Air Moorea Flight 1121
| Air Moorea Flight 1121 | |
|---|---|
_on_final_approach_into_Papeete.jpg) The crashed DHC-6-300 Twin Otter |
|
| Accident summary | |
| Accident type | Loss of control |
| place | 1.5 km southeast of Moorea Airfield |
| date | August 9, 2007 |
| Fatalities | 20th |
| Survivors | 0 |
| Aircraft | |
| Aircraft type | de Havilland Canada DHC-6-300 |
| operator | Air Moorea |
| Mark | F-OIQI |
| Departure airport | Moorea Airfield |
| Destination airport | Tahiti airport |
| Passengers | 19th |
| crew | 1 |
| Lists of aviation accidents | |
On August 9, 2007, a de Havilland Canada DHC-6-300 Twin Otter crashed into the sea in French Polynesia on Air Moorea Flight 1121 shortly after taking off from Moorea Airfield . All 20 occupants were killed in the accident.
Airplane and occupants
Air Moorea's DHC-6 Twin Otter was 28 years old. There were 19 passengers on board. The only crew member was the 53-year-old pilot Michel Santeurenne.
the accident
The plane took off shortly before 12:00 local time from the island of Moorea for the flight to Papeete . When the Twin Otter an altitude of about 120 meters (400 feet) was reached, the pilot pulled the lift devices (flaps) completely. Then the machine went into a steep dive and hit the sea. All 20 occupants were killed in the crash. It is the second worst airplane crash in French Polynesia , after Pan-Am Flight 816 .
Cause of accident
Immediately after pulling in the buoyancy aids, one of the two steel cables used to control the elevators broke . As a result, both elevators suddenly fell down, so that the machine fell into a dive. Due to the low altitude and the unexpected occurrence of problems, the pilot was not able to catch the aircraft in time by adjusting the trim towards the rear .
Due to the large number of take-offs and landings on the short stretch between the islands of Moorea and Tahiti , the steel cables of the elevators were heavily stressed. In contrast to the other twin otters in the company, the crashed machine did not have wire ropes made of carbon steel, but of stainless steel . Stainless steel is more resistant to corrosion , but it wears out faster. This was not taken into account when determining the maintenance intervals.
The investigators found that individual strands or wires of the steel cable had already broken at an earlier point in time because the cable chafed on the guide aids and thus increasingly roughened. At the time of the crash, half of the strands were broken. This reduced the stability of the entire steel cable. It tore completely when the pilot pulled in the buoyancy aids after take-off from Moorea and the pressure on the control surfaces increased.
According to the investigators, the rowing ropes were also loaded outside of flight operations, which accelerated their wear and tear . Due to renovation work at Tahiti Airport , the Air Moorea machines had to be parked between their missions in an area that was not surrounded by a windbreak fence. The jet engine of the incoming and outgoing traffic caused uncontrolled rudder deflections in the parked machines, which were transferred to the steel cables and increased their wear and tear.
process
The criminal case began in autumn 2018, with six employees of the company, the company itself and the head of the civil aviation authority being charged. In the first instance, all of the defendants except the head of the civil aviation authority were sentenced to terms of between two and three years.
In the media
In the series Mayday - Alarm in the cockpit , the crash was dealt with in the episode “Terror in Paradise”.
See also
swell
- Accident report on Aviation Safety
- BEA investigation report (English, 27 MB)
Individual evidence
- ^ Air Moorea crash goes to court , rnz.co.nz, October 9, 2018
- ↑ Crash d'Air Moorea: des peines allant jusqu'à 3 ans de prison , la1ere, January 22, 2019
Coordinates: 17 ° 30 ′ 6 ″ S , 149 ° 44 ′ 46 ″ W.