What happened
On January 11, 1999, an aircraft was conducting a local check flight for a new owner-pilot at Frankfurt Egelsbach Airport in Egelsbach. During the final stages of a visual approach to Runway 27, the aircraft was descending through approximately 150 feet when the pilot moved the throttles back to ground idle. Although the pilot attempted to correct the situation by immediately advancing the throttles, the aircraft had already entered a high rate of descent. As a result, the aircraft made a very hard touchdown at the runway threshold. The impact caused the nose gear and the left main landing gear to break off from the airframe.
Findings
- The primary factor in the accident was the unintended reduction of engine power to idle during the descent phase of the approach, which led to an excessive rate of descent and a subsequent heavy landing.