Pilot locked in F22

On 29-Apr-2007, TheSmokingGnu wrote:

The canopy is held onto the aircraft by those explosive bolts. If those
don't remove the canopy's incentive to remain attached, there's not much
you can do about it.

As a bonus, however, the seatback will punch through the canopy first,
and you're wearing that fancy helmet. Worth a shot, at least! :P

TheSmokingGnu




I can't speak for the F-22, but I can tell you with the F-4 Phantom, if the
canopy didn't jettison, you couldn't eject. There was no such thing as
ejecting through the canopy. And an F-4s canopy wouldn't have jettisoned if
had been stuck closed as it was on that F-22. That's why they had a great
big knife on each canopy's left rail, to cut your way out if you had to.
With the F-4 (and the F-15) the canopy is jettisoned by shooting unregulated
compressed air into the pneumatic actuator normally used to open and close
the canopy. The canopy would open so fast with the unregulated air that it
would snap off the hinges at the rear. There were NO explosive bolts
involved. If the canopy was already open, you couldn't eject either, as the
canopy jettison system couldn't work.
As I said, I don't know what kind of system the F-22 uses, so the above
might not be pertinent. But I do know ejecting has plenty of potential
injuries and hazards. I think they did the right thing by exhausting all
other avenues, then cutting the pilot out.
Scott Wilson
Phormer Phantom comm-nav avionics tech
F-4C 1980-82, F-4E 1982-86