The airline transport pilot/owner was conducting a personal cross-country flight in the Piper Sport LSA.
The pilot reported that, after the main landing gear touched down at the airport in Mansfield, Ohio, he eased the backpressure on the control stick and that the nose landing gear (NLG) then separated from the airplane.
The airplane slid on the runway.
Post-accident examination of the airplane revealed that the NLG had fractured at a weld area.
An airplane manufacturer service bulletin (SB) called for periodic inspection of the NLG for cracks in the weld area every 25 hours.
The pilot reported that the NLG had accumulated a total time in service of 371 hours at the time of the accident and that it was last inspected 31 flight hours before the accident.
Probable cause: The pilot’s failure to inspect the nose landing gear (NLG), which resulted in a crack going undetected and the subsequent separation of the NLG at the weld area during landing.
NTSB Identification: CEN16LA157
This April 2016 accident report is provided by the National Transportation Safety Board. Published as an educational tool, it is intended to help pilots learn from the misfortunes of others.
There are no such things as ADs for LSAs.
First, SBs are not mandatory for Part 91 operations (NTSB should know better).
Next, the SB as quoted by the NTSB should become an AD and in my opinion, the costs born by the manufacturer.
Commercial operations of an aircraft require 100 hour inspections, but the landing gear for these planes must be inspected after 50 cycles or 25 hours which ever comes first.
It appears to me that this will make these aircraft too expensive for flight training because the nose gear doesn’t have the needed “strength”. I’ve seen students practicing for the PPL check ride do nothing but pattern work (15-20 landings?) to hone their precision landing, and so 2-3 students in a day doing this and that airplane now has to be inspected in less than 25 hours $$$ .
When one reads the indicated NTSB report, me thinks this is a design/manufacturing defect for Czech Sport Aircraft AS (and by extension Piper).
So this really sounds like a manufacturing defect worthy of an AD.
Pretty sad when a manufacturer produces a sub standard product and then hides behind a service bulletin or AD to put the responsibility on the consumer. Can you imagine what would happen if a wheel came off of a production automobile and GM, Chrysler or Ford would say, “Oh tough–it’s the driver’s responsibility to check for cracks per our published instructions?” This would create auto owners to scream and the manufacturers would make it right through a recall and fix. We pilots and aircraft owners are suckers for letting the aircraft manufacturers get away with their BS. We need a Ralph Nader to go up against the aircraft companies (and aircraft component companies) who create poor designs and then refuse to rake responsibility.