Impala jet crash mystery

Long before this weeks tragedy, another pilot died. His parents still dont know why

THE parents of an Impala fighter pilot killed 18 months ago are still waiting for the SA Air Force to tell them how their son died in a crash similar to the one that killed two pilots this week. On April 26 last year, 28-year-old Brett Burmeister died near the Albasini Dam during what the SAAF described as a low-level navigation exercise the same description it used for the mission that killed pilots Derek Duvenage , 22, and Paul Martin, 28, on Wednesday.

All three pilots were attached to 85 Combat Flying School at Hoedspruit in Mpumalanga (motto: Detrimento Sumus Our Purpose Is Damage).

At the time of the Burmeister crash, the SAAF insisted that no reasons could be offered for the disaster until it had been fully investigated by its own inquiry. A report on that accident has yet to be made public. On Friday, Lieutenant-Colonel MFR Smith, responding on behalf of the chief of the air force, sent a fax to this newspaper saying: The Board of Inquiry for the previous Impala accident has been completed and is in the final stages of review.

But Judy Burmeister said from her home in Horison, on the West Rand, this week that weve heard nothing about the crash that killed her son, despite approaches to the SAAF. In his statement, Smith insisted that the air forces fleet of Impalas, in service since 1966 (the two-seater Mark I) and 1974 (the single-seater Mark II), were still in working order.

The aircraft, made under licence by Atlas in South Africa, are based on an Italian fighter, the Aermacchi MB-326, which first entered service in 1954. Over the years Atlas has built191 Impala fighters, of which eight Mark Is and 12 Mark IIs are still flying. Despite the age of the Impala, it remains fully airworthy and hence continues to form the backbone of combat training until the new Hawk lead-in fighter trainer is commissioned, Smith said. The first Hawk fighter conversion course is currently scheduled for 2006.

In the absence of any indications of aircraft failure, Wednesdays crash has baffled at least one former SAAF fighter pilot.

Everything in their years of training teaches them to leave the aircraft before it is too late, according to one former top fighter pilot and Impala instructor.

From reports it would seem that the two-man crew were too low and slow to make it safely out of the aircraft. They should never have allowed themselves to get into that situation, said the source, now an airline captain, who asked not to be named.  He believed the pilots were trying to re-ignite the Impalas flamed-out engine and failed to monitor their loss of altitude. He said that often when there was an emergency in the cockpit the crew became so involved with solving it that they lost perspective of what was happening outside the aircraft.

Its scary when the engine stops. You are losing height and speed and trying to solve the problem all the while knowing you are going down. Then when you look up you realise it is too late, said the captain.

Impalas are equipped with ejection seats that enable a safe evacuation even if the aircraft is standing on the ground. So why was one pilot still strapped to his seat and the other not far from his?

One of two things. Either the aircraft was banking and the crew were blasted out at an angle instead of going straight up, or else they had already sunk below the level of the road in the ravine before banging out.

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