R22 crash Bankstown 3 October.

[flying dog]

Sorry, few details from me.

 

But heard on the news today.

 

Instructor "Brown bread", student injured.

[BurnieM]

News reports saying it clipped power lines - VH-RDL ?

 

https://asn.flightsafety.org/wikibase/548620

 

https://www.9news.com.au/national/fatal-bankstown-helicopter-crash/60c38199-60b6-4c8b-b4a0-1241a622d8b9

 

Edited October 3, 2025 by BurnieM

[KRviator]

There's Dashcam footage of it with the news claiming they hit wires - no way in hell did it hit powerlines causing the crash. Maybe before impact, yes, but not a causal factor. They were already in what looked like a power-off descent, they didn't hit powerlines and then crash.

[red750]

https://7news.com.au/news/man-dead-and-teen-fighting-for-life-as-helicopter-crashes-onto-car-near-bankstown-in-sydney-c-20225294

[onetrack]

The crash looks very much to me, like an engine failure followed by an auto-rotation that wasn't fast enough to arrest the rapid descent. The chopper experts claim you have about 1 to 2 seconds after engine failure to initiate an auto rotation in a Robinson R22. Failure to very rapidly adjust to auto-rotation means a loss of rotor RPM, which leads to an extremely rapid descent.

 

The Robbies have a very light rotor assembly, which is low-inertia, and losing that small amount of rotor inertia, by a delayed move to auto-rotation, means a high speed crash, instead of a controlled, slow-descent, hard landing.

It's saddening to hear the instructor was killed, and I trust the young chopper trainee pulls through, but it sounds like his injuries are critical.