Ultralights like one in N.S. crash popular due to price, fewer rules – expert

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This article was published 26/09/2007 (6918 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

HALIFAX – Light aircraft like the one involved in a deadly crash in Nova Scotia this week are increasing in popularity across Canada due to less expensive regulatory requirements than slightly larger, federally certified airplanes, aviation experts said Wednesday.

A 64-year-old Swiss man was killed and another Swiss man in the rear seat was seriously injured on Tuesday when a RANS S-7S float plane plunged nose down into a rock quarry about 100 kilometres southwest of Halifax.

Burkhard Woelky, a veteran operator of the Sunnybrook Flight School in Nova Scotia, said the plane is part of the increasingly popular “advanced” ultralight aircraft – small airplanes that are usually equipped with four-stroke engines and aircraft-grade components.

He argued the ultralights, offered in kit form or pre-assembled, are in most respects the equivalent of small manufactured aircraft, “unlike the flimsy ultralights with two-stroke engines of the past.”

Woelky said the growth trend is driven by lower registration fees than slightly larger planes, such as Cessnas or Pipers.

“You buy a brand new kit and build it, and you have a better equipped aircraft and it will cost you a fragment to operate in relation to certified aircraft,” he said.

The advanced ultralights must be inspected by a manufacturer’s representative after they’re constructed, but don’t require a federal Transportation Department inspection.

Annual inspections are left to the owner while certified aircraft must go through an inspection from a federally approved mechanic.

Figures from Transport Canada confirm a steady increase in the light aircraft over the past five years. There were 942 of the aircraft registered this year compared to 654 of the category in 2002.

Meanwhile, small certified aircraft have increased at a much slower pace with-,292 registered this year, compared to 12,934 five years ago.

Mike Cunningham, a manager at the Transportation Safety Board of Canada, also noted that the ultralights are growing in popularity.

“They (ultralights) have taken domination over what you’d consider conventional production line aircraft, and that’s because of the cost,” he explained.

He added it remains uncertain whether the Transportation Safety Board will produce a formal report into the accident near Rhodes Corner, N.S.

“It’s all about the travelling public and it’s all about using the resources we have in a wise fashion,” he said. “Really, when it comes right down to it, there’s not a lot of safety payoff in looking at ultralight accidents, especially when there’s so few.”

However, statistics remain unclear on whether the advanced ultralights have a similar, worse or better safety record than certified, private aircraft.

The Transportation Safety Board of Canada says there have been 15 ultralight accidents since January of this year, but it doesn’t stipulate how many of those involved advanced ultralights.

Maurice Landry, a spokesman for Transport Canada, said federal agencies can’t provide “an accident rate” – which measures the number of accidents per 100,000 hours flown – for advanced ultralights.

He said ultralights are considered to be in a different category of flying, where pilots tend to use the planes for recreational, “sport-related” flying.

Pilots are required to carry a placard in plain view indicating the aircraft isn’t certified.

Landry said the department is consulting with the aviation industry but has heard that there isn’t a desire to require advanced ultralights to have annual inspections by Transport Canada.

“They (the industry) say this would only result in making a sport activity more onerous for practitioners,” he said.

The actual cause of the Nova Scotia crash remains unknown, said Cunningham.

He said the investigators have determined “we have an aircraft that in the final moments of flight descended fairly steeply into the ground.”

That could have occurred for a number of reasons, he noted, with an engine stall being only one of a number of possibilities.

The name of the victim hasn’t been released.