pro wrote:

Being a military plane, would he have had the ability to eject?


Anthony W wrote:

Harry K wrote:

patrick mitchel wrote:

A hawker hunter flown by Robert Guilford went down departing an
airshow in
oregon. There was a question as to the series/specs of the hunter
that went
down on the rec.aviation.military ng. Anyone familiar with the
plane/pilot
combo? Thanks Pat
I was at the KHIO air show and looked at his airplane, it was a beautiful
airplane and he loved to show it and talk about it. The plane went down
about 3 miles from my house. I had left the air show about 30 minutes
before he took off to fly back to southern Calif. A lot of the news
reports had him crashing doing the air show but that was not true he was
just on his way home. As far as his ability to eject, yes he did have
that ability and had just had his ejection seat inspected and it was
good to go. the problem is he was taking off may have flamed out
on takeoff, the witness say he never ever really established a climb rate
and that he had used a big share of our 6500 ft runway at Hillsboro. The
witness in the neighborhood he landed in said it was silent as it came
down. It totally destroyed one house and damaged at least three others.
No one on the ground was hurt and they think the reason he did not eject
is because he was trying to steer away from a big shopping complex in
his path.

Don't take any of this as gospel because we will not know what really
happened till the NTSB reports come out. I did not see it happen and
only am reporting what I have heard around the airport and on the local
news channels. It is a sad thing to have happened and is the first crash
associated with the Hillsboro, Oregon air show in 19 years. Of course
now the future of the air show is in doubt.

His son has been interviewed on the local news and told about how much
his dad loved the airplane and how he flew a mechanic over here from
England every year to do the inspections and maintenance.

Jerry