3 more gone too soon. Near Maffra 16/11/24

[Thruster88]

The final report is interesting reading. Many weak links in the chain.

 

Loss of control and collision with terrain involving a Morgan Cougar Mk1 aircraft, VH-LDV, 19 km north-north-west of West Sale Airport, Victoria, on 16 November 2024 | ATSB

WWW.ATSB.GOV.AU

 

[onetrack]

It very much appears the pilot was another Matthew Farrell, an accident looking for a place to happen, because of his "bold" approach to flying. And we all know about bold pilots and old pilots.

 

What is the shame of the whole exercise, is that he took two innocents with him, due to his brazen belief, that he knew how to fly better than anyone else.

 

The ATSB doesn't have much good to say about the design of the aircraft. They might as well have said, "a flying deathtrap". Using car seatbelts where the tongues broke on impact, is unforgivable.

 

Car seatbelts only have to meet a specified Australian (Vehicle) Design Rules (ADR) load, not any aviation regulations. I can recall an exercise around 1967, that highly embarrassed GMH management at the time. The new Holdens were being produced with their (new to the industry) seatbelts. GMH decided to put on a show for motoring journos, as regards the strength of their new seatbelts.

 

They pulled a new HR Holden off the production line, and also a new Vauxhall Viva (predecessor of the Torana). They arranged for crane to pick up the HR Holden by its seatbelts. They slung the seatbelts out the windows of the HR Holden, and the crane operator duly hooked up to them, and lifted the HR Holden off the ground! (about 2600 lbs in the measurements of the day, or 1100 kgs).

 

The journos were all impressed, and the cameras clicked and clicked. But the GMH managers said, "You ain't seen nothing yet!". So they rolled the Vauxhall Viva under the suspended HR Holden, and then slung the Viva's seatbelts out of its windows, and hooked them to the underside of the HR Holden!

Then they signalled to the crane driver to lift again! So he did - and the Vauxhall Viva was lifted well clear of the ground! - all hanging from the HR Holdens seatbelts!

 

Then the GMH engineers went into the details of how the seatbelt tongues had to meet a vehicle design regulation (this was before ADR's), that insisted the seatbelt tongues had to hold a 4400 lbs (1995kgs) load, for 30 seconds - and here they were, holding a constant static load, of over 4000lbs (1815kgs)! The cameras clicked again and again. 

 

Then, while all this was going on, the crane driver got bored, and started fidgeting in the cabin of the crane. He managed to bump a control lever with an elbow - just a tiny bump.

But it was the boom lift lever, and it was enough of a bump on the control lever, for the crane boom to drop just 2" (50mm). There was an almighty CRASH!! - as the seatbelt tongues of the HR Holden snapped, and it came crashing down onto the Vauxhall Viva, partially crushing the Viva!!

 

Of course, the cameras clicked even faster, then!! But GMH insisted that the crash photos were NOT to be released to the public - until they figured out why the HR's seatbelt tongues had snapped.

They hurried off, and did some rapid calculations.

The engineers calculated that the 2" (50mm) drop, that when it was stopped, produced a loading on the HR seatbelt tongues, that was more than DOUBLE the specified loading, that the tongues were required to meet under the relevant design regulation.

 

Of course, the whole promo was a disaster for GMH, and they never tried to do it again. But it shows how impact loadings can produce enormous loads on vital safety equipment, and these must be properly calculated, and engineered accordingly.

[BrendAn]

On 26/11/2024 at 8:21 AM, facthunter said:

Remember the friends and relatives. No one KNOWs exactly what happened for certain.  Nev

its weird, i fly in that area quite a bit but i always go around that farm. it feels disrespectful to fly over it for some reason.