An urgent phone call this afternoon had me driving in to the airport to find that the clubs Cherokee found itself with a blown left main landing gear tire while turning off the runway. Since it happened before the ILS hold short, the student and instructor had to have the aircraft moved to parking by the local FBO. Thankfully they were able to use a dolly and didn’t do any more damage than had already been done. When I arrived the aircraft was in transient parking and the enterprising student pilot had carried a jack all the way from the hangar over to the disabled aircraft.

After jacking up the aircraft, it was quick work to change the tire and get the aircraft moved back over to the hangar where an inspection of the wheel and landing gear could be conducted. The pilots reported they had no idea what happened, however the wear pattern on the tire suggests brakes were applied a bit too early in this crosswind landing. But what do I know, I’m just a mechanic!

While 43.3 allows pilots to perform preventative maintenance such as replacing a tire, they did the right thing calling in the mechanic in this situation, further damage to the wheel, strut or brakes could have been present and those systems should be inspected following an incident like this one.