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Don Cowling. This is a file of a radio interview of Don explaining what happened.
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Quite a famous gyro that one, it formerly belonged to ???? McQueen from Gippsland area and at one time it held the speed record from Adelaide to Darwin.He rang me one time and asked if he could have a bed & refuel here as he was flying from Leongattha I thinks to approx 160 K"s north of Broken Hill. Anyway, he rings from Swan Hill saying he"s refueled and on his way & expected to be here by 10.00AM
. About 10 & his landing. Over a hot coffee he says he"s had a 130 /140 knot GPS groundspeed @ 4 or 5 thousand feet and it was about freezing up there as well. Anyway, he reckoned he was right to go [ defrosted], fueled him up and away he went....very quickly once he turned northerly, must have been one humdinger of a southerly up there. Anyway, he"s at his destination
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Would that be John McQueen from eagle point victoria cos i bought his single seat rosco early last year?
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The bloody media want to always beat it up. The simple fact is he had an engine out and landed safely but it was on mud and it tipped and he had a rotor strike. To my knowledge you cant get cut to pieces because the centripetal forces throw everything outwards. If a fixed wing touched its wing then nothing would have happened - gliders do it all the time however we all know that a fixed wing would have dropped like a brick in this case and nobody would have walked away. Matey, glad you are OK but we know gyros can come off second best if they don"t settle straight - bugga!.
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Hi queenslandferal, ok re the media!!!! BUT, Why would a fixed wing drop like a brick? They would just glide down and landed on the beach due to better glide ratio than a gyro, and probably no damage to man or machine. The gyro pilot made the mistake of not having enough height to glide to the beach if he had engine failure where a successful landing could have ensued.Aussie Paul.
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Probably right Paul but if 10 planes and 10 gyros had engine failures in random places within gliding distance to a "suitable" landing area, I bet more cessna"s would rip wheels off because of their high touch down speed than the gyros would.
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Would that be John McQueen from eagle point victoria cos i bought his single seat rosco early last year?Thanks Matt, John is his name !! Think he has a LSA now days.
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yeah he lives a Eagle Point East of Bairnsdale Vic, i think ha has a jabaru or some thing, its been about 12 months or so since iv spoken to him.
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yeah he lives a Eagle Point East of Bairnsdale Vic, i think ha has a jabaru or some thing, its been about 12 months or so since iv spoken to him.I was talking with John a few weeks back and he told me he ran into some power wires with the Jabiru and is fixing it up in his garage at the moment. He told me to Google
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Sorry Paul... I was not there however, the point I was making was we can spot land with enough air speed and rotors full of energy (we can also spiral descend) or we can descend vertically (trashed machine) but living pilot. Fixed wing cant pick a landing unless enough glide distance. If they slow up too much then they stall and fall like a brick. I was guessing also that a wheel may have bogged and put him into a bit of a cartwheel. Anyhow preaching to the converted. I was more narked about the sensationalism and the leading commentary by Derren Hinch ;-)
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Sorry Paul... I was not there however, the point I was making was we can spot land with enough air speed and rotors full of energy (we can also spiral descend) or we can descend vertically (trashed machine) but living pilot. Fixed wing cant pick a landing unless enough glide distance. If they slow up too much then they stall and fall like a brick. I was guessing also that a wheel may have bogged and put him into a bit of a cartwheel. Anyhow preaching to the converted. I was more narked about the sensationalism and the leading commentary by Derren Hinch ;-)No worries, I understand. Mongrel media!!!! It was just the "falling like a brick" comment that pricked my attention, and as a general rule you don"t get killed in a fixed wing forced landing, just wreck the aeroplane unless you have the "perfect" landing place which is generally 100 times longer than a gyro needs. The pilot had no need to be flying at a height that would not allow him to reach a suitable surface to land if he had an engine failure, BUT he has always had a habit of flying risky like that and this time it cost him his machine and a little deeper water he would have drowned due to the seat belt problem.The moral to the story is unless due to operational (mustering etc) reasons don"t fly where you can"t land.Aussie Paul.
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Great, that must be my old mate Magoo that you guys are talking about! I picked him up at Tennant creek airport during his epic flight from darwin to adelaide Many years ogo. A great adventurer, and is better on the didgeridoo than the average black fellow. Good to hear you"re still out there John Magoo.
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I was talking with John a few weeks back and he told me he ran into some power wires with the Jabiru and is fixing it up in his garage at the moment. He told me to Google
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, BUT he has always had a habit of flying risky like that and this time it cost him his machine and a little deeper water he would have drowned due to the seat belt problem.Aussie Paul. ;D Don is one of the only people I have seen fly around for at least 15 minutes in ground effect there at Lameroo. Quite spectacular actually cause there was a power line out in the area that he couldnt have flown over
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