Military vehicle model involved in fatal rollover had previously flipped

The six-wheel model of Supacat transporter that rolled killing an Australian soldier had previously been involved in a tip over incident in training, the ABC has confirmed.

A four-wheeled variant used by British forces had been involved in more than 30 rolls including one that caused the death of a Scottish reservist, the ABC also confirmed.

The British rollover led to calls in 2021 from the UK Defence Safety Authority to upgrade roll protection measures in the UK Supacats and modified training operations.

Corporal Brendan Hannam died, and five soldiers were injured when their open-top Supacat High Mobility Transporter rolled at the Mount Bundey training area about 115 kilometres south-east of Darwin on October 5.

Defence has confirmed Corporal Hannam was not the driver of the vehicle.

Following the incident Chief of Army Susan Coyle said Supacat operations had been paused, and it would be "premature" to make any other comment about how the incident occurred.

She said there had "not been" any other incidents involving those kind of vehicles.

Defence has since confirmed one of the Supacat vehicles had tipped in a previous training exercise, after the ABC later revealed it had photographic evidence of an incident showing a vehicle tipped over on its side.

Defence says not a rollover

A spokesperson said the image obtained by the ABC was likely of a 2020 accident on a driver training course which did not cause any injuries or damage to the vehicle.

The spokesperson said the vehicle in the image was not considered to have "rolled over" but to have "layed over".

The incident was classed as a "lay over" because the vehicle had not undertaken "significant rotational movement onto its roof after one or more complete rotations", according to the spokesperson.

Asked if Lieutenant General Coyle was aware of the 2020 "lay over" incident and what investigation had resulted, the spokesperson said it was inappropriate to comment due to the ongoing investigation into the Mount Bundey incident.

Questions over UK incidents

Defence has also declined to comment on whether any safety upgrades or changes to training were made in relation to Australia's Supacat fleet following the death of a UK soldier in 2019 in a four-wheeler British variant of the Supacat high mobility vehicle called a Jackal.

The Jackal, developed from the same platform that was used as the base for Australia's six-wheel Supacat Extenda models, is the company's flagship model.

It boasts a similar "open architecture" design with a series of roll bars to protect crew and has been in service with the UK forces from 2007.

In 2019 one of the Jackals, a model 2, rolled during a training exercise in the UK, killing the driver, Staff Sergeant John McKelvie, and throwing the instructor from the vehicle at a training ground.

An official UK military inquiry was held into the incident in 2021 and an inquest in 2024.

The inquest heard there had been more than 30 rollover incidents involving the UK Jackals that had led to some soldiers suffering head and neck injuries.

The military inquiry findings, released in 2021, raised concerns about the Jackal's inadequate rollover protection and officially recommended roll safety upgrades to all high mobility Supacats and changes to training operations.

Concerns were raised about the individual roll bars not being designed to support the full weight of the vehicle and occupants being at risk from objects intruding into the open cabin area during a roll.

It also raised questions how a Jackal had failed a tilt trial but there had been no evidence that the results of this trial had been used to determine a safe operating envelope of the vehicle.

"Additionally the panel found that vehicle crews had no means by which to measure the tilt of the vehicle while driving or surveying the ground on foot,'' the inquiry report stated.

This was considered a "contributory factor", it stated.

The inquiry made more than 50 recommendations to improve safety with many related to rollover protection including that crews should be informed of vehicle tilt limitations and there be a mechanism to determine vehicle angle to stay within safe operational limits.

Some of the recommendations called for changes in the UK to "all High Mobility Truck variant vehicles" such as a demand to improve protection of crew members taking into account "rollover events, neck protection, helmet design and vehicle design to ensure adequate protection is provided to vehicle occupants".

Changes to the wire cutter bar design to reduce the risk of crew injury in a rollover, were also recommended.

Efforts to obtain comment from Supacat have been unsuccessful.

In 2023 Supacat's UK company released a promotional video on Youtube that said: "to meet the new roll over protection requirements Supacat have designed a new system that will be integrated into the current fleets whilst already built into the new integrated armoured cab."

Four deaths in five years

Corporal Hannam's funeral was held on October 19.

The highly experienced soldier who had done two tours of Afghanistan left a wife and two children. The five soldiers who were injured in the crash have since been discharged from hospital, Defence says.

Corporal Hannam is the fourth soldier to die in the past five years in rollover incidents involving military vehicles.

In October 2025, Australian soldier Lance Corporal Tulsa Rumney was killed when an armoured personal carrier rolled at a training area west of Townsville.

In August 2021, Craftsman Brendon Payne and Warrant Officer Ryan Leslie died when the heavy recovery vehicle they were driving rolled near the Townsville Field Training area in North Queensland.

Following the Mount Bundey accident Defence Minister Richard Marles said he had asked Chief of Defence Admiral Mark Hammond "to look at what might be the best vehicle to examine issues such as risk settings, management of fatigue, appropriate training across Army and the defence force".

Australia's Supacats have largely been used by the special forces, the commandos and the Special Air Service Regiment.

In the 2000s, Australia purchased a four-wheel version of the Supacat that is similar to the Jackal and was named the Nary after Special Air Service Regiment Warrant Officer David Nary who died in a pre-deployment training exercise in Kuwait in 2005.

In the mid 2010s, Australia purchased 89 of Supacat's high mobility transporter Extenda vehicles at a cost of about $130 million according to official statements from the then-Defence Minister David Johnson.

The Extendas were filmed on operations at Mount Bundey as recently as earlier this year.