Snoopy wrote:
The operations manager saw the aircraft take off in the area of the center square, that is, in front of the second taxiway. It was a normal takeoff. The aircraft had “not appeared steep” to him. It was a normal takeoff distance. He watched the aircraft until it disappeared into the fog. A few seconds after takeoff, a colleague came up to the tower and reported that he heard a “bang” and that the aircraft had probably crashed.
So what happened? Did the pilot fail to maintain control of the aircraft in IMC? Any technical problems? Was the pilot instrument rated?
As I wrote above: No more posts please unless they are relevant to Austrian regulations (or EU regulations applying to Austria) or the accident itself
BTW I am informed the pilot had thousands of hours. The aircraft had old-style avionics; not that that means anything since an old panel is likely to have more redundancy.
The aircraft had old-style avionics
Sorry to say, but you are again informed wrong.
I have just seen a photo (not for publication) – unless it was re-done recently. Where is “again” from, please, Bosco?
Off topic posts moved to off topic thread
The aircraft did not have old style avionics.
It was recently upgraded with G500TXI, GTN750, GTN650 and it had a fully functioning autopilot.
Airborne_Again wrote:
So what happened? Did the pilot fail to maintain control of the aircraft in IMC? Any technical problems? Was the pilot instrument rated?
Conclusions
The aircraft accident is most likely due to the fact that the aircraft entered a stalled flight condition during takeoff in fog at low altitude. Due to the low airspeed and the low altitude, it was no longer possible to escape the stalled flight condition. Contributing factors were:
Conducting a visual flight under instrument flight conditions.
Misjudgment of the pilot
Possible lack of the stall warning horn during the
accident flight
Conformity pressure of the pilot
3.1. findings
The flight weather had a significant influence on the accident flight.
The weather conditions at the time of the accident did not conform to the
Visual Flight Rules.
The airfield was in operation at the time of the accident flight.
Approved notices for safe operation of the airfield were not complied with.
The pilot held a private pilot rating with instrument rating.
The pilot had his instrument rating repeatedly renewed without proven completion of all required items of the proficiency check.
It cannot be determined whether the pilot also completed other required maneuvers/procedures in the course of practical proficiency checks only partially or not at all.
The pilot had sufficient flight as well as type experience to perform the flight.
There is nothing to indicate that the pilot’s health was impaired at the time of the accident flight.
The stall warning horn of the aircraft could not be found despite intensive search. Whether said horn had possibly already been missing before the accident flight could not be clarified afterwards.
It cannot be ruled out that the passenger’s photo camera falling down and being picked up by the passenger had distracted the accident pilot or caused him to be careless.
The radar plots evaluated are consistent with both the surviving passenger’s testimony and the evidence found at the accident site.
The rescue chain was set in motion by several people sending out distress messages.
The dense fog made it difficult for rescue workers to find the crash site.
The aircraft was certified to operate under visual flight and instrument flight rules on the day of the accident.
Both the mass and center of gravity of the aircraft were within the limits permitted by the Pilots Operating Handbook (POH) at the time of the accident.
The last airworthiness inspection was performed in due time.
The fuel injection pump installed was not the fuel injection pump listed in the CV file. Neither installation certificate nor
Certificate of Release to Service was found in the aircraft records.
3.2 Probable Causes Obstacle contact in forested terrain.
Probable factors:
Conducting a visual flight (VFR) under instrument flight conditions.
IFR in G is possible. Need to find an area in Austria where airspace G meets SERA minimum altitude… maybe there is a small patch somewhere.
There is a actually a huge patch and it’s right by LOIH.
The green shaded area south and east of LOIH is G up to 15499ft. So IFR + observing minimum altitude acc. SERA is possible there.
VFR min vis in G (for take off at LOIH) = 1500m and clear of clouds.
Once airborne and in line with SERA min alt, IFR possible.
Not sure many people are aware of this in Austria.
By9468840 wrote:
The aircraft did not have old style avionics.
It was recently upgraded with G500TXI, GTN750, GTN650 and it had a fully functioning autopilot.
Would the G500TXI imply some sort of synthetic vision would have been available? And certainly, the GTN’s have terrain warnings. More and more confusing.
As to why the confusion about the runway use happened, I think there are several factors.
From the flight track, runway 05 was the most likely, which was stated in the first post even.
Several posters based at LOIH stated that 05 is the runway in use for most of the time.
LOIH has noise problems. So take offs from 05 are avoided before 9am.
Eventually the web cam pic turned up, showing that the airplane took off from 05, putting that matter to rest.
The problem with every one of these accident threads are assumptions and confused withness statements.
I was wrong on the predominantly used runway at LOIH because I made the wrong assumption that because winds in that area are mostly from the western direction, most airfields use westerly runways predominantly. This was quickly corrected by based pilots.
The poster claiming he “knew” runway 23 was used based this assumption on the noise preferrencs as well as talking to someone who had discussed this with the pilot prior to departure.
The flight track on FR24 is as usual not shown from the ground but only after one of the receivers got the signals. It has been said before, FR tracks and speeds can be very unrealistic for that reason, particularly if MLAT signals are used.
The whole discussion about legality came up because lots of people were drilled to the old rules which prohibited IFR in airspace G. So I and several others were totally dumbstruck by the fact that this is now an EASA standard. For me, this is an important take away from this thread which corrects a long standing error on my side.
While this won’t be a surprise to anyone, assumtion is what moves us from facts to guesswork. An old teacher of mine used the Benny Hill moniker: "Never assume, because if you do, you make an ass out of you and me (ass-u-me) .
Assumptions base on “fact” which a person is 100% sure to KNOW. Yet they are very frequently wrong. Some people will not budge from their false knowledge even when proven wrong, most will however.
So quite a few of us, who grew up in the G-Airspace IFR prohibition area have gotten vital information: IFR in G is now legal in Europe, all of Europe.
Some others learnt another lesson about things they know “for sure” only to be proven wrong. Nothing is sure and things change much more than most of us can keep up with.
Some of us may re-evaluate their risk assessment regarding departures with low visibility, in both directions.
We have yet to learn the cause of this crash, and we most probably will once the report is out. We can then muse about who was “right” or “wrong”.
loih has no ifr clearance/procedure.
in some 40 years i do not know of approved or regular ifr traffic at loih.
(wether it might be legal under overruling eu law/regulations i do not know).
visibility (of at least 1500m) at the time of takeoff for vfr will be determined by the official investigation.
data suggests visibility was less than 1500m.
runway is 630m.
on the here mentioned pic of the departure from the tower you see the plane barely in the fog taking off.
fact is the pilot took off. (the very wrong decision in my opinion for evident reasons) !
besides the legal questions, that are for of the investigating commission to answer, there might be some plausible hypothesis,
why the plane turned to the right (east to southeast) in a seemingly controlled way climbing steadily (if radar data is accurate) after takeoff from 05.
an emergency return is inprobable. why would the plane climb steadily until impact?
loih is the pilots homebase. he would never turn east towards the mountains when all is flat westwards for an emergency return/landing.
some health issues, instrument problems or loss of orientation?
how would a plane do a a smooth regular turn and steady climb (if radar data given in this blog is correct) under such conditions and zero visibility?
hypothesis is like this:
due to local flight restrictions pilot planed (or thought he had) to go out on 23 initially.
as pilot had if rating and plane was ifr equipped ifr takeoff could be done.
pilots destination was edja.
once out of the fog he could go vfr in fine weather conditions. (no fog at edja).
conflicting first hand informations as wether the pilot took off 05 or 23 suggest,
that some last minute change of plan might have been involved.
finally pilot decided to go out on 05.
that the pilot confused 05 and 23 and flew the plane vfr with zero visibility on a steady upward right turn is very unlikely to impossible in my view.
some ifr/autopilot reprogramming error or failure could have let to the tragic result of a system guided/controlled right hand turn after takeoff from 05?!
if a hypothetically plotted ifr/autopilot course out 23 turning west to north toward edja would be similar to the courseline the plane actually flew
it would strongly support this hypothesis.
Snoopy wrote:
VFR min vis in G (for take off at LOIH) = 1500m and clear of clouds.Once airborne and in line with SERA min alt, IFR possible.
So we can say that if vis was <=1500 m and there was a ceiling, take off per se was legal.
IFR in G is legal, but from which altitude? And wasn’t it said the SERA minimum Altitude can be disregarded for departure and arrival?
The SERA minimum altitude would be what in this case?
I may be thick, but these are things I really would like to know.
gallois wrote:And that means firstly, asking yourself would you have taken off in those conditions and if so have you thought through all the threats and errors that might ensue and how you would manage them.
I agree. In the end this is the main thing. And to some extent, the fact that EASA now allows this, makes this assessment a lot more important, particularly in areas where it was prior forbidden.
