Four Corners 3/9/12 Pel-Air jet crash

[Hvr]

In 2009, a Pel-Air jet took off from Apia airport in Samoa - destination was Norfolk Island, and then on to Melbourne. But the aircraft never made it to its destination. Instead, the pilot ditched the plane at sea. What really happened?

Crash Landing - Four Corners


Looks like an interesting programme tonight at 2030 hours local time and repeated several times.

Noting it was a medical evacuation it might even be of interest to the medicos here as well.

 

[Bundy Bear]

Thanks for starting the thread, seems like a bad string of events happened.

If you missed it can you watch a repeat on abc.net.au on the Iview section.

 

[munitalP]

interesting program, but I felt that they didn't have enough to make a 1 hour programme without bringing unnecessary personal details into it. I feel for the staff and the medivac - I just would have preferred to have seen more ATSB and CASA and less "other stuff". I still don't completely understand why he ditched with fuel in the tanks...

 

[fjc]

At the end of the 4-Corners report, they showed an image of a Pel-Air sign, showing that it was part of the Rex group. Googled it, and came up with the following
Pel-Air - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[markis10]

Yes, they are part of Rex and ironically Pel Air is being attributed for their record profit.

 

[markis10]

I still don't completely understand why he ditched with fuel in the tanks...

Better to have controlled impact with water than controlled impact with terrain, clearly they were low on fuel to the point where they could not have another go and be confident at landing with the engines under power, had fuel run out on that approach their only option may have been landing on an unknown surface in the dark.

 

[simongr]

Shame the wreck is a bit too deep for a regular dive (non-technical) to dive - would be interesting to see such a new crashed aircraft.