What happened
During the final phase of the approach, the aircraft began to descend at an excessively high rate. In response to this situation, the pilot elected to utilize elevator input exclusively to arrest the sink rate and level the aircraft for touchdown.
This technique resulted in the aircraft impacting the runway surface with significant force. The impact caused the airplane to bounce multiple times. On the third bounce, the structural integrity of the landing gear was compromised, leading to the failure of the nose gear. Following this mechanical failure, the aircraft nosed over onto its fuselage.
The investigation
Post-accident analysis focused on the pilot's decision-making process during the critical approach phase. The pilot later acknowledged that the use of elevator alone was insufficient for correcting the high sink rate and admitted that power adjustments should have been utilized to stabilize the descent profile.