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cooperplace

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Everything posted by cooperplace

  1. cooperplace
    anything is possible; it may have failed and they were trying a glide approach but didn't quite make it. Lots of other possibilities.
  2. cooperplace
    someone used a word a.........t but I don't think anyone used any f%%k words.
  3. cooperplace
    maybe he was trying to get to the cross strip?
  4. cooperplace
    Hi Rod, who did you fly with?
  5. cooperplace
    those figures I quoted above are those in wikipedia. I defer to RGMWA for his figures for local fuels.
  6. cooperplace
    I met my future wife in Vancouver, in 1994. Still together, and we now have have 3 kids. I've never been back to BC but have great memories.
  7. cooperplace
    yeah they did, but the key, critical error was that they used 1.77 as the factor for converting a liter of fuel to weight. A liter of fuel weighs 0.83 kg, and 1.77 lbs. They should have used 0.83. They took off with 0.83/1.77 of the amount of fuel they thought they had. Everyone says these guys were hero pilots, but I've always thought they were utter nitwits. If they'd paid the slightest attention in school chemistry, or even if they had any common sense, they would have exclaimed: "1.77! that can't be right: fuel floats on water, everyone knows that! Water has a density of 1, so fuel can't be more than 1." and the accident wouldn't have happened. But the significance of a density of 1.77 never occurred to these highly-trained aviators until they heard the all engines out warning sound.
  8. cooperplace
    read about the Gimli glider, this sort of mistake brought then down.
  9. cooperplace
    but powerful outboards on fishing boats are all fine? So the fish can tell whether that hull with a noisy motor attached is a boat or a plane?
  10. cooperplace
    Thanks, yes that's pretty clear.
  11. cooperplace
    I'm confused: the Adelaide Now article shows it circling over Crafers, but posts here say that it circled over Vic Park.
  12. cooperplace
    where is that press release visible?
  13. cooperplace
    I think a key question is exactly where the engine failure took place. If it happened en route to Vic park, then it makes sense. He can't offload jumpers onto suburbia: there's wires and light poles etc everywhere, so the decision would be to keep the jumpers on board and try to make it to Vic park, the only possible place for a forced landing. But if he lost power over Vic park, that's a different scenario. You would presume it a lot easier to deadstick land without the 300-350kg of payload. It would be expected to glide further.
  14. cooperplace
    I walk and cycle around Vic park racecourse all the time, and I can see areas there suited for an engine failure landing. My kids were cycling on the track that he skidded across the day before the crash. I practice engine failure from height occasionally. I understand how stressful it would be for the pilot, because even when I set it up the way I want it, and I have fuel in the tank and the engine idling, I'm breaking into a sweat as I'm trying for a forced landing. But to come in from the east, narrowly dodging a 6-floor building, the highest obstacle around, and skimming over 2-storey buildings, missing the fence by inches, these are choices that I struggle to understand.
  15. cooperplace
    what a pity to hear this, the newspapers hailed him a hero
  16. cooperplace
    "plenty of height" but they cleared the fence by inches; I don't get it
  17. cooperplace
    the fence is 1.2m high and they hit the ground 19m after it. I paced it out. On the other side of the road from the fence is all 2-storey buildings. These guys all need to buy lottery tickets.
  18. cooperplace
    no hints? are you saying that it definitely wasn't a fault with the aircraft?
  19. cooperplace
    The paper is now saying just a broken foot, still a nasty injury. I just visited the crash site and it's clear he came in from the east, must have narrowly missed the old Queen Vic hospital bdg, about 6 floors, cleared the fence by inches and hit the grass about 25m in from the fence, which is about 1.2m high. He then skidded about 55m in grass, crossing a a bitumen racetrack, and ended up in grass, between two small trees. One might have snapped off if the plane hit it, the other I'm not sure of. According to the paper here he circled over the Adelaide Hills, reaching 3700ft, then descended towards his drop zone over the racecourse. It's all tiger country (hills or suburbia) until you reach the racecourse, so I suspect that the engine failure happened well before he reached the racecourse. If you were directly over the racecourse and had an engine failure, and some altitude, you'd choose a much larger open area some hundred of meters to the south of where he landed. They were incredibly lucky to clear the fence. This was very close to being extremely nasty. It shows to me the importance of the rules around flying over built-up areas.
  20. cooperplace
    so do we know the cause of the crash yet?
  21. cooperplace
    Advertiser reports a broken pelvis and a broken foot, quite serious injuries. Hopefully no further injuries will come to light.
  22. cooperplace
    and the press got it right this time....
  23. cooperplace
    it's not as simple as that. These childcare centres will be used by the families of RAAF staff on the bases. They would rightly want to use the centre on the base to look after their kids. I don't blame them for being annoyed at the noise which of course is ear-splitting. Maybe the RAAF is to blame for putting the childcare facilities where they did.
  24. cooperplace
    when I started learning a lot of people said don't be in too much of a hurry to buy a plane, get your licence, fly for a while, try different types, work out what suits your needs. I think that is very good advice.
  25. cooperplace
    Hi shu77, thank you, I'll try RA Newcastle.
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