Clutha crash: accident investigators deny pilot has been cleared of blame

The Sunday Herald reports that David Traill was at the controls of the twin-engined EC135 Airbus aircraft when it fell from the sky shortly after 10pm on November 29, 2013.

Although there was sufficient fuel in the main tank to return to base, Traill had earlier switched off the pumps supplying the engines and then cancelled five audio warnings about low fuel as well as ignoring the permanently illuminated warning on his dashboard.

What we have now established is this: in April 2015, a draft accident report was circulated. In November 2016, the draft came to light and was used by two tabloids to claim the pilot was not to blame. However, the official report, written in 2015, does not clear the pilot of blame.

The Air Accident Investigations Branch, the independent body which looks into UK air crashes, issued its draft report in April 2015 to families of the dead and other “interested” parties which conceded that water and washing fluid “can” enter the fuel tank and cause the fuel indication system to “overreact”. This was based on a separate incident with an EC135 where a pilot had reported suspect readings. It was then discovered that water had entered the tank and caused the indicators to give a false reading.

Members of Traill’s family welcomed reports in two tabloid newspapers in November last year that claimed his name had been cleared. A spokesperson for the Clutha Trust, set up in the wake of the tragedy, said that efforts to blame Traill were “repulsive”.

However, the official report of the crash, published in October 2015, puts the blame squarely on Traill and rubbishes any claim that there was water in the fuel. The fuel supply system was recovered intact by the AAIB investigators and, as the report underlines: “When tested, the fuel samples taken from G-SPAO were unadulterated, free from water contamination and within specification”.

Referring to the final report, an AAIB spokesman said: “We stand by our report which is fully based on evidence.” The spokesman added that the unit was independent and has a worldwide reputation for its scientific methods and integrity.

Within half an hour of the aircraft crashing into the crowded bar and while rescue work was going on the AAIB had been contacted by the then Strathclyde police and investigators were on the scene by 9.15am next morning.

The damning accident report, in meticulous and measured detail, reveals a catalogue of pilot errors. The Sunday Herald can also reveal that despite turning off the tanks there would have been just enough fuel remaining to get home and the 10 who died would almost certainly be alive today if Traill had heeded the warning alarms in the aircraft, which had already been sounding for at least eight minutes, and headed straight for its base.

When 51-year-old pilot Traill took over the aircraft on the night shift, G-SPAO had already been operating all day and all over Scotland. It had been refuelled twice before and no problems had been reported by the day-shift pilot. And when it took off at 8.44pm on a dark and cloudless night it was again full of fuel. Pilots know just how far and for how long they can fly on the amount of fuel they have, in this case 400kg. The maximum flying time, as Traill would have known, was around 90 minutes. There were two police officers accompanying Traill, observers directing operations: Kirsty Nelis, 36, in the front seat alongside Traill, whose main job was to operate the on-board camera, and in the back seat 43-year-old Tony Collins, whose principal task was navigation. Both were highly-experienced and had worked together often and either would have been knowledgeable enough to raise concerns to the pilot during the flight.

The chopper took off at 8.44pm and spent just over half an hour hovering over Oatlands in Glasgow, looking for – it turned out erroneously - someone who may have been struck by a train. At 9.21pm, Traill radioed for air traffic clearance to head for Dalkeith, roughly 48 miles away. Along with the aircraft’s main radio system the police officers had Airwave radios which could independently communicate with police headquarters, then in Pitt Street, Glasgow. A minute after Traill’s call, Nelis called Police Scotland control room to report that they had been stood down – by a sergeant on the ground – and were heading towards Dalkeith, for a routine surveillance task.

At no time in this fatal flight did any of the three communicate that there were problems with the aircraft. G-SPAO arrived at Dalkeith at 9.41pm and four minutes later flew back towards Glasgow. However 14 minutes after, when just south of Shotts, Traill called in that they were now heading for Bothwell.

According to the air accident investigation report – based on recovered data from instruments, radar tracking and simulations – it was on the way to Bothwell, and at around 10.03pm, that the first low-fuel warning went off. For some reason – and perhaps no-one will ever know why – on the way there Traill had switched off the fuel pumps supplying the two main engines and had turned on the two priming pumps which are there for take-off and should be switched off immediately in flight.

The EC135 has both audible warnings, “gongs”, and an illuminated one on the pilot’s control panel. The gongs would have been heard by all three on board. Five times Traill switched them off, although he was unable to extinguish the bright warning light on his instruments which stays on permanently. This remained on for the rest of the flight, which would end disastrously 18 minutes later.

At the first warning, according to the pilot’s handbook, Pilot’s Checklist Emergency and Malfunction Procedures, Traill should have landed the helicopter within 10 minutes, if not on an airfield, in a park or any suitable empty ground. But despite the warnings going off he continued to fly. After two minutes’ flying over Bothwell the aircraft then circled Uddingston before appearing to head back to Glasgow, then, at 10.14, diverting to Bargeddie

and circling over three times. No radio transmissions were made by Traill or the police observers during these three tasks.

At this point the warnings had been going off for at least eight minutes, according to the air accident report.

At 10.19pm, Traill broke the radio silence and called in that they were leaving the Bothwell area and returning to the base, which was then at the SECC on the banks of the Clyde. No further transmissions were received through the remaining minutes of the doomed flight. At 10.21:35, or at latest nine seconds later, the helicopter’s right engine flamed out around three miles from base. The EC135 can fly on one engine and the manufacturers at the time believed that there would be three or four minutes before a second engine followed suit. However, just 32 seconds later the left-hand engine flamed out and the cabin plunged into darkness with the electrics down.

When the first engine died Traill should have checked the supply switches were on. And at this point he should have reached up and behind his head, thrown the gated switch and activated the radio altimeter telling him his height as well as the powerful landing light and called in MAYDAY. He did none of these.

Helicopters whose engines fail don’t just drop out of the sky if they are properly managed in a procedure called autorotation, which takes the stricken aircraft into a glide, keeping the nose down heightening the wind velocity coming up through the propeller – like a sycamore leaf in the wind – and turning rotors just sufficiently to effect a crash landing. But now, in total darkness, unable to see the ground below or read his height from the altimeter, he tried unsuccessfully to undertake an autorotate.

Shortly after 10.22pm, less than two miles from base, G-SPAO fell like a stone and plunged through the roof of the crowded Clutha bar below, killing the three crew and seven others inside. Traill was a highly-experienced pilot, with more than 5,500 hours at the controls. Prior to joining Bond (now Babcock), the firm contracted to fly police missions, he had been an RAF helicopter instructor and had flown in combat in Iraq and Afghanistan, but there he flew heavy Chinooks. It is now clear, according to the report, that he was not trained to deal with low-fuel situations on a flight simulator. Although whether it would have made any difference is questionable.

The helicopter pilot community is a small one and those who spoke to the Sunday Herald did not want to be named. John, not his real name, who also flew G-SPAO in the past, said: “There isn’t a pilot who doesn’t believe Traill is responsible. It was a catalogue of errors, none of which can be explained away. He switched off the fuel, he ignored the warnings and he didn’t put the chopper down within 10 minutes. The allegation of water in the fuel, disproved, is a red herring. Even if there had been it wouldn’t explain his actions.” Another working chopper pilot, who we have called Andy, said: “You can only react as how you have been trained. Your actions should be almost automatic. But your skills are very perishable so it will be vital to look at where he did his training and his assessments.”

This, along with all the other questions raised by the Clutha crash, will be examined at a Fatal Accident Inquiry, required by law – but although it’s now more than three years since the tragedy and over a year since the publication of the air accident report, one has not yet been scheduled. A Police Scotland spokesperson said: “Detective Superintendent Jim Smith, who is an experienced investigator and part of our Major Crime/ Major Investigation cadre, is currently in charge of the investigation. The investigation into the Clutha tragedy, under the direction of the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service, remains ongoing as an active and complex enquiry.”

Bond helicopter is now owned by engineering company Babcock, who bought the company in a £920m deal, including liability for the Clutha victims compensation. All remaining EC135s in service have now been modified – confirmed by the Civil Aviation Authority – to ensure that the radio altimeter remains powered, and the landing light activated, in all phases of flight, “including emergency situations, without crew intervention”.