Model Airplanes

Kalonzo’s Chopper crashes in Tanzania

BY JAMES MBAKA

October 19, 2015

THE Eurocopter that crashed in Tanzania last week killing four occupants, including the captain and a general election candidate, belongs to former Vice President Kalonzo Musyoka.

The Eurocopter AS 350B3 Ecureuil’s Registration Number is 5Y-DKK5Y-DKK.

It bore the manufacturer’s Serial Number 7027 and had been chartered by Tanzania’s ruling Chama Cha Mapinduzi for the ongoing election campaigns.

The Eurocopter can carry loads of up to 1,000kg and has a performance ceiling of 20,000 feet.

The helicopter came down last Thursday afternoon in the middle of the Selous Game Reserve en route to the town of Ludewa, in southwest Tanzania.

The pilot, Capt William Silaa, and outspoken parliamentary aspirant Deo Filikunjombe, died in the crash together with members of his campaign team.

Tanzania police confirmed that four people were on board during the accident. Filikunjombe was a CCM candidate.

A search-and-rescue mission dispatched at first light the next morning only discovered the charred remains of the helicopter but no survivors.

According to the Flight Safety Foundation’s online Aviation Safety Network report under the entry “Airplane damage”, the

Article source: http://www.the-star.co.ke/news/kalonzos-chopper-crashes-tanzania

The finding by the Dutch Safety Board last week that Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 was shot down by a Russian-made missile doesn’t come as a surprise – there was little doubt as to what caused a Boeing 777 carrying 298 souls to fall out of the sky in pieces on July 17, 2014, over eastern Ukraine.

But the confirmation, based on a painstaking investigation in which the plane’s cockpit was reconstructed out of recovered wreckage, is still important. It gives certainty to the families of the victims, who now have an official and incontrovertible version of what happened. It provides a lesson on the risks of failing to close air space over conflict zones. And it puts Russia in the hot seat, where it belongs.

The Dutch Safety Board was not mandated to point fingers. Its role was to establish the cause of the crash. The reconstruction of the cockpit, along with all available data, prove beyond a doubt that a Russian-made Buk surface-to-air missile exploded just off the front of the plane as it cruised at 33,000 feet. The pattern of shrapnel holes in the cockpit, and the shrapnel found in the bodies of three of the crew, match that found in this highly advanced Russian warhead.

The Board was also able to show that the missile was fired from inside a 320-square-kilometre area on the eastern edge of Ukraine –

Article source: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/globe-debate/editorials/the-lessons-of-flight-mh17-for-both-ukraine-and-russia/article26851941/

There are very few things in existence as worthy of obsession as flying. Piloting a machine thousands of feet above the assurances of solid ground, bouncing and bobbing along like a boat sailing the sky itself, is the purest pleasure that technology is capable of offering this side of actual orbit.

Image: Aidan Fay

Just ask Aidan Fay, a 17 year old inventor from La Jolla, California. Fay’s had the flying obsession since receiving a copy of Microsoft Flight Simulator as an 8 year old, his mother told Make Zine. He takes lessons and trains in quite real aircraft, but, due to a medical condition, Fay has been barred from solo flight by the FAA, at least for the time being. So, he built his very own Cessna cockpit, a detailed simulator powered by an Oculus Rift, Arduino microcontroller board, and a load of physical actuators.

Make explains:

Carefully designing and assembling the parts, Aidan wired the controls and switches into circuit boards. He used MDF and acrylic from the local hardware store, along with high tech components such as Arduino microcontrollers and used, disassembled joysticks he found for sale online. He even found actual airplane rudder pedals on eBay, as well as a real yoke, the airplane’s steering mechanism. To make the steering feel more realistic, the teen engineer used gears and motors to create a “force feedback” mechanism that tightens and loosens the steering according to the simulated flying conditions.

Fay’s been at this a while. The

Article source: http://motherboard.vice.com/en_uk/read/this-17-year-old-built-a-full-scale-cessna-cockpit-simulator-in-his-bedroom

The long-awaited Dutch report into the shooting down of flight MH17 suggests attempts were made to cover up the causes of the disaster, including the removal from the crash site of parts of the aeroplane showing severe damage from a Buk missile.

Dutch investigators said on Tuesday that the three pilots were killed instantly, after a Russian-built Buk missile exploded within a metre of their cockpit. The blast ejected hundreds of pieces of shrapnel into the plane with “tremendous force”, said the Dutch safety board report.

But investigators declined to apportion blame for who had downed the plane, merely saying the rocket was fired from a 320 sq km area of eastern Ukraine. Further “forensic investigation” was needed to determine the precise launch site.

But speaking to Dutch journalists in The Hague, in the corridor of parliament, the chairman of the safety board, Tjibbe Joustra, later admitted that the Buk missile was fired from a rebel-controlled area.

He told the Volkskrant newspaper: “The boundaries fluctuated a bit, but it is an area where pro-Russia rebels wrested control.”

He added: “If you really want to determine the location, you should take soil samples and examine witnesses. This is not our competence.”

The report by the Dutch safety board said that more than 120 objects, “mostly metal fragments”, were found in the body of the first officer, who had sustained “multiple fractures”. Dutch experts performed an “external and

Article source: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/oct/13/mh17-report-suggests-efforts-were-made-to-cover-up-causes-of-disaster

Another Warming Trend
Why I Fear the 7-Day Outlook

My wife is not happy. “If it rains on our son’s wedding day I will kick you right in your Doppler.” I shrugged. “I’m just the messenger, honey. I don’t make the weather, I just try and predict it” I stammered. “Try harder.”

An outdoor wedding in late October in northern Minnesota; what can POSSIBLY go wrong? At least it won’t snow at the Grand View Lodge next weekend. I consider that a personal victory. But if there’s a suspicious drowning on Gull Lake, if you turn to the weather page and find a crossword puzzle, you’ll know what happened.

I’m living the 7-Day, hyper-analyzing every model run, praying for a meteorological miracle, a wedding day reprieve, a pardon from eternal, spousal damnation.

Please God.

It’s back to the 60s this week; 70s possible tomorrow Friday. Not bad when one considers the sun is as high in the sky as it was in late February.

We’re heading into a wetter pattern as an atmospheric tug-of-war plays out overhead. All rain; no snow in sight just yet.

If my better half is reading this (doubtful) both the GFS and ECMWF hint at some cool sun on Saturday.

So Long Ragweed. Most of Minnesota and western Wisconsin experienced a hard freeze overnight; several hours at or below zero, cold enough to kill off

Article source: http://www.startribune.com/warming-up-60s-few-70s-this-week-wedding-day-weather-blues/333695841/

Outside the boundaries of the normal podcast thinks he’s got you guys cheering fourteen. And the fun sportsman like podcast. He loves sports comedy entertainment it. Or else that happens to come up a conversation the un sportsman like podcast is presented by draft games are you ready. We WB BI’s Gerry pointed. Fox. Bottom. Movie fan thing and suspend doing now. Your movies and you know. And family ties with the rank. And yank. And skin tone. And it won’t you. And nickel back in. Yeah. I didn’t aim. Yeah. Well you’ll school Saturday Night Live listeners will probably recognize that last bit that we just played as the. Epic Michael J. Fox. Back to the future an active time in the elevator sequence and if you wondered why the hell we start off the podcast at that it’s because. Businesses. Out of an important date in nerd culture this is. October 2015. On October 21 2015. Mart gimmick fly. Went. To the future rights and held. Right the rebellion. In back to the future to sell I’m joined by. My my best pal on and in the podcast world at a local backed format welcomed by thanks bout could be back in this some thought that they DeWitt and looking forward to this is. Literally all I guess we’ve been counting down to I mean it’s it’s amazing to think. And when will go through the site how many movies have had predictions are dates that eventually come

Article source: http://media.weei.com/a/110107378/unsportsmanlike-podcast-back-in-time.htm

The PA-46 M500 refines Piper’s pitch to well heeled, value-conscious general aviation pilots considering the transition from piston to turboprop, making its upsell not with increased power and performance but with enhanced safety. It’s the definitive answer to concerns safety experts, insurance companies and pilots raise about the challenges of stepping up to higher performance aircraft, questions the original PA-46 helped crystallize.

Piper’s pressurized, piston-powered PA-46 Malibu, introduced in 1982, created the modern cabin-class single, a category now dominated by turboprops, with Daher, Pilatus and Cessna offering interpretations of the concept. Meanwhile, Piper built out its PA-46 “M-Class” line, upgrading the Malibu into the Mirage and flanking it with the flagship Meridian–certified in 2000, which brought the Vero Beach, Fla.-based manufacturer into the single-engine turboprop echelon–and the entry-level, non-pressurized Matrix recip.

Earlier this year Piper revamped and rebranded the turboprop Meridian as the M500 and the Mirage as the M350, and also announced the M600, a more powerful version of the M500, expected to receive certification by year-end.

The successful growth of the PA-46 product line stands in contrast to its entry into service. In its first iteration, powered by a 310-hp Continental, a series of in-flight break-ups and other accidents prompted the FAA to issue an AD removing the PA-46 Malibu’s certification for flight into known weather, before the agency withdrew the directive after further testing of the design. The break-ups were attributed largely to pilot error, and subsequent PA-46 models

Article source: http://www.ainonline.com/aviation-news/business-aviation/2015-10-17/pilot-report-piper-pa-46-m500