This Date in Aviation History: August 11 - August 14

"ttyymmnn" (ttyymmnn) 08/14/2018 at 12:35 • Filed to: wingspan, planelopnik history, Planelopnik

7

25

!!! UNKNOWN CONTENT TYPE !!!

Welcome to This Date in Aviation History , getting of you caught up on milestones, important historical events and people in aviation from August 11 through August 14.

!!! UNKNOWN CONTENT TYPE !!!

August 12, 1985 – The crash of Japan Airlines Flight 123. The age of aircraft cabin pressurization began in 1938 with the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , and today, modern airliners use bleed air from the engines at the compressor stage so that aircraft flying at 35,000 feet or higher can be pressurized to maintain the same air pressure inside the cabin as if it were flying at no more than 8,000 feet. (The FAA mandates a maximum of 8,000 feet, while most airliners maintain 6000-7000 feet, and some business jets can maintain sea-level pressure.) But pumping that much air into the fuselage puts enormous stress on the aircraft, and repeated compressions and decompressions can weaken an aircraft over time. This lesson was learned tragically when a series of fatal, explosive decompressions plagued the world’s first jet-powered airliner, the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , in the 1950s. De Havilland had fitted the Comet with large, rectangular windows, and crash investigators discovered that the cyclical compression and decompression of the aircraft caused metal fatigue and cracks around the large windows, which then led to fatal aircraft breakups. The Comet was redesigned to use oval windows, which then became an industry standard.

A cutaway of the empennage of a Boeing 747 showing the location of the rear pressure bulkhead. (Author unknown)

Aside from the windows, another critical component of aircraft pressurization is the rear pressure bulkhead, a circular, dome-shaped structure that closes off the aft end of the passenger compartment tube from the rest of the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . This bulkhead must be regularly and rigorously inspected and, if damaged, must be repaired precisely to the standards set by the manufacturer. But that was not the case with Japan Airlines Flight 123, a !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! (JA8119) that took off from Haneda Airport in Tokyo for a short, one-hour flight to Osaka International Airport. Just 12 minutes departure, the aft pressure bulkhead ruptured, leading to a rapid depressurization of the cabin and the loss of most of the vertical stabilizer. When the stabilizer broke free, it ruptured all four hydraulic lines, leaving the plane almost completely uncontrollable. Captain Masami Takahama, a veteran 747 pilot with over 12,000 hours of flight time (4,850 in the 747), along with his flight crew, managed to regain some measure control using engine throttle inputs. But landing the plane safely would be next to impossible. Their skilled piloting kept the plane in the air for 32 minutes, long enough for many of the passengers to write farewell notes to their families. When the plane eventually crashed near Mount Osutaka, 505 passengers and crew were killed, making it the deadliest single-aircraft accident in history. Four passengers survived, and it is surmised that more may have lived had the Japanese government acted more quickly to reach the crash site.

The cause of the bulkhead rupture was traced to an improper repair following a tail strike seven years earlier which had damaged the aft pressure bulkhead. Rather than provide a redundant overlap of the bulkhead sections as dictated by Boeing, technicians in Japan instead used two separate splice plates, leaving the bulkhead dangerously weak. Even though the aircraft had gone through over 12,000 pressurization cycles before the crash, the bulkhead finally burst on that fateful day. Though JAL officially admitted no liability, they agreed to pay $7.6 million of “condolence money” to the families of the victims, JAL’s president resigned, and a maintenance manager committed suicide in atonement for his error. JAL no longer uses the number 123 for any flight, and has changed the flight number on that particular route to 127.

!!! UNKNOWN CONTENT TYPE !!!

Jimmy Doolittle’s Thompson Trophy winning Gee Bee Model R. (Author unknown)

August 13, 1932 – The first flight of the Gee Bee Model R. The speed at which the airplane went from its first flight in 1903 to breaking the sound barrier in 1947 years is truly extraordinary. A mere eight years after the Wright Brothers first flight, the Italians were flying heavier-than-air aircraft in war, and the fighter plane became a fixture in the skies over the battlefields of WWI. Since then, war has been one of the great drivers of advances in aviation, but the period between the World Wars, known as the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , saw the mantle of technological evolution pass into civilian hands. Aircraft design left fabric-covered airframes behind and replaced them with metal monoplanes of increasing size, strength and speed. And, just as the first automobile drivers pitted themselves against each other in contests of speed, airplane races became hugely popular. Contests of speed such as the the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! drew entrants from around the world, and helped spur ever more experimentation and innovation.

Beginning in 1920, newspaper publisher !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! initiated the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! in the United States, which included the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! races sponsored by Thompson Products (the company that would eventually become the aerospace and automotive company !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! ) which began in 1929. These contests of speed and piloting skill pitted aircraft and pilots in closed-course races around pylons, and the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! arose to recognize the fastest time between two points. In the quest to create the fastest aircraft possible, !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! built a series of powerful racers beginning with the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! in 1930. All the aircraft featured cockpits that barely rose above the fuselage, relatively short wings, and enormous radial engines. The planes were definitely fast, but they were also notoriously difficult to fly. Most of them crashed, claiming the life a number of pilots, including Zantford Granville, one of the five Granville brothers.

With the Gee Bee Model z, the Granville Brothers were approaching the classic and unmistakable shape of the Model R. (Author unknown)

Undeterred, the remaining Granville brothers forged ahead in 1931 with the Gee Bee (as in GB, or Granville Brothers) Model Z, which was essentially nothing more than a !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! supercharged radial engine with wings. The stubby design certainly was fast, with a top speed of nearly 270 mph, and it won the Thompson Trophy in 1932. But with its stubby wings and minimal vertical stabilizer it was also extremely difficult to fly, and a crash while attempting a world speed record killed pilot Lowell Bayles. Though the crash caused significant damage to the reputation of the Granville Brothers, they followed the Model Z with the Model R, perhaps the best known of the Gee Bee aircraft.

A cutaway of the Gee Bee Model R. (Author unknown)

The Model R was two feet longer, and featured a refined fuselage shape that its designers hoped would make it more aerodynamic. The wings were lengthened slightly, but the cockpit was placed even farther back on the diminutive fuselage, and it was driven by a still more powerful !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! radial engine which provided 800 hp. The Model R continued to be a very difficult airplane to fly, even in the hands of experienced aviators. But the new design, with a top speed of nearly 300 mph, also allowed the pilot to lap the racing pylons in a knife-edge turn without losing altitude and, in the hands of skilled aviators such as the famed aviator !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , the Model R won the Thompson Trophy in 1932 and set a land plane world speed record of 296 mph.

But the R-1 itself continued to be a handful to fly, and pilot Russell Boardman was killed flying a Gee Bee in 1933. Doolittle perhaps realized that he was cheating death and retired from air racing after his 1932 win. He went on to a storied career in the US Army Air Forces, where he commanded the audacious !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! on Tokyo in April 1942. None of the original Gee Bee aircraft exist today, but some replicas are still flown by brave pilots in the quest for speed.

!!! UNKNOWN CONTENT TYPE !!!

An RAF Tornado over Iraq in 2014. (Cpl Neil Bryden, Royal Air Force)

August 14, 1974 – The first flight of the Panavia Tornado. Throughout the history military aircraft, various schools of thought have arisen on how best to employ warplanes. In WWI, aircraft started out purely as observation planes, but then evolved into dedicated fighter aircraft. By WWII, there remained dedicated fighters, but also purpose-built !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! aircraft, !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , and !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . These basic categories continued into the jet age, but by the 1960s designers began to investigate the concept of the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! fighter, one plane that could do the job of several different aircraft and thus eliminate the need to develop and maintain multiple types for specific tasks. At the same time, designers in the United Kingdom began investigating the benefits of a variable geometry fighter aircraft, one that could sweep the wings out for lower speed flight or sweep them back for high speed flight.

Various European allies were working towards the same goal of a new multirole fighter, and it soon became apparent that working together would be more efficient than working individually. In 1960, four nations—the United Kingdom, Germany, Italy, and the Netherlands—agreed to form a multinational company called !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! to work together on the development of a Multirole Combat Aircraft (MRCA) capable of carrying out tactical strike missions, reconnaissance, air defense, and maritime patrol and attack. Britain was hoping to replace the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! bomber and the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! attack aircraft, while West Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, Italy and Canada were looking for a replacement for the problematic !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! interceptor and ground attacker. Eventually the consortium decided on the Panavia 200, a swing-wing aircraft that would be developed into the Tornado.

An RAF Tornado GR4 of 15 Squadron armed with laser guided bombs (SAC Scott Ferguson, UK Ministry of Defence)

The resulting design featured wings that swept between 25 and 67 degrees with hard points under the wings that swiveled as the wing swept. Power for Tornado comes from a pair of !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! afterburning (reheating) turbofans which provide a top speed of Mach 2.2. The Tornado is armed with a single 27 mm !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! cannon and has the ability to carry 19,800 pounds of external ordnance as well as up to four nuclear bombs. A tandem cockpit with pilot in front and navigator/weapons officer in the rear was included to reduce pilot workload.

A US Air Force F-15C Eagle from Bitburg Air Base leads a pair of German Luftwaffe Tornados during a fly past over Germany (US Air Force)

The flight of the first prototype took place in West Germany in 1974, and the Tornado entered service first with the Luftwaffe in July 1979 followed by other partner nations. The Tornado eventually formed the backbone of the aerial attack and defense air forces of Britain, Germany, Italy and Saudi Arabia. German Tornados took part in the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , the first combat operations by the Luftwaffe since WWII. British and Italian Tornados saw action as part of the NATO force in !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , and the RAF flew scores of missions with the Tornado during the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , eventually being complemented by older !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! which were used as target definition aircraft. A total of 992 Tornados of all variants were built by the time production ended in 1998, and continuing upgrades will ensure continued service for many years to come.

!!! UNKNOWN CONTENT TYPE !!!

Short Takeoff

!!! UNKNOWN CONTENT TYPE !!!

(Tim Shaffer)

August 11, 1995 – The first flight of the Embraer ERJ-145, the largest of a family of commuter airliners that includes the ERJ 140 (up to 44 passengers) and the ERJ 135 (up to 37 passengers). With accommodation for 50 passengers, the ERJ 145 was developed as a faster and more comfortable alternative to the turboprop regional airliners in service at the time. Powered by a pair of !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! high bypass turbofan engines, the ERJ 145 has a maximum cruising speed of about 515 mph, and the XR long-range variant can travel up to 2,000 nautical miles. More than 900 have been produced since 1989, and it remains in production today.

!!! UNKNOWN CONTENT TYPE !!!

(US Air Force)

August 11, 1972 – The first flight of the Northrop F-5E Tiger II, an upgraded version of the Northrop F-5A Freedom Fighter and winner of the International Fighter Aircraft competition in 1970. In an effort to make the F-5A more competitive with the Soviet !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , Northrop lengthened and enlarged the F-5A to provide room for more fuel and improved avionics, and fitted more powerful !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! engines for increased speed. The wing area was also increased by the addition of larger leading edge extensions for better maneuverability, and Northrop equipped the F-5E with an !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! radar, where the F-5A/B had none. Almost 1,400 F-5E/Fs were built, and they saw extensive service with American allies. Though tested in combat by the US Air Force in 1965 during Operation Skoshi Tiger , where the F-5E received its nickname, the Tiger II never entered regular service with the USAF, though it does serve in the aggressor role for US combat flight training.

!!! UNKNOWN CONTENT TYPE !!!

(US Air Force)

August 11, 1955 – The first flight of the Bell XV-3. Though not the first !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! aircraft, the Bell XV-3 verified the tiltrotor concept and eventually completed 110 successful transitions from vertical to horizontal and back to vertical flight. The XV-3 was powered by a single !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! radial engine located in the fuselage which turned a pair of two-bladed rotors (the prototype had a three-bladed rotor) through a drive assembly that could rotate through 90 degrees. While only two aircraft were built, data from the XV-3 program was used to develop the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , which then paved the way for the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! tiltrotor in service today.

!!! UNKNOWN CONTENT TYPE !!!

(UK Government)

August 11, 1937 – The first flight of the Boulton Paul Defiant, a “turret fighter” interceptor developed for the RAF just prior to the outbreak of WWII. At the time, the RAF envisioned waves of unescorted German bombers flying over England, and the turret fighter concept would allow the pilot to focus on flying below or alongside the bomber while the gunner, along with other Defiants, concentrated the firepower of four !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! .303 caliber machine guns on the bomber. In practice, the Defiant proved to be vulnerable to more maneuverable escort fighters such as the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , and it was eventually converted to a night fighter before being replaced in the interceptor role by the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . The Defiant was then used for gunnery practice and as a target tug. Just over 1,000 were built, and it was retired at the end of the war.

!!! UNKNOWN CONTENT TYPE !!!

(NASA)

August 12, 2018 – The launch of the Parker Solar Probe, a robotic probe built by NASA and the first to investigate the Sun’s !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! by passing through it . The probe will take approximately seven years to reach the sun, flying ever shrinking elliptical orbits, and scientific observations will take place each time the probe passes close to the Sun. Launched atop a !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! rocket, the Parker Solar Probe will pass the Sun on December 7, 2025 at 3. 85 million miles at its closest while flying at a speed of roughly 430,000 mph. The goal of the mission is to study the Sun’s corona in the hopes of improving the forecast of space weather events that directly affect life on Earth.

!!! UNKNOWN CONTENT TYPE !!!

(NASA)

August 12, 1960 – The launch of Echo 1A, an experimental passive communications satellite and the first of two enormous, metal-coated balloons placed into low Earth orbit. The balloons acted as passive reflectors of microwave signals that could be bounced off the balloon and back to Earth. The launch of Echo 1 on May 13, 1960 fell into the Atlantic Ocean when a stage of the newly-designed !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! launch system failed, but the launch of Echo 1A was successful, and a microwave transmission from the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! in California was received at !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! in New Jersey. Echo 1 was followed four years later by Echo 2, which was 35 feet larger and was placed in a polar orbit that was visible from Earth with the naked eye. Echo 1A burned up in Earth’s atmosphere in 1968, followed by Echo 2 a year later.

!!! UNKNOWN CONTENT TYPE !!!

August 13, 1976 – The first flight of the Bell 222, a light executive and utility helicopter and the first of its class to have two turbine engines. The 222 also features retractable landing gear housed in sponsons on the sides of the fuselage and an advanced vibration reduction system. A total of 199 were built from 1980-1991, and it was developed into a number of variants, including the 222B configuration with a larger main rotor, and the 222UT (Utility Twin) which replaced the landing gear with fixed skids. In 1991, Bell upgraded the 222 to the 230, which had more powerful Allison 250 turboshaft engines, and later with the still larger and more powerful Bell 430. A cosmetically modified Bell 222 appeared as the titular helicopter in the television series !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! that ran from 1984-1987.

!!! UNKNOWN CONTENT TYPE !!!

August 13, 1962 – The first flight of the British Aerospace 125, a twin-engine corporate jet originally developed by de Havilland as the DH.125 Jet Dragon and designed as a replacement for the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . Following the purchase of de Havilland by !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! in 1960, the 125 entered production as the Hawker Siddeley HS.125, while later models were known as the Hawker 800. One of the earliest business jets, the 125 found a wide open market for executives and government agencies, including the US Air Force, where it was known as the C-29, and the Royal Air Force, who flew it as a navigation trainer designated the Hawker Siddeley Dominie T1. A 125 was also owned by Formula 1 driver !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . More than 1,600 aircraft were produced from 1962-2013.

!!! UNKNOWN CONTENT TYPE !!!

(Author unknown)

August 13, 1939 – The first flight of the Vickers Warwick, an aircraft designed and built by !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! originally as a bomber to complement the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . The Warwick went through a long and difficult development process, and was ultimately deemed to be redundant by the time it entered service in 1942, resulting in only 16 being delivered as bombers. The rest of the nearly 850 aircraft produced still found roles to fill, serving as transports, maritime reconnaissance and anti-submarine patrol, and for air-sea rescue. Most of the production Warwicks were fitted with a deployable lifeboat (see photo) which was dropped to the crews of downed bombers over the English Channel or North Sea.

!!! UNKNOWN CONTENT TYPE !!!

(US Coast Guard)

August 14, 1958 – The first flight of the Grumman Gulfstream I. Grumman’s work on the development of a turboprop-powerd executive transport began with discussions about converting either the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! or !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! for transport duties. Grumman eventually settled on an entirely new design which became the Gulfstream and featured a low cantilever wing monoplane plead by two !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! turboprops. Depending on the configuration, the Gulfstream can accommodate from 10-24 passengers and it became a popular commuter airliner. It was also adopted by the US military as the C-4, and a modified version known as the TC-4C was used for navigator training. A handful remain in operation today, mostly with charter airline Phoenix Air. A total of 200 were built from 1959-1969.

!!! UNKNOWN CONTENT TYPE !!!

Ukrainian government)

August 14, 1933 – The first flight of the Tupolev ANT-14, the first all-metal aircraft produced in Russia and the flagship of the Soviet propaganda squadron. The ANT-14 was an enlarged version of the three-engined !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , and was powered by five !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!!   !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , two on each wing and one in the nose. Capable of carrying 36 passengers, the ANT-14 never entered production, as there was no need at the time for such a large passenger aircraft. Consequently, it was named Pravda ( Truth ) and carried out sightseeing flights over the Russian capital of Moscow, carrying over 40,000 passengers before it was retired in 1941.

!!! UNKNOWN CONTENT TYPE !!!

Connecting Flights

!!! UNKNOWN CONTENT TYPE !!!

!!! UNKNOWN CONTENT TYPE !!!

!!! UNKNOWN CONTENT TYPE !!!

!!! UNKNOWN CONTENT TYPE !!!

!!! UNKNOWN CONTENT TYPE !!!

If you enjoy these Aviation History posts, please let me know in the comments. And if you missed any of the past articles, you can find them all at !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . You can also find more stories about aviation, aviators and airplane oddities at !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! .

!!! UNKNOWN CONTENT TYPE !!!

KingT- 60% of the time, it works every time > ttyymmnn 08/14/2018 at 12:54

1

I love swing-wing aircraft and the Tornado is one of my all time favorites, especially in this DesertPink color scheme

Hoping to buy or build a scale model someday

https://armchairaviator.com.au/shop/corgi-aa39806-tornado-gr1-diecast-model/

ttyymmnn > KingT- 60% of the time, it works every time 08/14/2018 at 12:57

0

I finally saw my first Tornado up close at the US Air Force Museum of all places. 

KingT- 60% of the time, it works every time > ttyymmnn 08/14/2018 at 13:00

2

Same. I got the chills seeing it and I was like “Holy fucking shit they have a Tornado!”

facw > ttyymmnn 08/14/2018 at 13:07

2

I probably said this last year as well, but every time I read about JAL 123, it’s just so incredibly frustrating to think that the Japanese response team not only decided to wait until morning to go to the crash site, but also that they rejected offers from the nearby US base to send helicopters to the site immediately following the crash.

ttyymmnn > facw 08/14/2018 at 13:09

1

Yeah, that was a cock up of epic proportions. To know that people died because the rescuers refused to go is just heartbreaking.

facw > ttyymmnn 08/14/2018 at 13:14

0

Yep, and of course we have another (probably much worse) emergency response coming up next week...

ttyymmnn > facw 08/14/2018 at 13:16

0

Saudia 163?

Chan - Mid-engine with cabin fever > ttyymmnn 08/14/2018 at 13:19

2

I was barely born at the time of JA 123, but the fallout continued in media and pop culture through the rest of 1980s Asia. I was in Hong Kong and I guess part of the media attention was due to the loss of several locals in the crash.

CI611, another 747, also broke up mid-flight in 2002 due to improper tailstrike repair conducted at Taipei, with no survivors.

The effect  on the maintenance engineers’ conscience must be incredibly haunting.

facw > ttyymmnn 08/14/2018 at 13:20

1

Yep. If you successfully land the stricken plane, but then let everyone die anyway, you’ve clearly done something very wrong. Though there I would put much of the blame on the pilots for not evacuating immediately after landing, as opposed to JAL 123 where all accounts indicate that the pilots had to show astounding skill just to keep the plane airborne as long as they did.

Highlander-Datsuns are Forever > ttyymmnn 08/14/2018 at 13:26

2

How even do you do the number 2 repair? I’ve done a lot of repair and weld details and the number 2 repair has a useless splice plate and extra rivets that add nothing to the structure.

ttyymmnn > Chan - Mid-engine with cabin fever 08/14/2018 at 13:32

0

Yeah, but that half-assed repair on JA123 was criminal. The guy who committed hara kiri did the only honorable thing.

ttyymmnn > Highlander-Datsuns are Forever 08/14/2018 at 13:37

2

Criminal negligence. From the inside, it looks right. I’m no engineer and I can barely drive a nail straight, but even I can tell that’s a BS repair.

user314 > ttyymmnn 08/14/2018 at 14:20

0

I’m just amused that after all the jokes, NASA did in fact send a probe to the sun at night. 

ttyymmnn > user314 08/14/2018 at 14:27

2

I hadn’t thought of the irony of that until you pointed it out. “How do they get to the Sun if they can’t see it??/?”

TheRealBicycleBuck > ttyymmnn 08/14/2018 at 14:46

2

“The 222 also features retractable landing gear housed in sponsons on the sides of the fuselage and an advanced vibration reduction system.”

The “Advanced vibration reduction system” was quite radical in that it reduced external  vibrations by blowing the offending source into little bitty bits. 

user314 > KingT- 60% of the time, it works every time 08/14/2018 at 15:09

1

I had, back in the day, a Revell 1/32 scale IDS Tornado

It was a very pretty airplane, but it was heug liek xbox, and had to go during downsizing.

I’d love to get a smaller scale Tornado in Tiger Meet markings.

user314 > TheRealBicycleBuck 08/14/2018 at 15:11

0

I still wish this was real:

ttyymmnn > TheRealBicycleBuck 08/14/2018 at 15:18

0

Slightly off topic, but I was reading about Northwest Airlines Flight 255 that crashed back in 1987, which lead me to read about the crash of West Caribbean Flight 708 , another MD-82, in 2005. Since you’re on the way to becoming a pilot, I thought you might find the description of how Flight 708 went down to be instructive: a captain who didn’t know his plane   and who didn’t/couldn’t/wouldn’t listen to his FO . The story of NW255 is pretty instructive as well.

TheRealBicycleBuck > ttyymmnn 08/14/2018 at 16:53

0

The first course of action in a stall is to nose down and gain airspeed. He probably should have turned off the autopilot too. I recently watched a show about another flight that nearly went down . One of their engine died in flight. The plane had three other engines, so it wasn’t in danger, but the flight crew forgot to reduce the thrust on the other side to balance the thrust conditions. The autopilot didn’t have enough control authority in the ailerons and elevator to overcome the differential thrust and it had no authority over the rudder . The right course of action to counteract the differential thrust was to apply opposite rudder and/or reduce power on the side opposite the failed engine (it was a 747 ). While the crew was focused on restarting the failed engine, the plane went into a dive. The crew finally realized what was happening and managed to pull out of the dive before hitting the Atlantic, but the stress ripped a large portion of the empennage off the plane and bent the main spar.

We’ve talked about similar cases in class. It all falls under CRM, C rew R esource M anagement, or SRM, Single-pilot Resource Management. Basically, when problems arise, don’t forget to fly the plane.

WilliamsSW > TheRealBicycleBuck 08/15/2018 at 09:59

1

Rule #1 — FLY THE AIRPLANE.

My instructor beat that into my head until it became religion :)

WilliamsSW > ttyymmnn 08/15/2018 at 10:01

2

Flight 708 reads a bit like AF447. And perhaps Colgan Air 3407.

We get better, but we still repeat mistakes...

WilliamsSW > ttyymmnn 08/15/2018 at 10:02

2

It still amazes me that the Gee Bees could fly at all.  Such amazing airplanes.

ttyymmnn > WilliamsSW 08/15/2018 at 10:10

1

You had to be a special pilot. You know, like Jimmy Do olittle.

WilliamsSW > ttyymmnn 08/15/2018 at 10:20

1

Yeah - he was no ordinary pilot, that’s for  sure!

ttyymmnn > TheRealBicycleBuck 08/15/2018 at 10:23

1

As the plane descended through clouds, the captain’s attention was drawn to the artificial horizon which displayed excessive bank and pitch. Because such an attitude is highly irregular, the captain incorrectly assumed the indicators to be faulty

It boggles my mind how often this seems to happen. Humans are so convinced they are right that they ignore everything that tells them they are wrong. I’m reminded of an Apache pilot in Desert Storm who shot up a couple of American APCs.