Incident
During a landing attempt, an aircraft departed the runway surface, sustained a collapsed nose gear, and nosed over. The pilot had been unable to extend the flaps and conducted three landing attempts before the accident occurred.
Circumstances
The pilot initially conducted one approach but performed a go-around. On a second approach, he was again unable to extend the flaps and executed another go-around. On the third attempt, he landed but the aircraft was traveling too fast. It ran off the runway into high grass, which the pilot used to slow the aircraft, then entered a soft plowed field. There, the nose gear broke and the aircraft nosed over.
At the time, the pilot was landing with a tailwind of 11 knots on a runway 3,800 feet long. A longer runway measuring 7,003 feet was located 8 nautical miles west of the landing site. The pilot had made one approach and performed a go-around before the final landing.
Investigation
Examination revealed that a micro-limit-switch had malfunctioned, preventing the flaps from operating. This malfunction was identified as the reason the pilot could not extend the flaps during the approaches.