A Boeing 737-300 fighting fires has crashed in Australia. According to initial reports, both pilots onboard the aircraft survived the crash and were transported to the hospital with minor injuries. The incident took place at roughly 16:00 local time.
What do we know?
N619SW, operated by Coulson Aviation, departed from Busselton Airport south of Perth on Australia's west coast at 15:32 local time today. According to data from FlightRadar24.com, the aircraft climbed to 29,000 feet en route to assist firefighting efforts in the Fitzgerald River National Park. As it had done previously, the aircraft descended to around 700 ft to drop firefighting substances over the area.
Having dropped the substances, flight tracking data suggests that the aircraft began to climb out of the area as it had many times previously. However, this time the Boeing 737 only managed to reach around 1,800ft before crashing in the vicinity of the fire it had been fighting.
According to 7 News Australia, a police spokesperson commented,
“The two pilots on board were retrieved from the crash site by helicopter and airlifted to Ravensthorpe Airport. Both survived the crash with minor injuries..."
Coulson Aviation posted a statement confirming the crash on its facebook page,
The third mission of the day
Data from FlightRadar24.com shows that the aircraft, currently based out of Busselton, West Australia, was on its third mission of the day. The two preceding tasks had also been to drop firefighting substances over the same area.
The data shows that the aircraft climbed out of the area and returned to its base after dropping the materials on the two previous missions. The two previous flights were each one hour and 20 minutes long. It's not immediately clear what caused the aircraft to crash on the third rotation, though this will be something for air crash investigators to determine.
About the aircraft
N619SW is a 27.32-year-old aircraft. According to data from ch-aviation.com, the aircraft was built in 1995 and was delivered to Southwest Airlines in November of that year. The airline flew for Southwest for just under 22 years, leaving the fleet in August 2017.
The aircraft, maintaining its old Southwest registration, joined the Coulson Aviation fleet in June 2019. As of leaving the airline's fleet, the jet had clocked 69,004 flight hours across 54,436 flight cycles. The aircraft was reportedly due to be registered as N136CG. FlightRadar24.com data suggests that the aircraft has only been fighting fires for Coulson Aviation since last summer.
Simple Flying has contacted Coulson Aviation for comment.
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Sources: 7 News, FlightRadar24.com, ch-aviation