On the 1 st of August 2024, the École de Parachutisme Sportif de Vannes Bretagne arranged a parachute decrease for 14 The sky diving centre is a charitable running their aircraft under AIR OPS.
The aircraft was a Cessna 208 Caravan, a single-engine turboprop, registered in France as F-HVPC and owned by the skies diving centre. It was set up for sky diving, with 2 benches, one of which seats 5 sky divers and the second seven.
Approximately 3 skies scuba divers can rest on the flooring between the benches or by the door, for an optimum of 15 sky divers.
Each parachute system consisted of a harness, a get (backup) parachute, the major parachute and an automated safety gadget created to deploy the reserve as needed. The parachutes are attached to their harnesses through risers: webbing straps that organize the suspension lines.
When jumping from the airplane, the skies scuba diver pulls out the take care of and launches it, causing the little pilot chute to unclothe a fabric bag on the back of the harness. The pilot chute catches air which starts the deployment of the major canopy.
The parachutes had actually been evaluated four months before the dive, 4 April 2024, with the reserve repacked by a certified packer and valid until 4 th April 2025
For the flight that day, there were 2 jumps prepared around 1, 200 metres and 4, 000 metres. (~ 4, 000 feet and 13, 000 feet).
At 1, 200 metres, the first jumpers were three experienced sky divers practicing accuracy touchdown and 2 students under the supervision of the skies diving teacher. Then at 4, 000 metres, the staying sky scuba divers and the instructor would certainly leap with each other.
The skies scuba divers carried out their tools examine the ground prior to boarding and would repeat them during the climb prior to getting to dive elevation. The release manages for the main canopy, get cover, and cutaway can easily become removed from their housings with marginal movement.
The instructor was in charge of checking the tools of the two pupils, which he did. He held C and D licences, permitting him to manage various other skies scuba divers and do presentation dives. He was in training for the federal instructor ranking.
The pilot held a business licence with 6, 600 trip hours, with 5, 500 as a sky diving pilot.
It was a hot August day, 28 – 30 ° C (82 – 86 ° F) and it would have been boiling in the cabin. They departed Vannes and climbed away, prepared for their dives.
The skies divers were sitting according to their jumps, with the eight skies scuba divers leaping 2nd seated nearby the cockpit, with one on the flooring in between the benches. The skies diving trainer sat at the end of the longer bench, with one student unemployed to the trainer’s left and one pupil to the right of the bench, remaining on the flooring. The 3 skilled skies divers practising accuracy touchdowns were nearest the door, with one on the short bench and two on the flooring. The three sky divers on the floor (one trainee, two precision) rested shoulder to shoulder. Everyone was sitting with their backs to the cabin.
The aft door was an upright gliding layout of Plexiglas slats. The Cessna 208 was licensed to fly with the door open as a part of its sky diver procedures. The only restriction was that the door must stay closed during take off and listed below 500 metres, to ensure that owners could not befall at an elevation too low for the canopy to release. The head of the skies diving centre confirmed that it was common for the skies divers to partially open the door for some fresh air when temperature levels were high, in order to cool down the cabin. There had never ever been any kind of issue with partly opening the door. The pilot had actually explicitly allowed for this prior to the trip.
The sky diver remaining on the flooring closest to the door had been designated the job of running the airplane’s vertical moving door. He was really knowledgeable: he held C and D permits and likewise a government teacher score with 3, 600 leaps logged. He had gone to a briefing prior to the flight to learn more about the door and the preventative measures to take when running it. The pilot had told him that he might partly unlock throughout the climb in order to aerate the cabin.
It was extremely hot in the cabin. After checking for any anomalies, the skies scuba diver increased the slats a little bit to ventilate the cabin. He opened the door by concerning ten centimetres (4 inches) to let the air in, somewhat less than the elevation of a soda can.
The instructor, seated at the end of the bench outermost from the door, started to inspect his students’ parachutes. He started with his student sitting on the flooring. The more knowledgeable skies diver resting alongside him on the flooring changed towards the door to offer the student some space.
The sky scuba diver sitting by the door positioned his foot to act as a door quit. He really felt the skies diver in the middle shift in the direction of the door and press against him. He really did not relocate but turned his upper body to the right and leaned a little bit out of the way.
In the process, he needs to have compressed the leather round of the pilot chute between the parachute and the flooring. What no person became aware was that a bit of his pilot chute had actually come out of the fabric pouch.
The slipstream from the open door caught the chute and pulled it out of the aircraft. This set off the main container to open up, the start of the series to deploy the major cover.
The skies diver sitting on the bench heard something from the door. He turned to look and saw the pilot chute of the skies scuba diver nearest the door fly out of the airplane. The primary canopy container of the parachute was open and being dragged outside. He ordered the suspension lines yet he could not pull the container back in.
The skies scuba diver on the flooring was non-stop drawn in the direction of the door.
The major parachute opened beyond the airplane under the left straight stabiliser, the little wing on the tail.
While the sky scuba diver was being dragged out of the airplane, the top loophole of the right-hand riser snagged on the door frame and afterwards snapped under the stress. The main cover was now just partly attached to the harness.
The sky diver felt himself being drawn via the bottom of the door, three slats breaking under the stress. He really felt a sharp pain in his leg as he discussed the limit. He didn’t recognize it yet but his leg was broken.
The riser that broke indicated that the main cover was currently just partially attached to the harness. The get cover deployed up and towards the tail. It rubbed against the straight stabiliser, enough to leave a mark, yet luckily did not get captured up in the tail.
The man remaining on the bench watched out the damaged door and saw the sky scuba diver outside of the airplane under the get cover, with the primary cover still partially connected.
From the skies diver’s perspective, he was unexpectedly outside of the airplane. He promptly saw that the reserve had actually deployed but that the major canopy was still partially connected to the harness. He started to make use of the get canopy to manage his descent while maintaining the main cover out of the way so it would certainly not obtain contended the get. At the same time, the planet was rushing at him.
He struck the ground, hard. He damaged his back, fracturing five lumbar vertebrae. All he can do was lie there and wait for a person to find him.
On the other hand, in the cockpit, the pilot heard a loud sound. They were at concerning 2, 000 feet, halfway to their jump altitude. His stick vibrated highly. He wasn’t sure what was occurring and believed that an elevator might have failed. He pulled back on the power and began to descend. The resonances stopped however he chose it was much better to terminate the dive, as he had not been certain what was wrong with the airplane.
The skies scuba divers should have remained in shock. The one unemployed claimed they were already coming down by the time he took into consideration claiming something, so he presumed the pilot understood what had actually just occurred.
I think it’s fair to assume that everybody was in shock.
They landed safely within a few minutes. The pilot had no concept that he had actually shed a passenger up until he had cabbed to the car parking stand. He right away called ATC to state they required an emergency situation search for the sky diver.
There are no information concerning the search and rescue aside from that the pilot informed the BEA that the sky diver was “quickly found” by the rescue solutions.
Actually, in general, I’m let down by the detail in the BEA record There are a variety of angles that seem not to have actually been checked out in all. That stated, I such as that the report is careful not to designate blame or second-guess anyone’s choices. Splitting open the door to obtain some air right into the warm cabin was authorized and the sky scuba diver assigned to the door was seasoned and effectively briefed. All of the devices checks were completed as anticipated.
The secret here is the positioning of the sky scuba diver. This meant that the natural leather pilot chute ball was probably squished in between the parachute and the floor. Lots of skies scuba divers prefer the natural leather sphere: it’s much easier to grip and doesn’t damage as easily as a plastic ball. Yet the leather additionally glides much less easily, which describes why it got entraped, taking out the pilot chute.
Even more, the pilot chute pouch, on the ideal side of the back, was directly exposed to the slipstream. It was a sequence of occasions that no person had thought about.
When the right riser got on the door frame, the fabric loop safeguarding it severed, causing the book deployment, specifically as designed. It was pure luck that neither cover captured on the horizontal stabiliser. The sky scuba diver handled both covers to the ground, which talks with his experience degree.
The record wraps up that although the danger of a parachute snagging on the horizontal stabiliser or elevator is a known risk of skies diving, no person had actually analyzed the interaction of the air flow from the partially open door.
As an outcome of this case, the sky diving centre no longer enables the door to be opened throughout trip, not also partially, except throughout the decrease phases.
It should get very hot in the cabin yet that’s still far better than instantly discovering you are outside of it.