Dieselten

Would the moderator(s) please delete every reply that is not immediately relevant to the accident in question to save server bandwidth and reader frustration please? This thread isn't drifting, it's moving away from the subject at Mach 1.2! Back to the subject, I met the pilot in question at Wollongong the day he undertook the ill-fated flight and am very saddened to learn he did not make it home. We must wait until the investigators have done their work before we go speculating on what might have caused the accident. We have lost a fellow-aviator and that ought to make us pause and reflect.

According to reports of ATSB assistance for the ASRA investigation of the gyro accident, it was a separation of the upper part of the mast from the gyro. (The gyro in question was fitted with the folding-mast option.) The instructor who lost his life was 60-year old Mike Waldon, from Kiama. Mike was a friend and colleague, a very good instructor and meticulous about pre-flight inspections. I miss his humour, professionalism and determination. He was one of a kind. Condolences to his family, especially Caitlin and Alexia.

Repeat the test in a wind-tunnel with the airflow over the wing at normal cruising-speed for a better test of a real-world situation. Either way I think there will be significant wing-damage. As for the drone...

One if those killed in the gyro was a personal friend and aviation colleague. RIP my friend, you will be missed.

APF Interim Fatality Report now issued. Situation is a little more complex - and baffling - than I described above. A freefall collison appears likely, but canopies did open; the tandem reserve canopy and both the main and reserve for the solo jumper. Severe injuries to the two jumpers consistent with freefall collision, but the solo jumper also descended to the ground under a "down-plane" at a high rate of descent which may have contributed to his demise. Tandem pair located at the base of a tree with severe injuries and pronounced dead at scene. This is a very complex accident and the investigation is likely to take some time. Losing skydivers with perfectly good canopies open is something which indicates the jumpers were so severely incapacitated they were unable to take control, even after the AADs had done their usually-lifesaving work.

Collision in freefall apparently. Tandem-Master and Camerman both knocked unconscious, camerman's AAD did not activate, he became tangled in the tandem drogue-bridle, the tandem AAD activated but the reserve became tangled with drogue-bridle etc and all three died. Heavy blow for the skydiving fraternity so soon after the double fatality at Picton in July.

The maximum bank-angle for a turn in the circuit (be it crosswind, downwind, base or final) shoud be no more than 30 degrees on any trike wing, be it Wizard, Arrow, P&M Blade or whatever your trike-wing is. For most normal flying away from the circuit a 15-degree banked turn is quite sufficient. I teach the 60-degree banked turn as an emergency avoiding-manoeuvre only, using added engine-power to counteract the potential height-loss due to load-factor, and stressing the need for a gentle recovery to prevent overspeeding as a result of conservation of angular momentum. Anyone needing to do a 60-degree angle-of-bank turn onto final needs some re-training in how to fly the circuit and how to judge angles and distances. Circuit-height is not the place for such potentially hazardous manoeuvres. I lost two friends on an Arrow near Glen Innes in 2015, and as yet I still have no explanation for how the accident occurred, coronial inquest notwithstanding. About the only thing I do know is the Arrow wing has no innate malevolence - it is just a machine, and needs to be correctly handled and kept within the defined operating parameters as set out by the manufacturer. Somehow, in that accident, it was mis-handled to the point of the situation becoming irrecoverable. That much is certain. How it was so mishandled remains a mystery, and seems destined to remain so. Those who decry the Wizard wing have failed to grasp one very significant fact...the Wizard is an excellent training-wing because it is forgiving, yet it does require a pilot to manage the wing through all phases of flight. Landing a Wizard in gusty conditons will give the pilot a workout - and show him just how he needs to fly the wing in every axis all the way down to the ground. He will be a better pilot for it. (I have about 1100 hours on the Wizard and am grateful for each and every one of them.) I train on the Cruze as well as the Arrow and stress to each student the particular characteristics they must keep in mind at all times for whichever wing they are flying. Lastly, I fail to see the need for going any faster than about 60KIAS on a trike, and in fact 50KIAS suits me just fine. If you need to go faster, get a different aeroplane. (If I need to go 100KIAS then the J160 is my aeroplane of choice.)

Here's a trick for flying in rain in Jabirus with wooden props if you simply can't get away from it. Reduce your airspeed below Vfe, then lower half-flap. Now set engine RPM to keep you level at 70KIAS in the J160, 65KIAS in the 170 or 230. In the J160 this is about 2400RPM with half-flap and 2 people onboard. Maintain level flight with elevator. This will take 500RPM (approx) off your prop and greatly reduce the impact of raindrops on the leading-edge, whilst maintaining your chosen altitude. Once clear of the rain, retract flaps and increase power to normal cruise-settings.

Various BBSs have something like a "Gone Home" or "Departed Friends" section. Bandwidth and storage are potential issues as any BBS expands.

"Kalganyi", private strip immediately adjacent to Hume Hwy south of Marulan. Grass surface, faces E-W. Good surface, slopes at either end, more gentle slope to the west.

The pilot has a history. This isn't the first time ambition has exceeded ability. If he never leaves the ground again except in an elevator I will be very pleased.

You may as well ask why aviation, shipping and the scientific and business worlds still use English - because no-one's come up with anything that works better and which people are prepared to adopt. It works, that's why. The Germans persisted with units of angular measure called "grads" in which there were 100 grad in a right-angle and four hundred grads in a circle. Try buying a sextant, or a set-square, or a protractor, or a goniometer calibrated in grads these days (if you can still find a sextant for sale, that is.)

This is gutting. Ross was a colleague and friend back in the skydiving days at Wilton in the early 70s. His passion for sport aviation was evident then, and he never lost it. He survived the crash of a fully-loaded jump-aircraft and although it affected him deeply, he still retained his love of jumping. He was Alan Jay's rigger when Alan was building the "Parasport" equipment, some of the very first custom-built skydiving gear ever seen in Australia. He had seen so much and knew so much in sport avation he became a touchstone, a resource from whom a great many benefitted time and time again. RIP my friend. Our little world is poorer for your loss.

Weightshift:- fly the wing. 3-Axis - fly the wing. Start flying the wing and stop just flying the controls. Works every time! A wing only knows how to make lift. It doesn't know what it's bolted onto. Make the wing do the work, and fly it and only it. That way, if you don't break the wing you probably won't break anything else either, and if you make the wing go where you want it to go the rest ot the aeroplane will follow. Fly the wing.

...and 384 angels can dance on the head of a pin.