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BRS deployment from unrecoverable spin


Ed Cesnalis

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Posted

Anybody know additional details about the incident?  It looks like a conventional spin that devolves into a flat spin, but it's hard to tell since it's in IMC, which is also interesting -- did he start out there or simply spin down into it?

Posted

He looks like he stayed cool.  Went towards the handle a couple of times but seemed to try to get the best attitude before pulling?  Pretty scary to see him working to arrest the spin to no avail.

Posted
1 hour ago, Runtoeat said:

Pretty scary to see him working to arrest the spin to no avail.

Looks like the spin was too flat and the elevator was useless when trying to break the stall.   I don't think our CTs are prone to behave like that. Is there someone with 1st hand experience with fully developed spins that can comment?

 

Posted

I think it's a Bristell.  The center stack looks like a Bristell, and when the 'chute deploys, you can see the tethered hatch flopping around the cowl.  (Sportcruiser's hatch just blows out and is not tethered.)

The pilot looks like he might have been a test pilot.  In another forum, I noticed that he had his right leg extended (right rudder) but the aircraft didn't respond to the rudder and aileron input.  I wonder why?  But the pilot almost waited too long to deploy.  The 'chute's cords (belts?) had tension on them just seconds before touch down.  Pretty scary...

Posted

If this would have been me, you'd see me getting out of the plane and kissing the ground!  :bow_down_before_you-960:    Oh yeah, and I wouldn't have my back to the camera. :embarrassed-1030:

Posted

From Reddit...

I have a bit of inside knowledge on this one. I know the pilot involved (he is a New Zealander) and first saw this footage on his cellphone after he took the SD card out of the GoPro and plugged it in. The incident was in China and the aircraft is a Chinese built Sportscruiser LSA. He was doing the test flying for the factory over there. He told me that he had spun this aircraft many times before and had no issues, but this time it just wouldn’t recover no matter what he did. He also said he held off deploying the BRS because he wanted to make sure he wasn’t going to land in a nearby swamp. Yes, he got a sore head from the canopy, but that was all the injuries he received. The damage to the aircraft was minor and it was flying again later that week. He is a highly experienced aviator having been an airline pilot, owned his own flying school where he was chief instructor, and been the test pilot for numerous homebuilts and new designs including the “Kahu” gyrocopter and “Furio” fixed wing kit aircraft. (Both NZ designs). He has been an airshow pilot for many years, displaying those Kiwi designed machines as well as doing an act as “Darkhorse 16” in a Hughes 500 chopper. He also does the “stolen aircraft” schtick in a Cessna 152 Aerobat. If he says the aircraft wouldn’t recover, then I would believe him over any armchair experts watching the video of a video on Reddit. I’m not sure how this video got made public but it has, so I thought I’d better put my 2 cents in before the knocking machine gets too much momentum.

Posted

The Sportscruiser and Bristell and a couple of others appear to come from the same family so they look pretty much the same to me. Here in AUS we lost an instructor and a student flying a Bristell during a pre licence check ride when they spun in and did not pull the handle only a month or so back. I have flown a Bristell and was impressed but did not try any stalls etc.

Posted
35 minutes ago, ct9000 said:

The Sportscruiser and Bristell and a couple of others appear to come from the same family so they look pretty much the same to me. Here in AUS we lost an instructor and a student flying a Bristell during a pre licence check ride when they spun in and did not pull the handle only a month or so back. I have flown a Bristell and was impressed but did not try any stalls etc.

Are you absolutely sure the Bristell your are referring to had a parachute?

Posted
13 minutes ago, WmInce said:

Are you absolutely sure the Bristell your are referring to had a parachute?

better not to go into details I believe the matter may be subject to coroner inquirey

Posted

Turns out that a forum poster in another forum also identified this aircraft as the Chinese made variant of the Bristell and SportCruiser called the Triton Skytrek.  It appears that the same pilot is the PIC for this video.  But the dash layout is identical at around 1:32 mark of the video.

 

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