19
Home
Single Turbine Engine Aircraft
Is Two safer than One? No!
Is Two safer than One? No!
Loss of Power
1. Introduction
A core question related to the issue of the commercial operation of single-engined turboprops at night and/or in IMC (SE-IMC) is the consequence of loss of power and a forced landing. The ‘success rate’ of such forced landings has been established previously 1, 2 and also the probability of power loss in different phases of flight 3 .
This note consolidates and updates these data. A ‘Loss of Power’ event was defined in the JAA SE-IMC Working Group as “a loss of power such that a forced landing was inevitable.”
2. Analysis
2.1 General
Tables 3.1 Tables 4.0 Tables 5.0 give details of known loss of power events for the Cessna C208 Caravan, Pilatus PC-12 and EADS Socata TBM 700 in either commercial or private operations, with key details to the extent possible. In the case of the C208, the data are confined to US operations owing to incomplete data at early years of operation elsewhere. Comments include the phase of flight, cause, cases where subsequent ‘design changes’ make a repetition of the cause impossible or highly unlikely, and ‘ditching’ where applicable; the latter two aspects are underlined to ease analysis.
Daylight and weather information at the time of the events has been added to the original data and was supplied by the UK CAA. Additional more recent events have been supplied by the manufacturers
2.2 Probability of a Fatal Accident or Injuries
Events
Fatalities Occurred
Injuries Only
Neither
Cessna C-208
25
2
3 to 5
18 to 20
Pilatus PC-12
9
0
1
8
Socata TBM 700
3
1
0
2
37
3
4 or 6*
28 or 30*