Gyrocopter crashes on beach near Tathra 06/10/2022

[RFguy]

BTW GyroPlanes are 300' minimum (ASRA registered) 

[BrendAn]

Did this gyro pilot get behind the power curve when he was distracted.

[Thruster88]

21 minutes ago, BrendAn said:

Did this gyro pilot get behind the power curve when he was distracted.

Only gyro pilots know how those things work.

[onetrack]

From "understanding Gyroplanes" -

 

"Under CASA CAO 95.12 & 12.1, Gyros are classified as an ultralight aircraft with a maximum flying altitude of 500ft AGL, unless the pilot holds a specific endorsement issued by ASRA.

Gyros may also legally operate at a minimum altitude of 300ft AGL, and even lower with the permission of the landowner."

[facthunter]

They are autorotating  all the time. Some have spin up facilities that  reduce the TO run.   Nev

[BrendAn]

when a gyro slows down too much they drop rotor speed. you have to drop the nose and accelerate like a stalled fixed wing to regain lift. while they can not stall , they will sink fast with no forward movement.  an excellent gyro instructor i have done a couple of flights with showed me. he also said if you get behind the curve to close to the ground you are going to crash, usually the pilot walks away ok but the gyro is wrecked. 

[BrendAn]

3 hours ago, facthunter said:

They are autorotating  all the time. Some have spin up facilities that  reduce the TO run.   Nev

they are called prerotators.      far safer than a fixed wing. i worked that out when i was doing stall lessons today.

[RFguy]

Hey Brendan, so you are having instruction in a Gyroplane ? that's great.  yes, Gyroplanes are not helicopters...

 

Do you  know what the glide ratio is ?

 

[Garfly]

 

 

https://au.news.yahoo.com/pilot-crashes-into-ocean-while-trying-warn-surfer-of-giant-shark-221716311.html

[onetrack]

The above report pretty clearly outlines a gyro pilot who took his eye off his ROD, and who could only try to make it to the beach, as the realisation dawned, he wasn't going to be able to arrest his ROD into the water.

[Blueadventures]

18 hours ago, BrendAn said:

when a gyro slows down too much they drop rotor speed. you have to drop the nose and accelerate like a stalled fixed wing to regain lift. while they can not stall , they will sink fast with no forward movement.  an excellent gyro instructor i have done a couple of flights with showed me. he also said if you get behind the curve to close to the ground you are going to crash, usually the pilot walks away ok but the gyro is wrecked. 

A mate with a 'Magni 22' got to a situation near rotor speed being to slow so he hit the pre rotator, thinking that would speed up the revs.  That did not work; infact it uncoiled the flex drive cable, destroyed it instantly.  He was high enough to maintain flying rotor speed and got back to his home airfield about 10 miles away.  Then grounded until a new pre rotator cable was shipped to him and fitted.  A lesson Learn'd.

[facthunter]

The ground effect which sometimes helps is not  there  reliably when there are waves involved,.  They use a lot of fuel so are  pretty draggy. They can't stall as the rotors are set at the angle that keeps them spinning when you are airborne Nev

[BrendAn]

12 hours ago, RFguy said:

Hey Brendan, so you are having instruction in a Gyroplane ? that's great.  yes, Gyroplanes are not helicopters...

 

Do you  know what the glide ratio is ?

 

Sorry for the late reply.  I have only done a couple of flights then decided to sell my gyro and finish the fixed wing training. Wife was too worried about me being in a gyro. I hope to get back to it later if I can convince her it's safer than a fw. I haven't read anything about glide ratios or talked about.  Basically if the engine quits get the nose down quick and land. The good thing is they don't stall but will sink fast with no forward speed.  As long as you keep out of tiger country you can land just about anywhere. Only needs a few mts to roll out.

[BrendAn]

2 hours ago, Blueadventures said:

A mate with a 'Magni 22' got to a situation near rotor speed being to slow so he hit the pre rotator, thinking that would speed up the revs.  That did not work; infact it uncoiled the flex drive cable, destroyed it instantly.  He was high enough to maintain flying rotor speed and got back to his home airfield about 10 miles away.  Then grounded until a new pre rotator cable was shipped to him and fitted.  A lesson Learn'd.

The other problem there is had his pre rotator  worked he might have lost control with the torque reaction. Basically turning it into a helicopter without a tail rotor

Edited October 9, 2022 by BrendAn

[facthunter]

He doesn't understand his gyro if HE needs telling that. Nev

[poteroo]

On 07/10/2022 at 2:21 PM, onetrack said:

You don't need to get down to wave height to warn swimmers, that's just plain stupidity, and shows a lack of situational awareness. The shark spotting choppers never go below about 200 feet.

At the very least, not unless you have had low level training, and you delegate the non-flying stuff to the passenger while you just fly the aircraft.

[BrendAn]

On 09/10/2022 at 6:39 PM, facthunter said:

He doesn't understand his gyro if HE needs telling that. Nev

 he may have just panicked and made the wrong decision even if he knew better.

 

 

[facthunter]

I'm thinking he didn't want to witness a swimmer being attacked by a shark. I had a similar response when a shark was under a board and I flew low to drop the toilet roll to individually warn the rider..

re the starter/spin up It might be intuitive but so is pulling the stick BACK when the nose drops or lifting the wing at low speed with  aileron.. Those things have to be trained out of you, or bad things happen. Nev

[BrendAn]

7 minutes ago, facthunter said:

I'm thinking he didn't want to witness a swimmer being attacked by a shark. I had a similar response when a shark was under a board and I flew low to drop the toilet roll to individually warn the rider..

re the starter/spin up It might be intuitive but so is pulling the stick BACK when the nose drops or lifting the wing at low speed with  aileron.. Those things have to be trained out of you, or bad things happen. Nev

yes nev. i have been doing stall lessons this week and it takes all my will not to use the ailerons when the wing drops. i think once i get my nerves under control i will be ok.  the instructor said we will keep doing stalls until gently dropping the nose and adding a bit of power and rudder is automatic.  

Edited October 13, 2022 by BrendAn

[facthunter]

I've got the aileron bit covered. I had instructors giving me a hard time on that one when I first started back at Ultralights. Just pretend there is no aileron at all. Starting on Tailwheels in the late 50s I'm an active rudder person but I don't pick up a dropped wing if it's vertically below you. Get some more speed and just fly it. Nev

[BrendAn]

Pilot:  Passenger:  Site: on beach just south of Turingal Head in Bournda National Park, NSW Immediately after the event. Emergency Services and Police contacted by mother of surfer Mrs Ballard. Police indicated if no serious injuries it was just a procedural matter. National Parks and Wildlife contacted re the logistics of getting the gyro off the beach in terms of access. Witnesses included mother of surfer Bill Ballard. Pilot contacted ASRA operations manager Jeff Blunt to report the occurrence. I was tracking 500 feet above the beach with a passenger (Alison Tygh) looking for whales. The beach and the ditch site are marked on the photo above. We sighted a pod of dolphins rounding up fish, and nearby, and close to the shore break, a large shark (twice the length of the nearby dolphins I would estimate) – possibly a white pointer – this can be confirmed by my passenger Alison, but unfortunately my GoPro is in the sea somewhere. When I first saw the shark from a distance I asked my passenger if it was a whale, and she indicated it was a shark, and on closer inspection it was a very large shark. As I circled back the shark was heading straight towards a sole surfer paddling out. That set me up circling, with my passenger and I both waving frantically and pointing down to the surfboard rider, and also to the beach bystanders at the river mouth. I got totally fixated on the need to warn the surfer and took my concentration off the flying. Because I was looking and signalling to the bystanders at the river mouth I thought I was higher than I was. After coming out of a turn to turn back towards the surfboard rider, and having spent time frantically signalling during the turn to bystanders on the beach near the river exit, I realised that I had lost significant altitude with the circling. Presumably, when frantically signalling to the bystanders with my right hand, I had back stick motion with my left. I came out of the turn downwind pointing at the beach, low airspeed 35 to 40 kts and sinking. I lowered the nose and put power on as I was behind the power curve. There was a delay in response with me sensing I was sinking. (After the event I realised I was not only behind the power curve, but I had a light tailwind and the weight of a passenger with almost a full tank of fuel when departing for the flight causing lift issues). Although I was flying not far above the water at this stage, the view straight ahead revealed the bush just off the beach behind the sand wall to be well above me, and the sand wall in turn was quite high. This can be confirmed by the attached photo on page 11, where the damaged gyro has been pulled out of the water and positioned near the sand bank. Thus followed a rush of decisions. I looked left thinking if I could turn left and get over the beach and then climb, but I was too low to turn to get parallel to the beach, and my gyro instructors (Willi and Neil) had stressed repeatedly no turns below 300 feet, so I thankfully quit that idea. Next, I thought if I have nose down and full power on will I build up airspeed quickly enough, with the distance to obstacles ahead, to pull into a steep climb and clear the sandbank and the trees just beyond? But the thought came quickly “I’m probably not going to make it above those trees ahead and if I hit them my passenger and I are unlikely to survive.” So at this stage the decision was made - I had to do a controlled landing heading straight ahead on the beach. It is funny how many thoughts race through your mind in what must be only seconds. I didn’t want to land and hit the sand bank and at that stage two thoughts came to mind – “Sully and passengers, and Allan, all survived a water landing”, so I did a controlled landing into the water just shy of the beach. I remember the last moments before touching down thinking to make sure I was parallel as possible to the water, stick centred ready to pull back if I overshot to the beach and needed the rotor brake, throttle power fully off as I settled for the landing, and the pilot teaching – engine failure on takeoff below 50 feet land straight ahead. There was a bang when the gyro touched down and the water soon filled the cockpit. But it was when the cockpit was filled with water, and the passenger and I were still seated, that the rotors struck the water with a bang. I suspect our weight and the water kept the gyro.

[BrendAn]

Just now, BrendAn said:

Pilot:  Passenger:  Site: on beach just south of Turingal Head in Bournda National Park, NSW Immediately after the event. Emergency Services and Police contacted by mother of surfer Mrs Ballard. Police indicated if no serious injuries it was just a procedural matter. National Parks and Wildlife contacted re the logistics of getting the gyro off the beach in terms of access. Witnesses included mother of surfer Bill Ballard. Pilot contacted ASRA operations manager Jeff Blunt to report the occurrence. I was tracking 500 feet above the beach with a passenger (Alison Tygh) looking for whales. The beach and the ditch site are marked on the photo above. We sighted a pod of dolphins rounding up fish, and nearby, and close to the shore break, a large shark (twice the length of the nearby dolphins I would estimate) – possibly a white pointer – this can be confirmed by my passenger Alison, but unfortunately my GoPro is in the sea somewhere. When I first saw the shark from a distance I asked my passenger if it was a whale, and she indicated it was a shark, and on closer inspection it was a very large shark. As I circled back the shark was heading straight towards a sole surfer paddling out. That set me up circling, with my passenger and I both waving frantically and pointing down to the surfboard rider, and also to the beach bystanders at the river mouth. I got totally fixated on the need to warn the surfer and took my concentration off the flying. Because I was looking and signalling to the bystanders at the river mouth I thought I was higher than I was. After coming out of a turn to turn back towards the surfboard rider, and having spent time frantically signalling during the turn to bystanders on the beach near the river exit, I realised that I had lost significant altitude with the circling. Presumably, when frantically signalling to the bystanders with my right hand, I had back stick motion with my left. I came out of the turn downwind pointing at the beach, low airspeed 35 to 40 kts and sinking. I lowered the nose and put power on as I was behind the power curve. There was a delay in response with me sensing I was sinking. (After the event I realised I was not only behind the power curve, but I had a light tailwind and the weight of a passenger with almost a full tank of fuel when departing for the flight causing lift issues). Although I was flying not far above the water at this stage, the view straight ahead revealed the bush just off the beach behind the sand wall to be well above me, and the sand wall in turn was quite high. This can be confirmed by the attached photo on page 11, where the damaged gyro has been pulled out of the water and positioned near the sand bank. Thus followed a rush of decisions. I looked left thinking if I could turn left and get over the beach and then climb, but I was too low to turn to get parallel to the beach, and my gyro instructors (Willi and Neil) had stressed repeatedly no turns below 300 feet, so I thankfully quit that idea. Next, I thought if I have nose down and full power on will I build up airspeed quickly enough, with the distance to obstacles ahead, to pull into a steep climb and clear the sandbank and the trees just beyond? But the thought came quickly “I’m probably not going to make it above those trees ahead and if I hit them my passenger and I are unlikely to survive.” So at this stage the decision was made - I had to do a controlled landing heading straight ahead on the beach. It is funny how many thoughts race through your mind in what must be only seconds. I didn’t want to land and hit the sand bank and at that stage two thoughts came to mind – “Sully and passengers, and Allan, all survived a water landing”, so I did a controlled landing into the water just shy of the beach. I remember the last moments before touching down thinking to make sure I was parallel as possible to the water, stick centred ready to pull back if I overshot to the beach and needed the rotor brake, throttle power fully off as I settled for the landing, and the pilot teaching – engine failure on takeoff below 50 feet land straight ahead. There was a bang when the gyro touched down and the water soon filled the cockpit. But it was when the cockpit was filled with water, and the passenger and I were still seated, that the rotors struck the water with a bang. I suspect our weight and the water kept the gyro.

this is part of the pilots explanation about this crash. out of gyro news. it was as expected, he got too low and slow. once you get behind the power curve there is little chance of recovery if your close to the ground.