"Corky Scott" wrote in message
...
| On Tue, 18 Nov 2003 23:31:56 -0800, "C J Campbell"
| wrote:
|
|
| I believe his was the fifth Lionheart completed and the fourth to crash.
|
| Wow. What's going on here? Too much airplane for too little
| experience?

Short coupled tailwheel airplane landing in a left quartering tailwind with
a serious design flaw in the landing gear. The pilot of the chase plane said
that the Lionheart's pilot was having enormous difficulty controlling the
airplane throughout the flight, with violent pitch excursions. He also had
not had much recent experience landing any tailwheel airplane and none at
all in the Lionheart. The pilot was an ATP currently flying for a major
airline.

It reminds me of a story Mike told me about a pilot at Tacoma Narrows who
finished his homebuilt aircraft after many years of loving work. He was
hesitant to fly it because he was not current and had not flown a tailwheel
airplane in a long time, but his family and friends wanted to see him fly
and so he and Mike worked out a careful plan to test fly it, beginning with
taxi tests, fast taxis, etc. Unfortunately, the man's entire family and many
friends turned out to watch the initial tests, expecting him to fly. Instead
of doing the fast taxi he took off, pitched up too high, and plopped back
down so hard that he jammed the landing gear up through the wings and
folding up the prop on the runway.

His buddies helped him move the plane back into the hangar, only now the
obsession was to get the thing flying again instead of creating a work of
art. Six months later the airplane was ready for another try. The same crowd
turned out and again the pilot was pressured into taking off before he was
ready. Mike said that the man was so fearful he was sweating, pale and
shaking before leaving -- he doesn't know how his family missed it.

He had an impossible time controlling the airplane. He could not land it and
finally the tower had Mike and others trying to talk him down. Mike said he
could hear from the pilot's voice that he was in terrible trouble. Finally,
with the airplane on fumes, the pilot managed a landing and the airplane
coasted to a stop at the end of the runway. But it never pulled off onto the
taxiway and the pilot did not get out. He was dead of a massive heart
attack.

No doubt at the funeral they said of him that he died doing what he loved to
do.