Postby Fairy Flycatcher » Sun Aug 28, 2005 8:47 am
I want to share my experience of Friday afternoon, the afternoon of the Microlight accident at Umhlali with you, as it was part of the reason that this accident is attributed to CAT. And I hope that there are some lessons in this story for all of you.
The afternoon looked good and met said no probs expected. Front only due at about eight.
I flew in the afternoon as well. I took off at 15:00 with someone, and we
did abut 20-25min along the coast. It was lovely, but very bumpy coming back. Once I descended below 300' it was perfect!
So I decided to go again. I took off at about 15:45, expecting the weather to be even better. Hazy day, light wind, late afternoon. This time the upper turbulence was quite a lot worse, but I didn't think that there was much to it. I decided to climb a bit more, but the turbulence got worse. I also noticed that above 1000' my crab angle was severe, so I pointed the nose into wind, and actually flew backwards! Below 1000' it was fine though, and I decided to continue to the "smooth air on the coast".
From the surface of the water I could see that the wind on the coast was
light on-shore, but it was getting increasingly turbulent as I headed North. I reasoned that it must be the start of some catabatic winds near the dunes, as it was already in shade from the setting sun. Passing Westbrook beach, it became close to uncontrollable, and I started to get a lot of negative loading, and wing-ups. I climbed, and it got worse. I descended again and at 200' I barely managed to control my direction. At first I wanted to return to the airfield, and turned around. My turn became an increasing battle, as I was being blown out to sea, and was at risk of side-slipping or over-banking due to the severity of the turbulence.
I was close to giving up. My hang gliding instructor used to drum into my
head: "Above all else, fly the aircraft first!" It was this decision to actively fly the aircraft which I believed saved my life.
I called a precautionary landing on the radio, asked the helicopters to
convey the message to La Mercy and Virginia (could not reach tower on
120.6), told my passenger what I had decided to do. I explained to him that while we flew over the lagoon at Tongaat, I noticed that the surface wind was light easterly, and our best option was to put down on a piece of level sand I had seen there. He was terrified.
At first I felt like a total fool. I had the urge to climb up again and head
to the airfield. I though everyone would laugh at the incompetence of the
little "girl" who could not even handle a couple of bumps.
Then on finals for the beach we went negative severely. We dropped about 50-100' in an instant, and the seat-belt actually hurt my legs. I had a severe wing-up, and considered again aborting my beach landing and heading to the airfield, and then remembered my instructor drumming into my head that I must always stick to my decision.
I forced myself to remember that the signs told me that the wind was calm and even on the ground. As soon as we were below 30' the wing was controllable and I executed a perfect landing.
Up until that point I was willing to take a crash as an option, I just wanted to live.
The helicopter instructor who came to fetch me, did two missed approaches before he was happy to put it down, because of the severity of the turbulence.
David came to the beach with the R44, and felt the turbulence in the
helicopter, yet he was still confident that he could fly it out. It was now
about 45min after I put down, and he reasoned that he would be lighter than me, and with less wing loading and a greater power to weight ratio he would be OK. This made me feel like an idiot again, because if he could fly it, why couldn't I? I felt deeply embarrassed. The helicopter kept it low to avoid the worst of the turbulence. David radio'd that there are some big holes in the sky, but we all landed safely.
About 10 min later Dave Jackson from Ballito phoned. He wanted to know if it was me who landed on the beach at Zimbali. I though he was also going to point a finger at me (Zimbali being a very sensitive area), but instead he told us that his student had gone down. It was one of the scariest and saddest moments of my life.
1. The surface wind was calm.
2. Met said that the winds were doing 15-20NE. Very manageable even for me.
3. The South Wester was not due for another 4 hours.
So how could we have known? My flight at 3pm was very calm at ground to 300', and turbulent above that. I believe that should have been my first warning sign. I am happy to fly turbulence high up, so I was grateful that it did not extend to ground, and did not probe the cause further. I now know that it was stupid. I should have considered that at that time of the afternoon, with that level of haze, thermic turbulence could not have been a feasible explanation, and especially if there was no thermic turbulence close to the ground! Although I do not have all the answers yet, I will continue to think about this one. There was a cap-cloud at about 7-10 000 just before take off. The conditions were not conducive to wave formation, so I did not consider it an option. Maybe I was overconfident. What I do know, is that I will be more aware of warning signs in future, and if I am unhappy after take off, I will return immediately, rather than reasoning myself into a dangerous situation.
Knee closed mix just enuff to make engine splutter so no time to rescue coke or cell which was flying around cockpit. Looked like a bit of a Box when I exit cockpit covered in Coke - (must start drinking water) Was at 6000', but headwind was 25+kts just off the nose near Potch.
Drop 50' plus 
Truly sad news... Our thoughts are with those affected by this
