FIERY CRASH IN THE AUSTRALIAN OUTBACK MY 2 CENTS
By Randy Mains
Let me pass along to you an important tip: listen to the pilot you’re replacing. If a pilot who just quit your new job tells you, “Hey man, the machine’s unsafe” or “This is an unsafe operation,” believe them.
The cattle mustering pilot I was replacing in the Northern Territory of Australia quit because the owner of the cattle station, in an effort to save money, applied for and received a 25-hour extension on time before overhaul (TBO) of the cattle station’s Hughes 269. Not heeding the departing pilot’s warning would be a decision that would nearly cost me my life.
I’d just refueled the aircraft at the cattle station and was flying back to where I’d left 35 head of cattle halfway through the muster. I was at 300 feet when the tired little engine began to cough, vibrate and sputter. I instinctively reduced power. It didn’t help. There was no doubt I was going down.
Frantically scanning the parched landscape, I spotted a semi- clear area surrounded by trees, five-foot anthills and tall, dry grass. I maneuvered the little craft between several trees while aiming to land on either side of the anthills, knowing full well that if I hit one of them it would be like slamming into concrete.
I managed to milk what little power the crippled engine could deliver to make it down safely. Once on the ground, pleased I hadn’t damaged the aircraft, I let out a heavy sigh of relief that turned out to be way too premature. An awful oxygen-sucking WHOOMPH quickly filled the air, much like igniting too much lighter fluid on a barbecue but incredibly louder. Immediately, my tiny cockpit was surrounded by dancing flames.
I instinctively twisted on the throttle thinking I’d lift the little craft out of the inferno, but as I applied throttle the engine quit. The only sound now was the crackling of burning grass around me.
I suddenly remembered something that caused a shudder up my spine: there was a full tank of gas right behind my head!
I unlatched the shoulder seat belt and shoulder harness and threw myself out the open door. My body hit the ground, landing hard with a thud. I rolled, then scampered to my feet and put a good distance between me and the burning helicopter. As I stood in shock and watched the little chopper become fully engulfed in flames, I had an odd thought: Boy, is the boss going to be mad when he finds out about this!
I didn’t stick around to watch the helicopter explode, as I’m sure it did. Instead, I began walking three miles through the bush and tall grass toward the portable cattle yard where I knew the
10 May/June 2022
ringers (Australian cowboys) would be impatiently waiting for me to arrive by air — not on foot. I clearly remember having another thought while walking: Imagine the irony of dying in a fiery helicopter crash as a civilian after flying 1,042 combat hours in my one-year tour in Vietnam.
After an hour of bush walking, I burst out of the undergrowth to see three faces tilted skyward searching for me. When the three ringers saw this disheveled helicopter pilot emerging from the scrub, the look on their faces changed to one of disbelief.
“Where the bloody hell have you been?” the head stockman asked. “And where’s the chopper?”
I turned toward the direction from where I had walked and pointed, “See that thick column of black smoke on the horizon? That’s what’s left of your helicopter.”
“Bloody hell, the boss’s going to be angry when he hears about this!”
That’s what I thought too – that is, until I told the boss what had happened. He wasn’t mad; he was so happy that he threw a party in the mess hall for all 50 staff members to celebrate the demise of the tired little helicopter that had only 5 hours before the engine reached the extension to its TBO. The boss figured it would have cost him $3,500 Australian dollars to rebuild the engine. With the insurance money he would receive, he would be able to afford a brand new chopper. This incident, while very scary with consequences not worth thinking about, turned out to be a win-win situation for all concerned.
Two Director of Civil Aviation (DCA) accident investigators flew out to the 1,369-square-mile cattle station where I was working and living to inspect the wreck. Both men donned white lab coats, white pants, and matching white sun hats. They looked more like doctors about to perform surgery rather than aviation inspectors sent to determine the cause of the accident. Knowing how meticulous the DCA was about everything, and judging by the way the two men were dressed, I half expected them to treat the accident site like an archaeological dig, using tiny paintbrushes and dentist tools to uncover the root of the problem. Instead, they opened what looked like a black doctor’s bag, pulled out a hacksaw and heavy hammer, proceeded to cut and bash the engine out of the burnt wreckage, then loaded the engine in the back of their Toyota pickup for transport.
After a day of going over the engine and its internal parts, they determined that I had experienced a partial engine failure due to grossly fouled spark plugs and extremely low compression in
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