onetrack

The aircraft was built in 2015, so I guess that makes it an "early" model?

The aircraft has been recovered today and taken to the mainland. The ATSB says the wreckage will be transported to Canberra for complete examination. The wind and wave conditions today were vastly better than on the day of the crash. Wreckage recovered as ATSB investigators piece together moments before Rottnest seaplane crash - ABC News WWW.ABC.NET.AU The wreckage of a seaplane that crashed off Rottnest Island on Tuesday afternoon, killing three people, has been pulled from the water and taken back to the mainland for further investigation.

I believe this is the aircraft in question, and it wears RA-Aus rego, 19-8645.

There's one factor that has come out of this crash that has made a big difference to the outcome - and that was the fact that recreational boaters were nearby, and on the scene within a minute, and helped rescue survivors from the wreckage. I note that Col Blanch, the W.A. Police Commissioner made reference to this and expressed great appreciation towards the boaties involved. These people have possibly made a substantial difference to the final number of fatalities by grabbing the pax that were within reach of the surface. The aircraft sank in 8 metres of water, but not very far away, the water is considerably shallower (3-5M), and there's a curved section of shallow rock called Natural Jetty, that runs from the Island to Phillip Rock. The Natural Jetty rock formation is fully exposed at low tide, except for about a 50M section that stays underwater. The C208 took off at what appears to be high tide. In addition, Phillip Rock used to be much higher and larger, but during WW2, when the Military controlled Rottnest Island (there are large ex-military barracks there), and Rottnest was being used as "first line of Naval Defence" (with the impressive 142 tonnes, 9.2" Naval gun still in place on Oliver Hill), a decision was made by the military that Phillip Rock posed an enemy visibility threat and needed to be lowered! Accordingly, the Rock was blasted with a substantial number of artillery shells, which reduced the Rocks height to only about a third of its original height! All that rock blasted from Phillip Rock, now litters the area around the rock. Photos - 1. Original Rock size (prior to WW2) 2. & 3. Views of the Rock today from (2) the West and from (3), the NE.

It's claimed the crashed Bearhawk weighed 421kgs empty. He must have found a lot of light composites to use in the construction! He certainly wouldn't have had much fuel capacity with pilot and passenger aboard, under RA-Aus regulations. Log into Facebook WWW.FACEBOOK.COM Log into Facebook to start sharing and connecting with your friends, family, and people you know.

......a thriving cottage industry producing wing and fuselage covering materials utilising secondhand ex-military parachutes, that were cut up and re-sewn into wing and fuselage cladding sections. However, no-one foresaw the awkward development, whereby the parachute material, which had always been designed to plummet (there's that word again) earthwards at all times, started plummetting earthwards regularly again, straight after it was used to cover microlight wings and fuselages. This rather startling result - that only occurred once the microlight had exceeded jump height - caused so much concern, a committee was formed to address the problem and find a cure. To that end, an Official Investigator was appointed, and the person chosen just happened to be another Turbine family member with extensive aviation and jump experience (he was known to jump anything, a common Turbine family failing, but we won't digress at this point), a gent named "Chute" Turbine. His real name had long been forgotten, because his nickname had been used so regularly, everyone thought it WAS his real name. He was nicknamed "Chute" because of his constant habit of indulging in that well-known wombat habit of, "eat...........

I believe only the one was produced, because after it was completed, the designer couldn't ever see the blueprints again!

The ATSB is seeking crash witness information on their site, they have a specific webpage set up for witnesses to provide details. https://www.atsb.gov.au/media/2025/rottnest-island-cessna-208-accident

Many times, it's simply the luck of the draw that determines whether people survive air crashes. Being seated in the rearmost seating appears to enhance your chances of survival in most cases, unless it's head-on into cumulus granitus.

It's the pictures that ask me to identify the items with wings, that cause me to fail every time!!

Yes, that news that the pilot is one of the deceased is correct. A major update in the link below. Three confirmed dead in Rottnest plane crash THEWEST.COM.AU Premier Roger Cook has confirmed three bodies have been recovered from the wreckage of a seaplane which crashed off Rottnest Island on Tuesday.

Not much by way of news developments. I still don't believe the aircraft hit Phillips Rock. It may have crashed into submerged rocks not far out from Phillip Rock. All the signs point to a stall on takeoff, it was struggling to make adequate airspeed once it left the water, and the port wings vicious drop points to a stalled wing. Whether that was because there was inadequate power being produced by the PT6A, or because of a piloting failure, is yet to be found. There's media fanfare about the aircraft being a "brand new plane", but the records don't show it as brand new, it was manufactured in 2016. It was "brand new" to the current owners, Swan River Seaplanes. The aircraft was built in Aug 2016, initially registered to Wells Fargo Bank as N7129S, then de-registered and purchased by Whitsunday Air Services in late Sept 2016 and re-registered as VH-WTY. Ownership of the aircraft was transferred to Swan River Seaplanes, only a bit over a week ago. There are some interesting points being raised in discussion. The maximum "demonstrated" crosswind speed listed by Cessna for the Amphibian, is 20kts. However, the POH says - "Demonstrated Crosswind Velocity is the velocity of the crosswind component for which adequate control of the airplane during takeoff and landing was actually demonstrated during certification tests. The value shown is not considered to be limiting." Despite the above, the takeoff of the aircraft in the crash was in pretty choppy water (the stated wave height limit is 61cm), and the local indicated wind speed of 25-27kts with gusts to 31-34kts certainly made the takeoff riskier than any smooth water, light wind takeoff. The operators use Thompson Bay because it's partly sheltered from Rottnests winds, which are pretty fierce in the afternoons. Takeoff weight with 7 pax should've posed no overload potential, the Amphibian is capable of carrying 10-14 pax, according to the specs. A second interesting point is the seatbelts. The pilot and co-pilot seats are fitted with 5 point harnesses. The pax only get lap-sash style belts. I would've presumed the uninjured survivor is likely to be the pilot, with his superior belt security - but I may be wrong. A third interesting point is that many aircraft operators over water, insist that crew and pax undergo training to extract themselves from submerged aircraft after ditching and crashes. It's called Underwater Egress Training, and is compulsory as part of OH&S in many corporations where employees work out to sea. It's long ago been proven that may people (pilots and pax) survive crashes into the water, but then drown when they become disoriented under water, and caught inside a sinking fuselage. You generally get a couple of minutes to escape a sinking aircraft, enough time to orient yourself and make it to the surface (if you're able to still move, of course) - provided you have UE training. I don't know if any underwater egress basic advice is given to pax on seaplanes, but I would expect it should be - comprising a more comprehensive level of advice, as compared to the escape advice on land, is given to pax on commercial flights.

.....want to buy the new travelling machines invented and displayed by Orville Turbine. However, there was a serious backlash amongst many people. "You wouldn't get me in one of those things for all the tea in China!!", said one whiskery-bearded old fella. "Those things are going to kill a lot of people!!", he added. Orville was facing a new problem, one he'd never envisaged. One of his friends came out with an astonishing statement. "You have a marketing problem", he said to Orville. "You need to create a marketing department to increase demand for your products and to make them look so highly desirable, people will clamber over each other to acquire one! In addition, you can have major 'SALES!', advertising huge discounts - right after you just ramped up the purchase price by 40%!" "Well, that's just brilliant!", said Orville in excitement. "I don't have to worry about the problematic details in my new travelling machine designs - 'marketing' will cover up all the equipment failures, recalls, deaths caused by my design errors, and stop all the lawsuits in their tracks!" And so, dear NES readers, this is why the Turbine global corporations today have such power and wealth - it's all due to Orvilles highly-developed "marketing" skills, and as a result, Turbo has become just another.......

Actually, today, it's AI talking to us via chatbots, pretending to be humans, asking us to prove we're human!

deleted - double post

Skippy, did you do any failure analysis on your two failed actuators to determine the exact cause of failure? You seem to blame it on cheap Chinese construction, but it may have been caused by excessive loading, or a design fault in the actuation movement, that can only be discovered by careful examination, and a reconstruction of the failure sequence. Failure analysis is an entire field in itself.

Nope, nothing. He probably got overwhelmed with feedback. I did note the article was edited very soon after I sent my email to him.

By my estimation, the aircraft was taking off in a South Easterly direction, into a SW/SSW strong afternoon wind (typical of Rottnest in the afternoon), running at 25-27kts, and gusting to 31-34 kts around 1600 HRS. The wind was coming across the Island onto the aircrafts starboard bow. Thomson Bay and Phillip Rock are on the East side of the Island.

Yeah, the ABC knows exactly what all you backyarders have been building and flying! - they've seen the videos!! (check out the best part - between 4:40 and 5:30 in the video).

Someone took a grainy video of the takeoff. It's difficult to see good detail, such as control surfaces. Now, I'm no aircrash investigation expert - but - to me, it appears the, "hit a rock" story, is not correct. The aircraft got airborne, then seems to develop a pitch up, that is obviously a major increase in AoA. The aircraft appears to level out a bit as it reaches about 30-40 feet of altitude, then the starboard wing drops a little, correction is applied, then the port wing drops viciously (certainly looks like a stall to me), and the port wingtip hits the water, and it's all over, red rover. I'm wondering if W&B was out (tail heavy) on takeoff? Rottnest seaplane crash video 7NEWS.COM.AU Rottnest seaplane crash video

W.A. Police are now confirming that 3 people from the aircraft are still missing. This is looking really bad.

Yeah, but isn't the one you fly now, made from the same materials? The ABC journos seem to think so!

It's the ABC's term for the toys you drill holes in the sky with! Questions over hobby plane safety | ABC News

The aircraft in the crash event above was written off? They must have acquired a replacement, and kept the rego? EDIT: Aircraft in above crash that was written off, was C/N: 20800552, ex N1027V. Crashed aircraft off Rottnest is C/N: 20800586, ex N7129S. I just realised, two different companies are involved, although both are registered in FNQ.

Hey, at least it's 100mph tape!! 😄