Major maintenance mistakes are direct cause of SR22 crash in France in 2016
Interesting read. Clearly the shop did install the washer incorrectly and I would say that is causal. The last page of the report got that right it appears.
That last paragraph could be misinterpreted (not intentionally written that way I am sure). Cirrus may “require a 500 hour / 2 year inspection” but at least for FAA part 91 operators that is optional (and this was a N registry plane). Unless that is a life limited part (chapter 4) it is not required for airworthiness.
This clearly demonstrates the risks of not inspecting, failures like this are rare but real (worst case in this situation). I think the report suggests that inspection would have caught that and it very well might have. But that is not assured either. Either way, if it was a part 91 plane it was up to the owner / operator to make that decision.
We have to live with our decisions.
And it’s another example of how our “unreliable engines” often fail not because of the engine itself, but due to an extrinsic, usually human induced, cause.
Do we know if the pilot and passenger recovered fully from their injuries?
Pierre