It is easy to point the finger of blame after the event and what I am about
to say is not intended to blame anyone but rather offered as food for
thought.
It seems to me that there is a serious flaw in the regulatory system that
has allowed this (and probably other) accidents to occurr.
As far as I am aware there is no mandatory requirement to report to the
authorities -( ie: the CAA, PFA and Europa), defects or faults that are
discovered during the course of routine maintenance. It is necessary to
enter details of maintenance work in the aircraft log but these are rarely
examined until someone has had an accident. I am not sure if PFA inspectors
are required to report back to the PFA on such issues.
The issue of TP6 sleeves disbonding had been known about for many years but
no one knows exactly how many tailplanes have been affected. A Europa owners
mod was produced but this never became mandatory - in any event it could not
be easily retrofitted to the many aircraft already built. We are only now
addressing the problems that this particular design fault/ oversight has
created.
The point I am making is that without proper facts we are all working in the
dark and it seems there is no formal mechanism for collating this data.
A recent point in case was the implementation of FSB-006. We were asked to
check for play in the tailplanes but there was no requirement to pass the
data back to Europa or the PFA - nor was there a specific requirement to
record the amount of play in the airframe logbook.
Kitplanes can never be as rigorously tested or evaluated as commercial
aircraft and even these reveal design flaws long after they have been deemed
fit for service. Surely it is doubly important then that design and
manufacturing defects are reported back to the manufacturer for them to
evaluate and decide whether changes should be made.
This is purely my view as a builder/ owner. Are there any PFA inspectors out
there who could comment. Maybe there is a system and I have been unaware of
it.
Im donning my hard hat now.
Carl Pattinson
G-LABS
|