Thunderbird Crash Footage

Many thanks to this group's own John Osterhout for forwarding me these cool
videos of the Thunderbirds crash from last fall:
http://www.alexisparkinn.com/aviation_videos.htm

There are two separate videos -- one shot from inside the cockpit (that many
of us have seen, but is still remarkable) -- and one taken by a spectator
that I'd never seen before. It shows the entire event from start to horrible
finish.

Having seen the T-Birds do their show dozens of times, flawlessly, it's
still hard to believe that they made such a simple mistake. (The final
judgment was that the pilot had set his altimeter incorrectly, resulting in
insufficient altitude for the maneuver.)
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

The pilot survived, right?


"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
news:_HO0c.450298$na.1090802@attbi_s04...
Many thanks to this group's own John Osterhout for forwarding me these
cool
videos of the Thunderbirds crash from last fall:
http://www.alexisparkinn.com/aviation_videos.htm

There are two separate videos -- one shot from inside the cockpit (that
many
of us have seen, but is still remarkable) -- and one taken by a spectator
that I'd never seen before. It shows the entire event from start to
horrible
finish.

Having seen the T-Birds do their show dozens of times, flawlessly, it's
still hard to believe that they made such a simple mistake. (The final
judgment was that the pilot had set his altimeter incorrectly, resulting
in
insufficient altitude for the maneuver.)
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

The pilot survived, right?

His health is fine.

His career, I sadly suspect, is not.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
newsJQ0c.13888$ko6.201585@attbi_s02...
The pilot survived, right?

His health is fine.

His career, I sadly suspect, is not.

Why do you call it a "horrible finish". Nobody got hurt and we got to see a
cool ejection sequence!!

The moral of the story here is that ANY pilot can make a relatively SIMPLE
mistake.

Why do you call it a "horrible finish". Nobody got hurt and we got to see
a
cool ejection sequence!!

You forgot the little smiley thingy. :-)

But assuming you're not joking, for a moment, there a zillion reasons to
call it a horrible finish. Hell, just from a taxpayer's standpoint I'm
****ed that we're out $20 million because the guy couldn't set his altimeter
correctly.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
news:iMR0c.452166$na.1092261@attbi_s04...
Why do you call it a "horrible finish". Nobody got hurt and we got to
see
a
cool ejection sequence!!

You forgot the little smiley thingy. :-)

But assuming you're not joking, for a moment, there a zillion reasons to
call it a horrible finish. Hell, just from a taxpayer's standpoint I'm
****ed that we're out $20 million because the guy couldn't set his
altimeter
correctly.

I am not perturbed by a pilot making an honest mistake and wasting a $20
million airplane. That's a cost of 8 cents per person. There are a bunch of
thieves running the country, deliberately giving your money to corporate
interests. Now THAT is something to be worried about.

he set it correctly.. his mental math was in error..

BT

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
news:iMR0c.452166$na.1092261@attbi_s04...
Why do you call it a "horrible finish". Nobody got hurt and we got to
see
a
cool ejection sequence!!

You forgot the little smiley thingy. :-)

But assuming you're not joking, for a moment, there a zillion reasons to
call it a horrible finish. Hell, just from a taxpayer's standpoint I'm
****ed that we're out $20 million because the guy couldn't set his
altimeter
correctly.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

"Jay Honeck" writes:

The pilot survived, right?

His health is fine.

His career, I sadly suspect, is not.

A comment from one of the ASF people at a CFIRC I was at over the
past weekend was that he is now flying a desk at the Pentagon.

The same man stated that the problem was that the pilot had become
too comfortable with practicing the maneuver at his home base, which
was about 800 (+/-; I don't recall the exact number) feet lower
than the airfield at which the accident occurred. At the accident
location he set up the split-S so that the top was at the proper
altitude MSL -- at his home base, meaning that the entire maneuver
was executed 800 feet lower than it should have been.

I have *no* military jet experience, but especially for airshows I'm
somewhat surprised that there isn't an altimeter set to QFE to serve
as a sanity check against exactly this sort of problem.

Joe Morris

"Joe Morris" wrote in message
...
"Jay Honeck" writes:

The pilot survived, right?

His health is fine.

His career, I sadly suspect, is not.

A comment from one of the ASF people at a CFIRC I was at over the
past weekend was that he is now flying a desk at the Pentagon.

The same man stated that the problem was that the pilot had become
too comfortable with practicing the maneuver at his home base, which
was about 800 (+/-; I don't recall the exact number) feet lower
than the airfield at which the accident occurred. At the accident
location he set up the split-S so that the top was at the proper
altitude MSL -- at his home base, meaning that the entire maneuver
was executed 800 feet lower than it should have been.

I have *no* military jet experience, but especially for airshows I'm
somewhat surprised that there isn't an altimeter set to QFE to serve
as a sanity check against exactly this sort of problem.

Joe Morris

Newbie ignorance:

What does QFE stand for?

Jay Beckman
Chandler, AZ
Student Pilot
3.2 Hrs ... Nowhere to go but up?

"Jay Beckman" wrote in message news:UU31c.12459$id3.7043@fed1read01...
What does QFE stand for?

QFE is the altimeter setting that will cause the instrument to read zero at the field
elevation. It's used a lot in relatively low lying places (like the UK). If you've
got some real elevations you run out little numbers in the altimeter to dry to get
the proper QFE in there.