Flight instructor blamed for Do-228 belly landing

Taiwan’s Aviation Safety Council (ASC) has concluded that the incompetence of a flight instructor was the main cause behind a Daily Air Dornier Do-228 belly landing in December 2014.

Registered B-55565, the aircraft took off from Taitung airport for a training mission at the nearby Green Island.

The Council found that both the instructor pilot and the training captain did not follow standard procedures and conduct a pre-landing checklist. This resulted in the turboprop landing on its belly as the crew failed to extend its landing gear.

The instructor pilot also overloaded the training captain with instructions during the training, impacting the situation awareness in the cockpit. He subsequently failed to take over control of the aircraft after the landing gear warning went off, says the ASC.

It adds: “His airmanship and the proficiency was considered insufficient.”

In its investigation, the agency found that neither did the instructor pilot follow the training programme, impacting flight safety.

The airline was also lacking in providing adequate training for its instructors and supervising flight operations. Flight crew on its Dornier fleet also did not follow procedures in the manuals during daily operations, while parts of the manuals were inconsistent with practical operational conditions.

Recommendations have since been made to Daily Air, urging it to develop and conduct appropriate recruitment and training programmes for its flight crew, as well as to enhance the selection and assessment of instructors.

Flightglobal’s Fleets Analyzer database shows that the 1996-built aircraft, owned by Daily Air, remains out of service following the accident.