A Cessna 404 Titan aircraft was being operated on a scheduled
passenger service from Cairns to Aurukun.
At 1116 EST, the crew reported to Brisbane Air Traffic Control
that they were holding overhead Aurukun with an unsafe landing gear
indication. At about 1212 EST, the crew advised ATC that they
intended to land at Arukun. The aircraft's nose landing gear
collapsed soon after contacting the runway during the landing roll.
The aircraft sustained significant impact damage to both propellers
and the nose landing gear, and abrasion damage to the forward
underside of the fuselage. There were no injuries.
The pilot later reported that the flight had proceeded normally
until about 200 feet above ground level during approach to land
when he noticed the red landing-gear unlocked light illuminate. All
three green landing-gear down lights were also illuminated. The
crew conducted a missed approach and then held overhead the runway
while assessing the problem, and to reduce the fuel load. They
found that the landing-gear circuit breaker had tripped. The crew
reset the circuit breaker but it tripped again immediately. They
then attempted to extend the landing-gear using the emergency
system, but were unsuccessful.
The landing gear system was examined by company engineering
personnel, who informed the ATSB that they found that electrical
arcing had occurred across multiple terminals in the cannon plug
connector located at the bulkhead of the nose-wheel well. Several
of the terminals had fused together, causing the erroneous landing
gear position indications. The most likely reason for the arcing
was the ingress of moisture. The emergency extension system
operated normally when tested by maintenance personnel who advised
that the crew had probably not operated the emergency extension
system correctly.
The ATSB did not conduct an on site investigation of this
accident. All information relating to the accident was obtained
from the flight crew and company engineering personnel.