[Peetwo]

Update 23/02/17: YMEN VH-ZCR CFIT fatal accident.

From an ABC article today;

"It is still unclear who the registered operator of the plane was on the day of the crash after a delay in the transfer paperwork between Bendigo-based My Jet, and Australian Corporate Jet Centres (ACJC) based at Essendon.
CASA updated its database at 12:01pm yesterday, three hours after the crash, to show ACJC as the registered operator.
"Our involvement in yesterday was less than zero," ACJC chief executive Vas Nikolovski said.
Sources told the ABC the question of registration, however, is unlikely to affect the outcome of the investigation.

In reference to my bolded bit, it's probably not a huge deal, but I am always amused by CAsA's sneakiness. It's just who they are, always trying to correct things or covertly amend things when there is a risk that they be caught out on the back foot. It's the first thin they would have thought; 'make sure we look squeaky clean above all else'.

http://mobile.abc.net.au/news/2017-02-22...ck/8294244

Excellent catch Gobbles and I have it on good authority that the registration issue IS a big deal..

Here is the excellent informative ABC article in full... :

Essendon plane crash aircraft recently underwent maintenance check
Updated Thu Feb 23 06:25:30 EST 2017

Watch
Video 0:49
Aerial footage shows the plane crash site at a shopping centre near Essendon Airport (Courtesy Channel 9)

ABC News
A plane that crashed near Essendon Airport, killing five people, had been through a maintenance check only last month, it has been revealed, as investigators continue to gather evidence at the scene.

Four American tourists and Australian pilot Max Quartermain died after their Beechcraft B200 Super King Air crashed shortly after take-off.

It crashed into the nearby DFO shopping centre, hitting the storage areas of Focus on Furniture and JB Hi Fi, before bursting into flames.

What will crash investigators be looking for?

The ATSB, CASA investigation will probe why the plane lost power and was unable to land safely.

The ABC has been told the plane had only flown five hours since its last maintenance.
The plane was built in 1996 and the ABC understands it had previously been used in Noumea, before being registered in Australia in December 2013.

The ABC has been told at the time of the accident Mr Quartermain was qualified to conduct flights after facing four Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) tests since an incident in September 2015, when his aircraft was involved in a near miss in bad weather at Mt Hotham.

Mr Quartermain was tested twice immediately after the Mount Hotham incident, and twice last year.
[/url]
Video 1:38 Air crash investigators say they will remain at the scene of the fatal plane crash for the next few days

[url=http://mobile.abc.net.au/news/2017-02-22/air-crash-investigators-will-remain-at-crash-scene-for-few-days/8292682]ABC News

It is still unclear who the registered operator of the plane was on the day of the crash after a delay in the transfer paperwork between Bendigo-based My Jet, and Australian Corporate Jet Centres (ACJC) based at Essendon.

CASA updated its database at 12:01pm yesterday, three hours after the crash, to show ACJC as the registered operator.

"Our involvement in yesterday was less than zero," ACJC chief executive Vas Nikolovski said.

Sources told the ABC the question of registration, however, is unlikely to affect the outcome of the investigation.

Mr Quartermain — who has been described as an experienced and trusted pilot — was the co-owner of Corporate and Leisure Aviation, which had hired the plane for a charter flight.


Photo Police will use eyewitness accounts and CCTV footage as part of a brief for the coroner.
Metropolitan Fire Brigade

Preliminary crash report to be completed within 28 days

Four Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) investigators are at the crash site, and are likely to remain there for several days.

ATSB chief commissioner Greg Hood said forensic examinations would then be conducted off-site and a preliminary report into the crash would be completed within 28 days.

"We're very much in the gathering of evidence phase," he said.

Police Superintendent Mick Frewen said police would produce a brief for the coroner including information from eyewitness accounts, CCTV footage, and details posted on social media.

He called on anyone with information to get in contact with authorities.


Photo An Australian flag flies at half-mast at Essendon Airport.

ABC News: Joanna Crothers

"We will be working closely with the ATSB over the course of the investigation," he said.
He said it could take some time for the investigation to be completed.

Essendon Airport, often used to transport freight, was closed today out of respect for the victims and their families.

Only essential emergency services were allowed access and a flag on the grounds was flown at half-mast.

The airport reopened at 6:00am.

A DFO spokeswoman said the shopping centre, and an adjacent homewares centre, would remain closed "until further notice".

The Bulla Road entry ramp inbound onto the Tullamarine Freeway remains closed during investigations.

 
Also the Minister this AM informed us via twitter   :

ATSB has confirmed: cockpit voice recorder from aircraft which crashed at Essendon has been recovered & enroute to Canberra for analysis

However this is yet to be confirmed on the ATSB investigation webpage - HERE - or on any of the ATSB media feeds..

Next from the Oz today:
 

Air agencies spoke on near-miss

12:00am SIMONE FOX KOOB

In 2015, Essendon crash pilot Max Quartermain almost hit another aircraft after having GPS problems at Mount Hotham. P2 - Also HERE

---

Crash airport: expansion on hold

12:00amCHIP Le GRAND

Australia’s pilots accuse airports and successive federal governments of putting commercial gain ahead of safety.

Finally from the SMH with an article that will be examined in greater detail on the re-incarnated Dots & Dashes thread.. :

Pilots untrained to deal with 'feathering' failure that may have caused DFO crash: experts

• Liam Mannix, Matt O'Sullivan and Deborah Gough
  

• 262 reading now
  

Failures in both the engine and 'feathering' system, that pilots are not trained to deal with, may be behind Tuesday's fatal plane crash, experts say.

Investigators remain at Essendon Airport, sifting through pieces of wreckage from Tuesday's light plane crash that killed five, as they try to determine what went so fatally wrong.

But experts say several crucial clues may point to a failure of the feathering system on the Beechcraft King Air.

A remarkably similar fatal crash in 2001, referenced by air crash investigators at a press conference on Wednesday, involved another King Air whose engine failed. Its propeller did not feather, and it drifted to the left before crashing.

The crash scene Photo: Seven News

Tuesday's doomed flight left the runway just before 9am.  It rose 30 metres, called in two urgent maydays, veered gently to the left and crashed only a few hundred metres from its takeoff point.

The leftward drift may indicate a failure of both the engine and the plane's feathering system, said CQUniversity associate professor Geoff Dell. Mr Dell is a former air safety investigator and now teaches accident investigation.

Police said on Tuesday "catastrophic engine failure" may have contributed to the crash. Modern aircraft are designed to still take off safely even if one engine fails – but not if both the engine and feathering system fail at the same time.

The feathering system detects engine failure and automatically streamlines the blade position for minimal drag, allowing the plane to continue to fly with one engine.

If the feathering system fails, "then you're in really deep poo", Mr Dell said.

"If it does not feather it's creating a huge amount of drag. In that circumstance, it's difficult, almost impossible to fly. The aeroplane will turn toward the dead engine, the one that's generating the drag. So you get this big turn toward the left."

Pilots do not train for such a scenario because failures of both engine and feathering are considered so unlikely, Mr Dell said.

But a poorly maintained engine might lead to one system failing and damaging the other, he said. "Then the odds are less long that you're going to come to grief."

Aviation consultant and managing director at Aerospace Developments Peter Marosszéky said if he was the Australian Transport Safety Bureau he "would certainly be looking" at a feathering failure.

"It's a very unusual event for this type of engine and this type of airplane. These systems are very well proven and reliable. Something does not smell right.

"I suspect very strongly that, if in fact there was an auto-feathering feature, it did not happen."

At a press conference on Wednesday the man in charge of the investigation, ATSB chief commissioner Greg Hood, was giving very little away.

But when asked about other accidents involving the King Air, the airframe involved in yesterday's disaster, Mr Hood said "Toowoomba comes to mind".

In that incident, in 2001 in Toowoomba, a Beech King Air C90 suffered left-engine failure on takeoff. It veered gently left, lost altitude and crashed about 560 metres beyond the end of the runway, killing all on board.

An ATSB investigation of that incident revealed the aircraft's left propeller did not feather, creating significant drag that may have contributed to the crash.



Australian Licensed Aircraft Engineers Association president Paul Cousins suspects the Beechcraft suffered an "uncontained engine failure", which likely led to debris hitting other vital parts of the plane.

"The aircraft should have had enough power to get out on one engine," he said.

"It would lead us to see this as an uncontained failure, and that there was serious damage to flight control surfaces, and that [the pilot] was unable to recover."

MTF...P2