Circumstances:

The 900 metre strip had recently been rolled, however some longitudinal ruts were still present. Following touchdown, the pilot applied relatively heavy braking. When the aircraft had almost stopped, the nosewheel entered a soft patch in the strip surface, turned sideways and the nose gear collapsed.

The pilot reported that the flight was commenced with full fuel tanks. An endurance of over 210 minutes was anticipated with the planned fuel flow. The engine failed after three hours and the aircraft sustained damage to the nose gear and right wing during the ensuing forced landing. The pilot advised that when he subsequently dipped the fuel tanks there was no fuel remaining. The pilot had not leaned the mixture correctly, and the consequent fuel flow was greater than he had expected. On previous occasions he had operated the aircraft for shorter flight periods and had not calculated the actual fuel usage rate.

Circumstances:

The pilot reported that he had flown into the landing area earlier in the day and had noted the position of a power line. On the accident flight, he approached to land from a different direction and encountered another wire which he had not been aware of. He lost control of the helicopter when a main rotor blade contacted the wire.

Circumstances:

The pilot reported that after take-off he climbed the aircraft to approximately 500 feet where he levelled out. When he commenced a right turn, he heard a loud "snap" after which the aircraft would not respond to aileron control. The aircraft continued the turn out of control until impact with trees and the ground. The wreckage was examined by a licenced aircraft maintenance engineer who found that the damage to the controls was consistent with impact damage. No evidence of pre-impact damage was found.

Circumstances:

The pilot selected the landing gear up; following the take-off from Home Valley strip, and it failed to retract. After checking that the circuit breaker was set, the pilot selected the gear up and down several times, but it still remained down. The green light which normally indicates that the landing gear is down and locked, was not illuminated. The aircraft was flown to Kununurra and a normal circuit and landing carried out. During the landing roll the right hand gear leg folded up and the aircraft skidded off the runway. Information provided indicates that the aircraft's right hand landing gear had struck a tree, and was damaged, during a forced landing approach at Home Valley. The landing gear was not checked fully before the aircraft departed for Kununurra. The landing gear malfunction encountered by the pilot resulted from by damage to the down lock hook on the right hand landing gear which allowed the hook to jam the gear in a partly retracted position.

Before landing the pilot reported that brake pressure was available on both brakes. He stated that the aircraft touched down 400 metres after the threshold of the 1000 metre strip and when the brakes were applied no pedal pressure could be obtained. The aircraft overran the strip and collided with a ditch. A small hole had developed in the left brake line due to chaffing action against loosely clamped mounting bracket. No defect could be found with the right hand brake system. By the time the pilot realised that a problem existed with the braking system, he considered that there was insufficient strip remaining to carry out a go around.

The aircraft touched down about 160 metres past the threshold of the 650 metre strip and bounced. The pilot applied power to go around and progressively raised the flap, but the aircraft then began to sink and he was unable to prevent the left wing striking the ground. The aircraft cartwheeled and rapidly came to a halt. During the bounce the aircraft had drifted towards a tree on the right side of the strip. The pilot had commenced the left turn to avoid the tree and had not straightened the flight path for the go around. Flap retraction had been too rapid, considering the speed and attitude during the turn and the aircraft was probably in a stalled condition when contact with the ground occurred.

Following a period of dual instruction, the student was authorised to conduct a series of solo circuits and landings. On the first approach he lowered 30 degrees of flap and the aircraft touched down normally. After travelling about 50 metres, the aircraft veered sharply to the left, ran off the side of the strip, and came to rest in a shallow ditch just outside the boundary of the strip. The approach and landing had been conducted in light crosswind conditions. While compensating for these conditions, the pilot had probably inadvertently applied excessive forward pressure to the control column and a "wheel-barrow" situation developed. The elevator trim was found to be in the take-off position, which would have compounded the nose-down tendency during the landing roll.

During the take-off run the left wheel locked. The aircraft groundlooped to the left, the right gear leg collapsed and the nose section and right wing struck the ground. During prior maintenance of the left wheel hub the inboard bearing had not been correctly reinstalled and it subsequently collapsed into the centre of the wheel assembly during the take-off run.

Circumstances:

The pilot reported that he had been to Calowie Yard on a number of previous occasions and this time he carried out a circuit and an approach into the sun. As the pilot rotated the aircraft for landing it collided with a fence. The landing was completed without further incident. The pilot had mistaken a graded fence line for the airstrip and the glare from the sun had prevented him from sighting the fence prior to the collision.