Yak crash at Wanaka

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boff180
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Yak crash at Wanaka

Post by boff180 »

Pilot wasn’t hurt but I have to ask, how the hell did this happen on an active controlled airfield???

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keithjs
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Re: Yak crash at Wanaka

Post by keithjs »

Quite! Unbelievable... :dunno:
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Big Eric
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Re: Yak crash at Wanaka

Post by Big Eric »

Does the pilot have some issues with his eyes, like he can't see big red hard things staring at him in the face? :grin:

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Re: Yak crash at Wanaka

Post by Domvickery »

Why the hell would the airside staff leave something like that on a live airfield thats stupidly crazy.

The pilot would not have been able to see that once the tail wheel is on the floor and he should have complete fairh that the airfield management have left him an area free of any obstacles or debris ie a safe environment for an aircraft.
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Re: Yak crash at Wanaka

Post by Big Eric »

Domvickery wrote:Why the hell would the airside staff leave something like that on a live airfield thats stupidly crazy.

The pilot would not have been able to see that once the tail wheel is on the floor and he should have complete fairh that the airfield management have left him an area free of any obstacles or debris ie a safe environment for an aircraft.


The pilot would have been able to see the obstructions before he touched down, nothing to do with having a tail wheel ! Why not just use the active runway?

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Re: Yak crash at Wanaka

Post by Domvickery »

Big Eric wrote:The pilot would have been able to see the obstructions before he touched down, nothing to do with having a tail wheel ! Why not just use the active runway?


Probably for exactly the same reason many of the warbirds at Duxford dont use the concrete runway.

There could be many reasons as to why it may have fallen out of the pilots field of vision but one thing that cannot be denied is that machine should not have been anywhere near any active parts of an airfield where an aircraft is moving let alone moving at speed
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Brevet Cable
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Re: Yak crash at Wanaka

Post by Brevet Cable »

Pilot error....simply because the cherry pickers ( and whatever the big yellow thing behind them is ) were stationary & would have been visible before the aircraft landed - and you'd have thought that it would have been NOTAMd as an obstacle and/or the pilot would have been advised of their presence ( or are their regulations far more lax than those in the UK? )

The two obvious questions are.....did he land further along than expected, and did he land further to the right than expected?
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Re: Yak crash at Wanaka

Post by Gonzo230 »

It’s alright chaps, I’ve just called the NZ TAIC and told them not to bother, it’s all been investigated here already. :cuppa:

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Brevet Cable
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Re: Yak crash at Wanaka

Post by Brevet Cable »

From the Flypast forum :
Press release: MEDIA ADVISORY FROM WARBIRDS OVER WANAKA: 7:15pm, March 31, 2018

Warbirds Over Wanaka airshow organisers have launched a full investigation into today’s incident involving a WWII fighter aircraft which was damaged while landing after a display.

The pilot of the Yak 3 aircraft was unharmed after the aircraft wing appeared to strike a cherry picker that was on the grass runway as part of another display.

Warbirds Over Wanaka General Manager Ed Taylor says: “Our main concern has been the welfare of the pilot and we have offered him our full support.”

Taylor says there will be no further comment from airshow organisers until that investigation has been completed. CAA officials were in attendance at the airshow and continue to be involved.

The airshow programme was delayed for about one hour while the damaged aircraft was removed from the airfield. The airshow programme then resumed and the event will continue tomorrow.
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Brevet Cable
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Re: Yak crash at Wanaka

Post by Brevet Cable »

Gonzo230 wrote:It’s alright chaps, I’ve just called the NZ TAIC and told them not to bother, it’s all been investigated here already. :cuppa:

Thank you for such a helpful post.
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Re: Yak crash at Wanaka

Post by fideaux »

Brevet Cable wrote:Pilot error....simply because the cherry pickers ( and whatever the big yellow thing behind them is ) were stationary & would have been visible before the aircraft landed - and you'd have thought that it would have been NOTAMd as an obstacle and/or the pilot would have been advised of their presence ( or are their regulations far more lax than those in the UK? )

The two obvious questions are.....did he land further along than expected, and did he land further to the right than expected?



Thanks for this post....

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MicrolightDriver
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Re: Yak crash at Wanaka

Post by MicrolightDriver »

Lots of reasons ( often very much in the plural ) why something like this can happen.

Clearly something's gone wrong.

I wouldn't rush to be too judgemental.

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Re: Yak crash at Wanaka

Post by Brevet Cable »

fideaux wrote:
Brevet Cable wrote:(snip)

Thanks for this post....


Don't mention it, glad to be of service

Oh, and weren't you leaving this forum, never to darken it's doors again, last year? :pinkwafer:
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Re: Yak crash at Wanaka

Post by CJS »

Its Brevet, its ;-)

It's a little difficult to tell to be honest, his/her 11 posts are mostly in some kind of hitherto unknown code :-P

I just hope the cherry picker display gets booked for RIAT. And that it's there on the Saturday when I'm going - be just my bloody luck that it'll be only on the Sunday...
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GertrudetheMerciless
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Re: Yak crash at Wanaka

Post by GertrudetheMerciless »

Big Eric wrote:
Domvickery wrote:Why the hell would the airside staff leave something like that on a live airfield thats stupidly crazy.

The pilot would not have been able to see that once the tail wheel is on the floor and he should have complete fairh that the airfield management have left him an area free of any obstacles or debris ie a safe environment for an aircraft.


The pilot would have been able to see the obstructions before he touched down, nothing to do with having a tail wheel ! Why not just use the active runway?


Ok Eric the Expert. Last time I checked, large piston tailwheel aircraft have quite restricted forward visibility before touchdown too. :smile:

Maybe he used the grass for a reason? Maybe the "thing" wasn't supposed to be there? Maybe he got it wrong? We don't know.

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CJS
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Re: Yak crash at Wanaka

Post by CJS »

No, we don't know. But to be fair to Eric, it's not as if the pilot would have had no forward view at any point. I'm no pilot (hell, I'm not even much of a teacher...) but I think I'd at least have a bit of a glance at where I was going to be landing if I at all could, turning in to land, on the previous pass for example.

I assume he was landing after his display (although I haven't actually watched the video yet), so it's not as if he'd flown direct to the airfield from somewhere else and had no idea what was there.
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Re: Yak crash at Wanaka

Post by Brevet Cable »

GertrudetheMerciless wrote:Maybe the "thing" wasn't supposed to be there? Maybe he got it wrong? We don't know.

As per the quote I posted from the organisers themselves, the cherry pickers were there as part of another display ( posts on Flypast say it was something to do with aircraft having to land between 2 cables, which would explain the length of cable seen whipping around when the collision occurred )

CJS wrote:I just hope the cherry picker display gets booked for RIAT. And that it's there on the Saturday when I'm going - be just my bloody luck that it'll be only on the Sunday...

Will it be as gash as the 'upside-down ribbon-cutting' ( or whatever it is ) they once did, which dragged on for longer than a Thunderbirds display ? :lol:
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Abbo46
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Re: Yak crash at Wanaka [March 2018]

Post by Abbo46 »

Pilot has filed a legal case against the organisers.

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Orion
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Re: Yak crash at Wanaka

Post by Orion »

it's interesting that forum members are assuming that this is pilot error! There are a number of questions like was the runway declared to be active or closed during the show? I'm sure the investigation will bring out the truth.

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Re: Yak crash at Wanaka

Post by Brevet Cable »

Orion wrote:it's interesting that forum members are assuming that this is pilot error!

Because it always is, even when it's not.
More so if the pilot(s) is/are killed, so they can't argue differently.
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Re: Yak crash at Wanaka

Post by CJS »

I'm not sure I get you Brevet? Irony / sarcasm, or do you mean there's always some measure of pilot error?

If the latter, I don't think that's necessarily fair is it? Birdstrike, for example?

I'm guessing it's a reference to our (the royal 'our') keenness to jump to conclusions??
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Re: Yak crash at Wanaka

Post by Brevet Cable »

A prime example is the Chinook ZD576 crash which was declared as being pilot error.
No different to a lot of other aviation incidents.... default mode is 'pilot error', which sometimes continues even when the evidence proves otherwise.

Stuff your aircraft into something due to poor weather conditions? Pilot error.
Run out of fuel? Pilot error (even when it proves to be faulty gauges/fuel system)
Look at how many aircraft types (FW & RW) have suffered a rash of accidents which were classified as pilot error until it was proved to be due to faulty design/manufacture.
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Re: Yak crash at Wanaka

Post by foxfour »

It would certainly be interesting to see a transcript or hear a recording of the tower/pilot comms just prior to the accident. From a legal point of view there would be a hell of a difference between, "clear land runway xx grass" and "land runway xx grass your discretion".

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Re: Yak crash at Wanaka

Post by GertrudetheMerciless »

foxfour wrote:It would certainly be interesting to see a transcript or hear a recording of the tower/pilot comms just prior to the accident. From a legal point of view there would be a hell of a difference between, "clear land runway xx grass" and "land runway xx grass your discretion".


The comms, the briefing, the written/visual note available (or not) the the briefing etc.

All may support his case. Having seen the sorts of incidents at airshows here involving (in the main) full-time, professional aviators, nothing surprises me. It did, but it doesn't these days.

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Re: Yak crash at Wanaka

Post by GeorgeP »

Happy new year to everyone.

I was at this airshow, though didn't witness the impact. One runway, 29/11, is a paved surface and the other (parallel to and north of the paved runway) is grass. I believe that the aircraft landed on the grass area between the two runways and it was in this zone that the cherry picker was parked. The cherry picker appears to have been clear of both runway strips (strip includes runway and the area out to the cones) but may not have been visible to the pilot once he began to flare.

It is obvious that a series of failures occurred on this day; an aircraft was cleared to land on the grass between the runways when that area was clearly unsuitable for operations, possible inadequate pre-flight briefing to the display pilots, incorrect positioning of the cherry picker.... we will not know until the release of the final report. I was relieved that no-one was injured and the only damage was to an in-animate object.
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