Yak close call

"Kingfish" wrote in message
ps.com...

Bela P. Havasreti wrote:

Makes me want to bring up a comment made by an (forgotten to me
by now, sorry) airshow performer who opined there is no reason to
put an irreplaceable WW-II (or other) warbird at risk by performing
maneuvers that have you "pulling for your life" in order to complete
the manuever.... From an average airshow-goer's perspective,
what's the difference between a low-level pull-up to a split-ess with
a resulting half-cuban dive to the deck (such that, if everything goes
as planned) you live and airplane flies again, from a similar vertical
maneuver that is transformed to a positive G lateral pitch-out
recovery that doesn't have you "pulling for your life" to complete the
manuever. An example of the latter would be a high-G pitch-out with a
roll in excess of 90 degrees which has you recovering at something
less than a 90 degree down-line normal to the plane of the earth....
I've seen more than one high-time airshow warbird performer limit his
act to such maneuvers, and the thought that occurs to me is if the
picture/sight out the windscreen isn't what is expected, he now has
the option of (slightly) leveling the wings and pulling out of the
manuever instead of "pulling for his life" and hoping there is enough
airspace betwixt him and terra firma to stay out of the news /
newspapers....


Hmmphh. Reminds me of a thread from a while back where Peter D jumped
ugly all over me for expressing my opinion that irreplacable warbirds
shouldn't be risked in air races. I thought (and still do) that it'd be
just as exciting for the crowd to see Mustangs, Corsairs, etc doing
simple aero stuff like low passes/steep turns that wouldn't put the
plane at risk unlike the low altitude, high-G yank & bank that happens
in air races. Because I couldn't cite air race/airshow safety
statistics ad nauseum, my position was indefensible (sayeth he)
I think the guys that have the priviledge to own those planes have a
responsibility to preserve them as they are irreplaceable pieces of
history, but then again it's a free country...

Harrummph. There is more that one Peter D. I, for one, find myself of both
sides on many of these issues; and the more I learn, the less I'm sure...

Peter