The Royal Canadian Air Force’s (RCAF) Directorate of Flight Safety has concluded that the ingestion of a small bird into a Canadair CT-114 Tutor jet’s engine caused the aircraft to crash in May 2020.
The aircraft, Snowbird 11, had just taken off, and was about to begin an aerial demonstration near Kamloops, British Columbia. It suffered a compressor stall and a loss of thrust, says the investigator’s report, on 29 March.
“Upon loss of power, the pilot initiated a climb straight ahead and then a turn back towards the airport. During this manoeuver, the aircraft entered into an aerodynamic stall and the pilot gave the order to abandon the aircraft,” says the Directorate of Flight Safety. “The pilot and passenger ejected from the aircraft at low altitude and in conditions that were outside safe ejection seat operation parameters. Neither the pilot nor the passenger had…
