2007 helicopter mid-air collision in Austria
The 2007 Super Puma helicopter mid-air collision in Austria was a flight accident that occurred on March 5, 2007, at 10:53 a.m. CET (09:53 UTC), in which eight people died when a medium-size commercial helicopter and a small private airplane collided near the traffic pattern of the Zell am See Airport (LOWZ) in Austria. Both aircraft were operating under visual flight rules, and the weather was good, with a few clouds and 50 km visibility. The collision occurred at an altitude of about 5,090 feet (1,550 m), approximately 1 nautical mile (1.9 km) north-west (NW) of the airport, as the helicopter flew over the traffic pattern in the NNE direction on its way from Kaprun, Austria to Berchtesgaden, Germany. The collision occurred while the airplane was climbing and the helicopter had just finished climbing, about 850 feet (260 m) above the southeast slope of the Schmittenhöhe (Schmitten summit, 6,647 feet (2,026 m)).[2]
The final Report on the investigation of the accident was published (only in German with a brief English summary on page 55) on 9 April 2008 by the Air Accident Investigation Board (Flugunfalluntersuchungsstelle) of the Austrian Federal Department of Aviation (Bundes Fachbereich Luftfahrt). The main causes for the inability of both pilots to see the other aircraft in time to avoid the collision were found to be reduced fields of vision allowed by the cockpit designs, and subtle limitations on visual perception related in part to the proximity of the mountain slope not far below the aircraft, demanding the pilots' attention to maintain suitable terrain clearance.
See also
- Inattentional blindness, also known as perceptual blindness, is the failure to notice a fully visible, but unexpected object because attention was engaged on another task, event, or object.
- Change blindness is a surprising perceptual phenomenon that occurs when a change in a visual stimulus is introduced and the observer does not notice it.
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