News release

The Transportation Safety Board of Canada issued its investigation report (A17W0024) into the February 2017 loss of control and collision with terrain involving a Tecnam P2006T aircraft operated by Mount Royal University near the Calgary/Springbank Airport, Alberta.

On 13 February 2017, a Tecnam P2006T aircraft departed from the Calgary/Springbank Airport, Alberta, on an instructional flight. On board, there was a flight instructor and a pilot undergoing multi-engine training, who was also a flight instructor at Mount Royal University. Approximately 30 minutes into the flight, the aircraft departed from controlled flight and collided with terrain 32 miles northwest of the airport. There was a post-impact fire and the aircraft was destroyed. Both occupants were fatally injured.

The investigation found that for unknown reasons, the aircraft entered a spin from a stall exercise. The instructor and trainee recovered the aircraft from the spin, but insufficient altitude remained to recover from the ensuing dive.

The flight training material at Mount Royal University mentioned two types of stall recoveries: one for when the aircraft approaches a stall and the other for when the aircraft has stalled. However, guidance material issued by both Transport Canada (TC) and the United States Federal Aviation Administration indicate that a reduction in the angle of attack should be the only stall recovery technique to be used for either scenario. Further, TC issued an advisory to emphasize the importance of reducing the angle of attack during a stall or approach to stall. This information was not incorporated into TC's instructor guide for the multi-engine class rating. If flight training units do not emphasize that the most important reaction to a stall or approach to stall is a reduction in the angle of attack, a loss of aircraft control may occur.

Following the occurrence, Mount Royal University took a number of safety actions. These include: an increase in the minimum altitude at which an aircraft should be recovered from a stall; the issuance of a memo to all instructional staff clarifying the roles of the designated instructor and the designated student, when two instructors are conducting staff training flights together; the acquisition of a different aircraft type for its multi-engine training program; and the production of revised multi-engine standard operating procedures.