Aircraft accident at the Berlin Olympic Stadium
| Aircraft accident at the Berlin Olympic Stadium | |
|---|---|
 Aerial view of the accident site |
|
| Accident summary | |
| Accident type | Collision on the ground |
| place |
Maifeld , Olympiastadion , Berlin , Germany
|
| date | March 21, 2013 |
| Fatalities | 1 |
| Injured | 9 |
| Injured on the ground | 2 |
| 1. Aircraft | |
| Aircraft type | EC 155 B |
| operator | Federal Police |
| Mark | D-HLTM |
| Departure airport | Federal police station Blumberg |
| Passengers | 8th |
| crew | 2 |
| Survivors | 9 |
| 2. Aircraft | |
| Aircraft type | AS 332 L1 Super Puma |
| operator | Federal Police |
| Mark | D-HEGB |
| Departure airport | Federal police station Blumberg |
| Passengers | 13 |
| crew | 2 |
| Survivors | 15th |
| Lists of aviation accidents | |
There was an aircraft accident at the Berlin Olympic Stadium on March 21, 2013, when a helicopter of the Federal Police collided with another during a major exercise .
procedure
As part of an anti- hooligan - Full exercise of the federal police on March 21, 2013 at Station Berlin Olympic Stadium three helicopters of the Authority should front of the stadium on the Maifeld land to gain for the used at the station police officers withdrawn. These were two AS 332 L1 Super Puma and one EC 155 B . The three police helicopters started at around 10:12 a.m. at the location of the Blumberg Federal Police Fliegerstaffel . When they arrived at the Olympiastadion in Berlin, the helicopters flew two full circles due to a delay, as they were waiting for high-ranking police representatives. Eventually, the planes increased the distance between them to begin landing. The first helicopter, an EC 155 B, landed at around 10:28 a.m. on the snow-covered May field in the landing zone on the eastern edge of the May field, which was marked by three police transport buses and safety vests. The inmates there were not only the police but also a journalist. During the landing process, the rotor downdraft whirled up a roller which the pilot of the EC 155 B reported to the operators of the other helicopters. A Super Puma then began the landing approach to the right of the EC 155 B, seen in the flight direction (before take-off, it was agreed to land on the left here, due to the snow flurry, this was not done for a short time) and whirled up additional fresh snow, so that it, like the EC 155 B, disappeared in a snow cloud. The Super Puma hovered close to the ground for about 30 seconds without touching down, continuously throwing up fine snow. The third helicopter, also a Super Puma, was approaching to the left of the EC 155 B that landed first, as seen in the direction of flight. Here, too, snow was thrown up again. Now the instructing police officers and the helicopters that had already landed had disappeared in the snowstorm . The third helicopter then hit the ground on one side with the right main landing gear and rolled around its longitudinal axis to the right, where it also disappeared into the snow cloud. There it fell on its side and its rotors interlocked with those of the EC 155 B. The rear of the Super Puma was cut off. Helicopter parts flew through the air, hitting bystanders and the crew of the helicopters. An instructing police officer was blown backwards by the rotor downdraft of the helicopter rolling to the right. A total of nine people were injured, four of them seriously. Wreckage flying around killed the 40-year-old pilot of the EC 155 B; two occupants of his machine were seriously injured. The other two seriously injured were bystanders. The flight technician of the EC 155 B, the pilot of the Super Puma that landed last, and three bystanders were among the slightly injured. The two crashed machines were both badly damaged, as was one of the police vehicles used to mark the landing. The Super Puma that landed first only had slight scratches on the rotors.
helicopter
The EC 155 B is a twin-engine multi-purpose helicopter designed for up to 15 occupants and manufactured by Eurocopter . The helicopter type was approved in 2000. The helicopter that crashed was built in 2001 and had the serial number 6601 and the D-HLTM registration number. An Airworthiness Review Certificate (ARC) was last issued on September 24, 2012. The total operating time at the time of the accident was around 2099 hours.
The second crashed machine was an AS 332 L1, nicknamed "Super Puma". The aircraft, also manufactured by Eurocopter, is a multi-purpose helicopter designed for up to 27 occupants. The helicopter type was approved in 1985. The Super Puma involved in the accident was built in 1988 and had the serial number 2265 and the aircraft registration D-HEGB. The vehicle last received an airworthiness review certificate on February 1, 2013. At the time of the accident, the helicopter had a total operating time of around 3469 hours.
All helicopters involved were equipped with radar altimeters .
Investigations
The Federal Bureau of Aircraft Accident Investigation and the public prosecutor's office started investigations into the cause of the accident, and a murder commission was routinely set up at the Berlin State Criminal Police Office , which, however, stopped working after the victim's autopsy results were announced. The then Federal Minister of the Interior, Hans-Peter Friedrich , announced that the accident would be cleared up quickly. The helicopter wrecks were transported to a police site in Ruhleben on the night of March 22nd . Furthermore, the autopsy of the victim came to the conclusion that he had been killed by external influences, apparently caused by the collision. The Federal Bureau of Aircraft Accident Investigations (BFU) published an interim report on the course of the accident in its March 2013 bulletin at the end of May 2013. There she found, among other things, that all the pilots, flight technicians and aircraft involved had the necessary permits. The BFU endeavored to submit a final report no later than twelve months after the accident, i.e. in March 2014; this finally happened with the publication of the investigation report of September 23, 2014 on October 8, 2014.
Assumptions about the cause of the accident
The Vereinigung Cockpit suspected cause of the accident at the landing caused by snow swirling on the following day of the accident through which the pilot had lost orientation (see also Whiteout ). However, a technical defect cannot be ruled out, according to a spokesman for the Berlin fire brigade on March 21, 2013.
Identified cause of the accident
The investigation report from October 2014 reconstructed the accident and came to the conclusion that the helicopter landing process took place under whiteout conditions. These are directly attributable to inadequate communication between the helicopter crew and the selected approach procedure, which led to the throwing up of snow clouds and to the fact that the pilot lost the reference to the instructing officer on the ground. Furthermore, "a crusty blanket of snow under the powdery fresh snow" also led to a loss of reference, here on the ground. After the loss of reference occurred, the landing maneuver was not canceled immediately. Furthermore, the distances between the police buses marking the landing zone and the instructing officers were set too narrow. In its investigation report, the BFU identified systemic, i.e. generally present, causes as “missing and sometimes counterproductive instructions regarding crew communication”, “inadequately described procedures and crew training for snow landings” and “non-binding requirements for minimum distances between helicopters on the ground”.
Security Recommendations
The BFU concluded its investigation report from October 2014 with the section “Safety recommendations”. In it, she listed the measures taken by the Federal Police in retrospect in order to react better to such circumstances in the future (see section Reactions) and above all affirmed older recommendations from January 2006 and February 2011. It is recommended that the Federal Ministry of Transport “to Ensuring a high level of flight safety in consultation with the federal and state authorities responsible for the police forces. Creates aviation law regulations for the operation of police helicopter squadrons "," which meet the special requirements of police operations and guarantee a level of security that is appropriate for the commercial use of civil helicopters is comparable [...]. "In addition, the Federal Ministry should" create an independent control body for all police helicopter squadrons of the federal and state governments that regularly checks the quality, safety and standardization of flight operations. "
Criticism of the exercise
After the accident, critical voices emerged, including from the factions of Bündnis 90 / Die Grünen and the Left in the Berlin House of Representatives , who question the sense of using helicopters in view of the poor visibility that prevailed on the day of the accident and the scenario that was called "unrealistic" . Employees of the Federal Police and the representatives of the SPD and CDU, however, spoke of the fact that such exercises are particularly useful in bad weather conditions, since operations would also have to be carried out in such weather.
Reactions
In addition to the Federal Minister of the Interior Friedrich, the Governing Mayor of Berlin Klaus Wowereit and the Berlin Senator for the Interior Frank Henkel expressed their condolences to the victims and their families; the latter when he visited the scene of the accident on March 21st. Chancellor Angela Merkel also expressed her deep sympathy through her press spokesman Steffen Seibert .
Wolfgang Bosbach , the chairman of the interior committee in the Bundestag , said that his body would also deal with the helicopter crash in the course of a debate on the restructuring of the federal police. The opposition parties in the Berlin House of Representatives announced that the parliamentary interior committee of their house would also deal with the crash.
A few months after the accident, the Federal Police themselves determined how to proceed with take-offs and landings on whirling ground. The minimum distance to be maintained between landing helicopters was set at 70 meters. In addition, a flight simulator exercise program for whiteout and brownout conditions is available in response to the accident . A computer presentation "winter flight briefing" for helicopter crews, to be presented again every year , was worked out. This deals with the dangers and peculiarities of flight operations in winter conditions and presents procedures and specifications. So-called safety cards were prepared for the various helicopter types, which inform the occupants about the danger areas around the helicopter, its emergency equipment and the correct use of seat belts.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r Axel Rokohl (investigator) , Uwe Berndt, Thomas Karge (other investigators on site) , Hans-Werner Hempelmann, Dieter Ritschel (other contributors) : Investigation report . (PDF) Ref. 3X010-13. In: bfu-web.de. Federal Bureau of Aircraft Accident Investigation, September 23, 2014, accessed on October 9, 2014 .
- ↑ Helicopter crash on the Berlin Maifeld. Picture gallery. Berliner Zeitung , archived from the original on March 31, 2013 ; Retrieved March 22, 2013 .
- ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k l Bulletin "Accidents and disruptions in the operation of civil aircraft - March 2013". (PDF) Federal Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau , May 30, 2013, accessed on June 2, 2013 .
- ↑ Helicopter wrecks removed. Picture gallery. Berliner Zeitung , archived from the original on March 31, 2013 ; Retrieved March 22, 2013 .
- ↑ a b Der Tagesspiegel: Collision in a snow vortex , accessed on March 21, 2013
- ↑ a b Hans Schnedelbach: Months of searching for the cause begins. In: Berliner Zeitung . March 22, 2013, archived from the original on March 31, 2013 ; Retrieved March 22, 2013 .
- ↑ a b c Jörn Hasselmann, Kerstin Hense, Rainer During: After the helicopter accident, the Greens and the Left: Exercise should have been canceled. In: Der Tagesspiegel . Archived from the original on March 31, 2013 ; Retrieved March 22, 2013 .
- ↑ Bulletin March 2013 - Interim Report Helicopter Accident Berlin. (No longer available online.) Federal Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau , March 2013, archived from the original on March 8, 2014 ; accessed on March 8, 2014 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ a b c Helicopter accident in Berlin: Death in the snow. In: Spiegel Online . March 21, 2013, archived from the original on March 31, 2013 ; Retrieved March 22, 2013 .
- ↑ Stuttgarter Zeitung: Police helicopters collide in the snowstorm - pilot dead ( page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , accessed March 22, 2013
- ↑ Merkel upset by the helicopter accident in Berlin. In: The world . March 22, 2013, archived from the original on March 31, 2013 ; Retrieved March 22, 2013 .
- ↑ The last moments in the helicopter cockpit. In: BZ March 22, 2013, archived from the original on March 31, 2013 ; Retrieved March 22, 2013 .
- ^ Hans H. Nibbrig: Helicopter crash becomes an issue in the Berlin parliament. In: Berliner Morgenpost Online. March 24, 2013, archived from the original on March 31, 2013 ; accessed on March 26, 2013 (the graphic on the course of the accident appeared in the print edition of March 22, 2013).
