aerobat
Joined: 07 Nov 2008
Posts: 21
Location: UK
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 Posted: Sun Mar 08, 2009 11:37 pm Post subject: European news / more groundings |
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From the Zenair Europe website.
http://www.zenairulm.com/News/index_files/Page972.htm
Update of February 26, 2009
Another blow?
Just a week ago, we discovered that at the beginning of February, the Dutch Minister of Transport sent a three-page letter to various Civil Aviation Authorities around the world regarding the CH 601 XL situation in the Netherland. In this letter, one reads a point-by-point summary of the original preliminary report findings that were issued by the Dutch Safety Board in October 2008. Readers of these updates by Zenair Europe will remember how we painstakingly pointed out that many of these early “findings” are in fact inaccurate and/or misleading; nevertheless, four months after the original report, this new letter repeats every original point with no attempts to amend or rectify. Most damaging, the letter then encourages recipients to use the supplied information to “assist you in making your own safety assessment regarding the airworthiness of this aircraft type”.
With such a letter on your desk, put yourself in the shoes of an administrator in charge of civil aviation safety. Within a very short amount of time, Poland had grounded its CH 601 XL fleet; Pakistan followed shortly thereafter - Yes, the Dutch message was received well beyond Europe’s borders… This week we heard that Germany (again) and even France were considering flight limitations in response to this letter.
Trying to mitigate the fallout, Zenair issued its own letter to European authorities: We again pointed out that the aircraft has been approved as a certified ultralight by German regulators for may years and that the CH 601 XL has been demonstrated to meet North American ASTM standards as a much heavier Light Sport Aircraft (LSA) since 2005. In addition, Zenair has committed to conducting a new series of tests which, by the end of March, would include a full Ground Vibration Flutter Analysis as well as a total-airframe Combined Load Test (for simultaneous bending and twisting). We have yet to see if the various authorities involved accept these efforts as sufficient action to put off any decisions, or if they buckle under the political pressure to impose additional restrictive measures on owners and pilots of the CH 601 XL.
We have already been assured by the DAeC that when the test results are in (“and all parameters are met”), all limitations currently in place on Germany’s conditional flight authority for the CH 601 XL will be promptly lifted. Even if an additional grounding occurs, it should therefore not last very long. Considering the state of affairs in the Netherlands, this is perhaps not such a bleak outlook…
News about the Dutch situation:
In the past month, Zenair has heard of no new official findings regarding the accident investigation going on in the Netherlands. We were told a letter had been prepared for us, but that it was being held up in “legal review”. Then, we were informed not to expect new developments anytime soon since all Safety Board personnel and resources are now being dedicated to the recent Turkish Airlines accident which occurred near Amsterdam on February 25th.
One relevant piece of news received is that members of the newly founded CH 601 XL Owner’s Group in the Netherlands have located a previously unknown witness to the September 24 accident. This witness is apparently quite formal about what she saw: Namely, that the aircraft at some point pitched down abruptly and then flew straight into the waters below - fully intact. A copy of her signed handwritten statement was submitted to investigators by members of the Owner’s Group. They say her statement is very clear: she saw no evidence of structural failure of any kind (i.e. “folded wing”) prior to the impact.
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