Crime scene technology to map plane crash site

Investigators examining the wreckage of a mid-air collision in the Manawatu on Thursday in which two young pilots died are using forensic technology developed in road crash and crime scenes.

Brandon James Gedge, 20, of Tauranga, and Dae Jin Hwang, 27, of West Auckland, who were both advanced students of Massey University's School of Aviation, were found dead in their cockpits after their planes crashed near Shannon, southwest of Palmerston North, about 10am.

Debris from their single-engine Piper Cherokee training crafts was scattered over a 500sq m area, with one wrecked plane coming down in a paddock and the second in a ditch.

One plane had had a close call with a rescue helicopter minutes before the fatal collision.

A spokesman for the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA), Bill Sommer, said investigators had yesterday received specialist help from the Wellington Police Serious Crash Unit - the first time the two agencies had cooperated in the field in this way.

Because the wreckage was so spread out, it was decided to call in the police specialists.

Mr Sommer said: "We thought their expertise in doing surveying could be really handy, and so it has been ...

"They have been able to map where everything is relative to other pieces, which could be very important for the accident investigator to work out the sequence of events and what caused it."

The investigators may remove parts of the wreckage to examine some components more closely and once they were satisfied the wreckage would be returned to the owners.

"Thereafter, it's a matter of piecing together the parts of the jigsaw: from eyewitness accounts, aircraft track plots off the radar to any other evidence to hand."

The final report could take nine to 12 months to complete.

- NZPA