On 9 June 1995, the de Havilland Canada Dash 8-100[1] aircraft crashed into the Tararua Range on approach to Palmerston North.

Distracted by the first officer's attempt to lower the gear, the captain allowed the aircraft to drift off-profile towards the Tararua Range.

After passengers also noticed the landing gear was not fully extended, the flight attendant communicated with the pilots to inform them of the situation.

Less than ten seconds after the first officer pulled the manual release handle, the ground proximity warning system (GPWS) sounded.

The pilots pulled back on the control column and raised the nose to 8 degrees; before they could fully react to the GPWS alarm, the plane impacted the ground at 9:22 AM.

During the impact, a flight attendant who was unrestrained and leaning over a seat back to talk to a passenger was thrown to the floor and suffered fatal head injuries.

A passenger, William McGrory, found his work briefcase in the wreckage and used his mobile phone (an uncommon device in 1995) inside it to call 111.

Aircraft manufacturer De Havilland had issued several service bulletins regarding the risk of gear "hang-ups", and in August 1992, introduced a re-designed uplock actuator assembly to minimise failures.

In October 1994, de Havilland issued an All Operator Message discussing a hang-up on another Dash 8 due to a seized roller.

In this case, greater force and repeated pulls were required on the alternate main gear release handle to operate the uplock.

According to the TAIC report, an audio alarm telling the crew to climb the aircraft should have sounded 17 seconds before impact, but the GPWS malfunctioned, for reasons that have never been determined.

Later study of the wreckage of Flight 703 revealed that the antennas for the radar altimeter (which sends a signal to the GPWS indicating how far above the ground the aircraft is) had been painted and this possibly reduced the GPWS' ability to provide a timely alarm, although later comments by TAIC insisted the paint did not block or reflect signals.

At the time of the incident, New Zealand had not enacted section 5.12 of Convention on International Civil Aviation Annex 13, which made evidence taken as part of an accident investigation inadmissible in criminal proceedings.

In response, Parliament passed the Transport Accident Investigation Commission Amendment Act 1999 to implement section 5.12 of Annex 13.

[7] After a six-week trial at the Palmerston North High Court in June 2001, the jury found Sotheran not guilty on all charges.

[5] Ansett New Zealand Flight 703 was dramatised in the 8th episode of Season 21 on the show Mayday titled "Caught in a Jam".