What happened
On 19 August 2017, a Flight Design CT2K, registration G-CBIE, was involved in an accident at a private airstrip located at Peasemore Common, Berkshire. The aircraft, powered by a single Rotax 912 ULS engine, was being operated on a private flight by a pilot with 3,200 total flying hours.
During the flight, the pilot initiated an aborted takeoff. As the aircraft was decelerating, it encountered a patch of rough ground near the end of the grass runway. The impact with this uneven terrain caused the nose landing gear leg to fail. Following the failure, the remaining portion of the gear leg dug into the earth, causing the aircraft to pitch forward and land in an inverted position. The incident resulted in no injuries to the pilot, though the aircraft sustained damage to the propeller, the wing, and the nose landing gear leg.
The investigation
Investigators reviewed the aircraft accident report submitted by the pilot to reconstruct the sequence of events. The examination focused on the conditions of the airstrip and the mechanical failure of the landing gear during the deceleration phase of the aborted takeoff.