What struck me right away, as an obvious Mega Murphy, was that the "Tip to Main" selector switches in G-BBRP were absolutely identical to the "Fuel Booster Pump" switches which were normally switched on for take-off and landing and were mounted alongside one another above eye level.

This Mega Murphy was largely responsible for bringing down G-BBRP and I am astonished that nothing seems to have been done since.

If I haven't got this exactly right then forgive me. It was 30 years ago and my memory is not what it used to be.

I was thinking along the lines of:-

a) Rework the fuel system so that the engines only run from the mains and the tips transfer into the mains with a cut off if the mains are not below a certain level.

b) Change the indication system so that the gauges show the contents of the tanks currently selected. *

c) Both of the above.

* It's a long time since I have been in an Islander but from what I can see from photo's on the internet there are no gauges for the tips. Trislanders seem to have tip gauges on the sidewall above the P2 seat.

frontlefthamster:

I am grateful for your reply. As I have already said, it was a long time ago but perhaps your left-right switch came about as a result of the demise of G-BBRP?

In any event, it would appear that the Mega Murphy has struck again.

I spent ten years flying islanders, a fair percentage of which was in tip tank equipped fishery protection models. The transfer pump switches were identical to the boost pump switches including the direction of movement. The only difference being that they were located between the tip and main fuel gauges and had a light to say they were turned on.
What I could never fully understand was the logic of the POH checklist, for fuel transfer it said to wait until the mains were low (IIRC maybe under 15 USG). Our SOP was to start transfering about an hour into the flight (always max fuel on takeoff) so that we could visually see the tip tank contents coming down and the mains going up, the only true way of telling if the transfer pumps worked. It would afterall be a bit daft to follow the book to letter and not start transferring until the mains have an hours worth left in them with land being an hour away! I certainly aborted a flight more than once due to the pumps not performing properly.