A Cessna 208B Grand Caravan was scheduled to operate a Domestic Non-Scheduled Passenger from Jayapura-Sentani Airport to Mulia Airpor, both in Indonesia. The flight would be conducted under Visual FLigth Rules (VFR) with the captain as pilot fly (PF) and the co-pilot as pilot monitoring (PM) Onboard the aircraft, besides the two pilots, 9 passengers.
The aircraft after recovery shows the damaged landing gears and propeller (© KNKT)
At 11.30 lt (local time) the aircraft lifted off the runway at Sentani Airport and climbed to its cruise altitude of 10.000 feet for the estimated 1hr 15 min flight. The Mulia Airport is situated in a mountainous area with an airport elevation of approximately 5.500 feet and one-way runway operation due to the final area and runway slope condition of 10% up. The landing performs on runway 08 and takeoff on runway 27. The weather phenomenon was that the airport was normally covered by ground fog in the early morning and cumulus clouds builds up in the afternoon. During the descent towards Mulia ATC informed the crew that visibility was 5 NM with a westerly wind at 8 knots with a cloud base at 8000 feet. The required approach briefing and checklists were completed and at 6000 feet (~500 feet AGL - Above Ground Level) the aircraft was aligned with the runway.
The aircraft in its final position (© KNKT)
Touchdown occurred within the touchdown zone of runway 08, however, the aircraft bounced resulting in the floating down the runway and drifting to the left. When the aircraft touched down a second time the pilot pushed the nose down, applied full right rudder, applied reverse thrust and applied the brakes. This was insufficient to keep the aircraft on the runway and it left the runway, coming to a stop on soft ground on the left-hand side of the runway. The pilot shut the engine down and the passengers and crew disembarked normally. There were no injuries, there was no post-accident fire.
Aircraft track over and on the runway, based on marks on the runway (© KNKT)
The Komite Nasional Keselamatan Transportasi (KNKT - Indonesian Transportation Safety Committee) was alerted and initiated an investigation. In their report damage to the aircraft was given as;
All propeller blades twisted
Left main landing gear damaged
Nose main landing gear damaged
Lower fuselage scratched and dented
The investigation concluded that the contributing factors to this serious incident were;
The illusion of the runway condition resulted in the pilot misinterpreting the situation and being late to flare before touchdown and bouncing.
The recovery action performed by the pilot resulted in the force that moved the aircraft further to the left and difficult to recover back to the runway centerline.
View on the runway at a normal approach (left) and a high approach (right) (© KNKT)
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