2009 Accident review - Air Show South Africa

possible cause of the crash.The Russian Knights cancelled their performanceat MAKS 2009 although the openingof the MAKS exhibition, continued as scheduled.n AUGUST 22: Zivco Edge 540 (Silverstone,UK)Vicki Cruse, a 40-year old world-class aerobaticchampion and former member of the USNational Aerobatic Team, died in an aircraft accidentduring the 2009 World Aerobatic Championshipsin the United Kingdom. Using aborrowed Zivco Edge 540, an aircraft mechanicalmalfunction apparently occurred during aqualifying flight at Britain’s Silverstone motorracing circuit. She lost control of the aircraftand was too low to bail out.Cruse had previously also competed in theSport Class at the Reno Air Races and was thePresident of the International Aerobatics Club,a member of the Ventura County Ninety-Nines,a branch of the International Organisation ofWomen Pilots and had won the US UnlimitedAerobatics title in 2007.She had also competed in Spain as a memberof the American National Aerobatic Team.EXCELLENCE IN ADVANCED TRAINING43 Advanced Training providesprivate and commercial pilotswith state-of-the-art training.Modular courses allow flexibilityto suit our clients operationalrequirements.Top: After been hit by the wingman, significantdamage was caused to the forward section of theleader’s aircraft. (Dmitry Karpov Pompeya 2009).Above: Mortally wounded and with the pilotejected, the Su-27 Flanker plunges towards theground after colliding with the lead aircraft.(English Russia).n AUGUST 30: Sukhoi SU-27UBM Flanker(Radom, Poland)It is not an understatement to say that thebiennial Radom Air Show, recognised as one ofEurope’s leading air shows, has had its fairshare of air show accidents over the last twoyears. The previous event event, in 2007, wasmarred by a fatal mid-air collision involvingtwo Zlin Z-526 aircraft from the Zelazny AerobaticTeam.In the 2009 event, Belarus, their first everappearance at a Western European air show,provided a Sukhoi Su-27UBM, as well as aSukhoi Su-24 and Ilyushin Il-76.At one point in the routine, as the aircraftclimbed, the pilot half-rolled right to the invertedand then into a split “S”, then rolling leftto a level attitude but he had bled off excessiveenergy before the roll and simply “fell” into thedownward phase, which probably “rattled” thepilot; he ended up with too much workload,poor situational awareness, disorientationcombined with task saturation, as a chain reactionof flying the aircraft to the point wherehe simply had insufficient height and power toclimb out and arrest the descent. The aircraftimpacted the ground in a forest.The crash occurred out of sight from the airshow’s crowds, with a thick plume of blacksmoke seen rising from behind trees on theother side of the airfield. The aircraft, one ofonly four Belarusian Air Force SU-27UBs, killedboth pilots, Col. Alexander Morfintsky deputycommander of an air force unit in western Belarusand Col. Alexander Zhuravlevich, deputycommander of a fighter base. There were noadditional casualties, but the air show flightdisplays were immediately cancelled.There was no ejection and thankfully, therewas no collateral damage despite the fact thatthe aircraft crashed only 100 metres fromhouses; a tragedy was most certainly averted.Leaks from inside the Ministry of Defencesaid that low flight hours of the pilots and inexperiencein air show protocols were the primarycontributing factors.n SEPTEMBER 6: CAP-10B (Montichiari, Italy)Pulling out from the vertical at the Brixia AirShow to celebrate the centenary of the first internationalair show in Brescia in 1909, thepilot entered a positioning turn to the leftwhile the aircraft trajectory was still on thedown line and the aircraft had not recoveredfrom the pull-out.With the lift vector tilted, the vertical contributionto the dive recovery was reducedwhich meant that the aircraft, a CAP-10B, wasunable to avoid impacting the ground. Of thetwo pilots, Marzio Maccarana, 26, was killedWORLD AIRNEWS, FEBRUARY 2010. 55Providing Airline Standard Trainingfor General Aviation.Instructors with extensive experiencein the fields that they train.ADVANCED TRAININGLanseria International AirportJohannesburgSimulator based Type Rating and TurbineConversions,Proficiency / Recurrency, MCC,CRM,Dangerous Goods, etcPostnet Suite 86,Private Bag X4, Lanseria 1748Tel: + 27 11 267 5200Fax: + 27 11 267 5209E-mail: info@43at.co.zawww.43at.co.zaPart of National Airways Corporation (NAC)The force you can trustAn Imperial Company