Raaf Roulette Damaged In Runway Accident, RAAF Roulette damaged in runway accident

[GregHyde]

RAAF Roulette damaged in runway accident involving student pilot at Sale

A plane with its nose on the runway and surrounded by emergency services
A PC-21 aircraft crashed at East Sale Royal Australian Air Force Base on Thursday afternoon.

A student pilot has walked away uninjured after a runway accident involving one of the Royal Australian Air Force's (RAAF) Roulette planes in Victoria.
The mishap involving a PC-21 plane occurred at RAAF Base East Sale on Thursday.

An RAAF spokesperson said the pilot was making a "low-speed runway excursion" when the crash occurred.

The student pilot was taken to the base medical centre for assessment as a precaution.

Local photographer Grant McKillop said he was sitting at home when a friend knocked on his door and told him there was a commotion at the RAAF base.
"He told me there was a plane down, and there was a whole bunch of people around it with some fire trucks," he said.

"The propeller was missing, and it was nose down, ass up."

A wide shot of the plane on the runway as emergency services assess the scene.
The student pilot flying the plane has walked away uninjured. (Supplied: Grant McKillop Photography)
Mr McKillop estimated that about 20 emergency services personnel were at the scene, assessing the damage and ensuring the pilot was okay.

"I quickly ran over to the fence line, grabbed a couple of flicks, and then raced back to the car and took off," he said.

Mr McKillop's images have been shared widely online, accumulating thousands of reactions.
The accident will be investigated.

They are flown all around Australia at big events, from their Victorian base at East Sale in Gippsland.
The planes are flown as low as 80 metres at speeds of up to 685 kilometres per hour, sometimes just three metres apart in formation.

The pilots complete elaborate manoeuvres that take years to perfect.

In 2019, the Pilatus PC-9/A plane was retired from Roulettes operations and replaced by Pilatus PC-21s.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-10-04/raaf...pilot/104431840

[Shep]

The media report makes it sound as if it was a pre-planned maneuver,

"An RAAF spokesperson said the pilot was making a "low-speed runway excursion" when the crash occurred".

I would speculate that the pilot was involved in a low-speed runway excursion, rather than the pilot was MAKING a low-speed runway excursion.

If they were making (i.e. conducting) one, I wonder what the permission slip - I mean - the flight authorisation would have looked like ... perhaps something along the lines of "Solo GF/AERO recover for CCTs - authorised for one only runway excursion total duration 1HR".

The minor point about all of ESLs PC21s being painted in the Roulettes scheme evidently doesn't bother media outlets either.

Minor incident - hardly a "crash" - I bet the air bags didn't even go off ...