Parts of a skydiving plane that crashed at Fox Glacier nearly
two years ago , killing all nine on board, were buried in a paddock
soon after at the direction of the Transport Accident Investigation
Commission (TAIC).
Aviation expert Barry Payne, who was commissioned to supply an
independent report on the crash, told an inquest in Greymouth today that
he had concluded the two fundamental causes of the crash were an
incorrectly set stabilator trim (tail flap), and the plane being out of
balance due to a load shift with the passengers.
Four overseas tourists and five Skydive NZ staff members died in the fiery crash on September 4, 2010.
Mr Payne was recalled to the stand today and questioned at length by
Garth Galloway, who is appearing on behalf on Skydive NZ’s co-owner John
Kerr.
The other partner in the company, Greymouth man Rod Miller, died in the crash.
Mr Galloway asked Mr Payne whether there were other possible causes,
including a broken control stick, but Mr Payne said he had not
physically examined the stick because TAIC investigators had directed Mr
Kerr to have parts of the wreckage, including the stick, buried in a
paddock at the end of the airstrip a couple of days after the crash.
Mr Payne accepted that photographs of the wreckage showed that the
stick had worked free of the block, but he put that down to the extreme
heat it had been subjected to in the fire when the plane burst into
flames on impact.
The inquest also heard from Skydive NZ tandem master Dean Thomas, that a last-minute decision put Mr Miller on the fatal flight.
Mr Thomas had made five tandem jumps that day and was going to sit
out a sixth while Mr Miller and another tandem master, Greg Rowan, took
up two clients who had turned up unexpectedly at the airstrip.
However, minutes before that jump Mr Miller decided that he would sit
it out and take the next flight instead. Mr Thomas battery-started the
plane prior to the fatal flight but did not observe the take-off.
An unusual motor noise caused him to look skyward.
“It was revving high. I thought ‘far out, he’s putting the pressure on … doing something very different … radical.”
As the pilot struggled to gain control of the machine he could hear
someone saying, “no, no, no …” then the plane crashed out of his sight
behind a hangar.
Mr Thomas said the pilot, Queenstown-based Chaminda Senadhira, 33,
was highly competent and trustworthy and Skydive NZ was very safety
conscious and did not cut corners.
Patrick Byrne, 26, from Ireland, Glenn Bourke, 18, from Australia,
Annita Kirsten, 23, from Germany, and Brad Coker, 24, from England, and
four skydive masters Adam Bennett, 47, Michael Suter, 32, Christopher
McDonald, 62, and Mr Miller, 55, died in the crash, along with Mr
Senadhira.
The inquest continues.
- By Tui Bromley of the Greymouth Star
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