PILOT Matthew Furlong was one of the two men who died in a light airplane crash at Allenview on Tuesday last week.
Mr Furlong and a student pilot had flown from Archerfield Airport when the Diamond DA-40 aircraft crashed into a turf farm on Brookland Road.
A Civil Aviation Safety Association spokesman said a partial mayday call was heard over the radio by other pilots before the incident.
Allenview resident Peter McKenna said he saw the DA-40 nosedive into his neighbour’s paddock minutes after stepping out onto his veranda.
“I was on the phone to another neighbour when I saw it,” he said. “I looked up and saw the plane spiral down about 500 to 800 metres from the ground.”
Mr McKenna said he was shocked.
“It was a bit horrific to watch,” he said. “After seeing that, I knew they wouldn’t have made it out alive.”
Mr McKenna said he had seen several aircraft undergo training techniques above the area before.
“It didn’t look like the normal ones that fly over. This one was a very a different type of plane,” he said.
Turf manager Darryl Pearce said two women working in the field at the time alerted him to the crash.
“We had a couple of girls who were spotting weeds only about 300 metres from where the plane crashed,” he said. “They didn’t really see the plane but heard it crash behind them.”
Mr Pearce said he raced down to the site after one of the workers called him about the incident.
“There were so many things going through my mind of what I was going to find but luckily there was no fire and the plane was sitting upright.
“I went over to see if I could help the occupants but it was pretty obvious I couldn’t do anything to help.”
Mr Pearce said this was the second time a plane had crashed onto one of the turf farms in the area.
“About 20 years ago, one did an emergency landing at the Cusack Lane farm (at Jimboomba) but they were able to walk away from that one,” he said.
The turf farm workers on Tuesday were offered counselling and the site was cleared by Friday morning.
Archerfield Airport general manager Heather Mattes said both pilots were part of the the airport’s close-knit aviation community and their loss would be felt by the many who work, train or fly from the airport.
Police forensic officers and Australian Transport Safety Bureau investigators were looking into the cause of the crash.
An ATSB spokesman said there would be an initial report into the plane crash in a months time and the final report could take up to a year to complete.
Jocelyn Garcia
Jocelyn is a journalist at the Redland City Bulletin, covering education issues and school stories. She was a former journalist at Beaudesert Times, reporting about crime, schools and agriculture.
Jocelyn is a journalist at the Redland City Bulletin, covering education issues and school stories. She was a former journalist at Beaudesert Times, reporting about crime, schools and agriculture.
