David Isaac

Arthur, I think you may have taken Potts out of context. He was specifically talking about the circumstances in the ATSB report on the TB20 Trinidad accident that killed a personal friend of mine and his instructor at Lismore November 2012. Potts is talking about the lessons from the accident in endorsing low time/experience pilots in complex aircraft when the instructor is also low time. If you read the ATSB report you would see what he and I are concerned about. In the report data from the manufacturer warns about the height loss in a deep unbalance stall needing up to 800' to recover. Stall it on a base or final turn and you are in real trouble. The damn thing stalls at 83 knots in a 45 degree angle of bank turn, drop the dunlops and pull the power and there is a rapid drop in speed. How did this situation get away from a 3900 hour CPL with an instrument command rating and kill them both?

Shitstirrer ......

Thanks guys, that is a bloody great result and an excellent effort to promulgate the issues. Well done.

Paul, You will note from the ATSB report that Chris and Michael died from impact related injuries, not the fire. Also the report said the autopsies revealed that Chris suffered from moderately serious coronary artery disease but they could not ascertain whether that was any factor in the accident. There is a lot to be learned from this accident.

The ATSB have published their final report on this tragedy in which I lost my friend Chris Bowles and his instructor friend Michael on the 9th of November 2012. It is hard to understand the circumstances that could have occurred that meant that the instructor could not regain control of the aircraft until you read the report and realise just how 'hot' the TB20 Trinidad is. The ATSB report goes into a fair bit of detail into my friends training and his struggle with getting used to maintaining accurate speed control and balance in this high performance aircraft and may in part explain how they came to lose control on the base turn. Data from Socata (the TB20 Trinidad manufacturer) in the report states the aircraft will stall at 83 knots clean at a 45 degree angle of bank and that the Trinidad may need up to 800' to recover if the aircraft stalls unbalanced and the nose is allowed to drop to a steep down attitude. This seems plausible as witnesses and the evidence point to the aircraft being in a recovered attitude at or before ground impact. We have to assume the gear was down and at least 10 degrees of flap extended in the base turn because the undercarriage was torn off in the impact. It would seem that this accident was clearly preventable and though I don't want to admit, it appears to be a simple loss of control scenario bought on by a lack of concentration where the airspeed was allowed to decay to the aerodynamic stall stage with insufficient height to recover. My friends reaction to the stall may have contributed to the complexity of the situation (we will never know for sure). A real lesson for pilots and instructors when transferring students from training type aircraft to the more sophisticated high wing loading types. The accident may have in fact been survivable if they hadn't hit the concrete troughs (not mentioned in the report) and had not inverted. I still struggle with the loss of Chris in this incident almost two years ago. Motz, I would appreciate any input you may have after you have read the report here http://www.atsb.gov.au/media/4720120/ao-2012-149_final.pdf

Well that could do it Motz, that flying stabilator, let it loose and all hell can brake loose. What a bloody tragedy.

There are a couple of rather obvious problems with ground handling with an ABS type braking system on a tail wheel aircraft: 1. When you want differential braking, for example when you want to ground loop the aircraft by stomping on say the left brake to turn the aircraft, the right wheel will travel faster and the ABS will attempt to release the left wheel brake to counter your intentions. That could also be a real problem taxiing in strong crosswinds as well as landing in real strong crosswinds where at the last moment on a full stall touch down you might want to ground loop the aircraft to maintain control. 2. It will not stop the roll over as we saw in that Cessna 180 unless the brakes locked and from what I saw he over braked and let the control yoke move forward ( might have had the seat move forward under heavy braking). ABS can't stop that kind of cock up unless it has a G positioning sensor that releases the brakes when the CofG moves too far forward as a result of the tail rising.

I don't recall from any of my flying of the Citabria, Auster, C180 or C185 that you could of lift the tail while stationary at full power unless you were facing into a stiff head wind. If you do what has been suggested is a problem, then surely you are either an idiot or not trained correctly, or am I being too harsh. Are we attempting to create a solution for a problem that we don't have?

This might sound a bit odd Ian, but you could force every user to go back and update their profile in a private survey before they could read any further posts. Do it in a nice way and there will be minimum objection.

Yes, I was suggesting that the nature of the forces would have popped the Al sheet off the rivets. The forces could possibly have been uniform and concussive in nature. I'm not a metallurgist, I was just surmising using basic physics. I cannot speak with any authority on this matter it is simply an assumption on my part as to why the Al looks like it does.

Well I'd imagine if you hit the water at a high speed, the water entering the fuselage from the front would literally blow the metal off all the rivets on the fuselage because of the huge concussion pressures. From what I saw of the photographs and what was reported; what you see on the photographs would appear understandable.

Like hitting a concrete slab I would imagine Tubz, the poor buggas wouldn't have stood a chance, something catastrophic must have happened for neither of then to be able to regain control. May they rest in peace.

Richard, LSA is fairly well controlled (we hope). 19 Kits may be more of a worry because you need some confidence the builder is competent and has significant knowledge of the effects of his hand work.

Good Lord. That thing must have hit the water at a very high speed to explode like those pictures show. The thing is barely recognisable. There doesn't appear to be one piece left in its original shape. Even the engine oil filter is crushed.

Hmmm ... crazy people governing us ... we let that happen?????

Hey ... FT has a sense of humour ... LOL

Hopefully we have all done just that Reggie.

Product liability legislation applies across the board in Australia Tubz especially when it comes to 'Fitness for purpose' and 'Merchantable quality'. It is just that in Australian courts you must prove actual loss in order to claim compensation. In the US the jury will award compensatory damages and in certain circumstance punitive damages.

I read it as RAA having an ongoing due diligence obligation to remind pilots about the law and unsafe practices; as in fact is regularly done in the sport pilot magazine. To FTs question, as this fellow was well known at Gatton, it must have been well known he was flying illegally. I find it hard to imagine that he wasn't approached on more than one occasion warning him of the implications of his illegal activities. Had he been in the habit of conducting aerobatic activities in his aircraft? Who would attempt an aileron roll at such a low altitude if it had not been done many times at altitude?

Hopefully because of the loss of two lives, they will be involved.

Yeah ... but Nev, you know they are all pussies today compared to you ol fellas that flew real airliners with big round engines, hell the new boys wouldn't know where to begin with the good ol buses.

Correct Richard, and George Bernard Shaw was somewhat cynical in some of his statements.

Nice vid FT, I love the flex in those plastic wings, nice bit of slip and skid as well. She goes well (empty I assume).

The old adage ... You get what you pay for. Properly filtered circuits will obviously cost more.

So what happened Potts?