Crash at Shoreham Air show
Discussion
saaby93 said:
is the best thing to go by intention
Did he intend to perform some crazy stunt that was bound to lead to the loss of the aircraft
or did he go out that day intending to put on a display and bring the plane safely home
Your honour, I only intended to oversteer around the rondabout, and never intended to lose control and crash into the bus queue of school children.....Did he intend to perform some crazy stunt that was bound to lead to the loss of the aircraft
or did he go out that day intending to put on a display and bring the plane safely home
Trying to rerun the trial, without access to the evidence or experts used in it, is a fruitless exercise in conjecture.
The jury had no irons in the fire and did have access to all that information, and made their decision accordingly.
It was a sad event and probably one that could have been prevented, however on this occasion the pilot was not criminally responsible. In which case, he is an unfortunate victim in this episode, albeit without having paid the ultimate price.
Hopefully he can get on with his life. I am sure he'll feel guilty for the rest of his life.
The jury had no irons in the fire and did have access to all that information, and made their decision accordingly.
It was a sad event and probably one that could have been prevented, however on this occasion the pilot was not criminally responsible. In which case, he is an unfortunate victim in this episode, albeit without having paid the ultimate price.
Hopefully he can get on with his life. I am sure he'll feel guilty for the rest of his life.
janesmith1950 said:
Trying to rerun the trial, without access to the evidence or experts used in it, is a fruitless exercise in conjecture.
The jury had no irons in the fire and did have access to all that information, and made their decision accordingly.
It was a sad event and probably one that could have been prevented, however on this occasion the pilot was not criminally responsible. In which case, he is an unfortunate victim in this episode, albeit without having paid the ultimate price.
Hopefully he can get on with his life. I am sure he'll feel guilty for the rest of his life.
The pilot was an 'unfortunate victim'? Dear god The jury had no irons in the fire and did have access to all that information, and made their decision accordingly.
It was a sad event and probably one that could have been prevented, however on this occasion the pilot was not criminally responsible. In which case, he is an unfortunate victim in this episode, albeit without having paid the ultimate price.
Hopefully he can get on with his life. I am sure he'll feel guilty for the rest of his life.
He was a professional pilot, a professional display pilot, and he made a huge number of errors with previous form, that ultimately led to a bunch of people dying, and he's the 'unfortunate victim' !
tangerine_sedge said:
saaby93 said:
is the best thing to go by intention
Did he intend to perform some crazy stunt that was bound to lead to the loss of the aircraft
or did he go out that day intending to put on a display and bring the plane safely home
Your honour, I only intended to oversteer around the rondabout, and never intended to lose control and crash into the bus queue of school children.....Did he intend to perform some crazy stunt that was bound to lead to the loss of the aircraft
or did he go out that day intending to put on a display and bring the plane safely home
Surely the best analogy is to take what he intended to do, put on a display within the normal parameters of the plane and over open fields
For whatever reason he didnt have enough height or speed and as you can see from the video, despite trying to keep the nose up (whether that was the best thing to do is another issue) it eventually pancaked on the return to the airfield and the rest is history.
saaby93 said:
Not really a fair analogy.
Surely the best analogy is to take what he intended to do, put on a display within the normal parameters of the plane and over open fields
But he wasn't being charged with a crime associated with intention, he was being charged with a crime associated with whether or not he performed in line with his responsibilities.Surely the best analogy is to take what he intended to do, put on a display within the normal parameters of the plane and over open fields
saaby93 said:
Gandahar said:
I think the whole blackout scenario is completely bogus
The blackout scenario has only been invented by some posters in hereThe defence argued Mr Hill had been suffering from "cognitive impairment"- nothing about blackouts
Waits to be put right
Did you actually read my post?
"Assuming he did, and here I mean cognitively impaired which is not quite the same thing, but saves me typing"
I will rewrite it using more keypresses.
"I think the whole cognitively impaired scenario is completely bogus"
Given that.
1. It does not seem that he was cognitively impaired at all from the evidence.
2. Even if cognitively impaired if he was at the correct apex height when doing the loop he would not have killed those people as he would have crashed elsewhere.
Forgetting the lack of engine thrust, the low altitude etc he was still too far north on his track, if he had been on the correct track he would have been south of the A21.
All of the above problems, lack of height, lack of engine power, incorrect position, whilst cognitive meant he crashed on the A27 rather than not there, either cognitive or not.
Edited by Gandahar on Sunday 10th March 17:08
Just a few "general comments", A little about me first, flew "high performance" aircraft in the USAF, and was an instructor (T-38, F-4 and F-15) left active duty in the early 80s and flew commercially starting out on the 727, 757, A320, DC-10 747-1,2 and 400 777/787. Have done my share of airshows in the military and flew flew 10 years in the Reserves again, high performance aircraft.
My own personal feelings were the pilot should not have been prosecuted. Simply because if he gets done the the entire airshow operations staff should be done too. Having the display where it was was an accident waiting to happen. After the Ramstein AFB disaster, the USAF changed their entire approach to airshows. Specifically, it wasn't done over populated areas and certainly over the crowd. At Shoreham, for example, the show would be done over the water with a 1000' buffer zone to the shore line.
In addition, by going after the pilot, how long will it be before there is a civil accident where the decision to pursue the crew is made? Civilized, Western countries treat accidents as a way of learning from mistakes. Sadly people die. There was a saying in the military that every note, caution and warning in the -1 is written in blood. Should civil prosecutions begin as they do in other countries the accident rate will go sky high. Most "first world" countries have accident rates approaching zero. You will have more of a chance to die of a bee sting than from a commercial aircraft accident.
Yes it is a shame there were fatalities and their families have my sympathy. But, looking at my UPT class, we graduated with 32 pilots and 18 have been killed in military crashes. Anywhere from flying a perfectly good C-130 into the snow covered ground in a "Maple Flag" exercise in Canada, to a F-4 departing controlled flight in a 1 v 1 engagement or a special ops C-130 going down during the first Desert Storm.
Anyhow, I know I will take some flak over this but since I have retired now, over 65 so no choice, my skin has gotten remarkably much thicker.
My own personal feelings were the pilot should not have been prosecuted. Simply because if he gets done the the entire airshow operations staff should be done too. Having the display where it was was an accident waiting to happen. After the Ramstein AFB disaster, the USAF changed their entire approach to airshows. Specifically, it wasn't done over populated areas and certainly over the crowd. At Shoreham, for example, the show would be done over the water with a 1000' buffer zone to the shore line.
In addition, by going after the pilot, how long will it be before there is a civil accident where the decision to pursue the crew is made? Civilized, Western countries treat accidents as a way of learning from mistakes. Sadly people die. There was a saying in the military that every note, caution and warning in the -1 is written in blood. Should civil prosecutions begin as they do in other countries the accident rate will go sky high. Most "first world" countries have accident rates approaching zero. You will have more of a chance to die of a bee sting than from a commercial aircraft accident.
Yes it is a shame there were fatalities and their families have my sympathy. But, looking at my UPT class, we graduated with 32 pilots and 18 have been killed in military crashes. Anywhere from flying a perfectly good C-130 into the snow covered ground in a "Maple Flag" exercise in Canada, to a F-4 departing controlled flight in a 1 v 1 engagement or a special ops C-130 going down during the first Desert Storm.
Anyhow, I know I will take some flak over this but since I have retired now, over 65 so no choice, my skin has gotten remarkably much thicker.
phil squares said:
In addition, by going after the pilot, how long will it be before there is a civil accident where the decision to pursue the crew is made? Civilized, Western countries treat accidents as a way of learning from mistakes.
The pilot was prosecuted in this civilian incident.https://aviation-safety.net/wikibase/wiki.php?id=1...
He was convicted of negligently endangering the aircraft and occupants but acquitted of negligently endangering people and property on the ground, which seems bizarre.
Dr Jekyll said:
phil squares said:
In addition, by going after the pilot, how long will it be before there is a civil accident where the decision to pursue the crew is made? Civilized, Western countries treat accidents as a way of learning from mistakes.
The pilot was prosecuted in this civilian incident.https://aviation-safety.net/wikibase/wiki.php?id=1...
He was convicted of negligently endangering the aircraft and occupants but acquitted of negligently endangering people and property on the ground, which seems bizarre.
They changed operating procedures.
On a different day a pilot could be given an award for saving an aircraft, the passengers and the people on the ground, when the control systems had gone iffy
eccles said:
The pilot was an 'unfortunate victim'? Dear god
He was a professional pilot, a professional display pilot, and he made a huge number of errors with previous form, that ultimately led to a bunch of people dying, and he's the 'unfortunate victim' !
He's AN unfortunate victim, rather than THE unfortunate victim.He was a professional pilot, a professional display pilot, and he made a huge number of errors with previous form, that ultimately led to a bunch of people dying, and he's the 'unfortunate victim' !
Bloodlust is also unfortunate (and unhelpful).
Mave said:
saaby93 said:
Not really a fair analogy.
Surely the best analogy is to take what he intended to do, put on a display within the normal parameters of the plane and over open fields
But he wasn't being charged with a crime associated with intention, he was being charged with a crime associated with whether or not he performed in line with his responsibilities.Surely the best analogy is to take what he intended to do, put on a display within the normal parameters of the plane and over open fields
- the existence of a duty of care to the deceased
- a breach of that duty of care which
- causes (or significantly contributes) to the death of the victim, and
- the breach should be characterised as gross negligence and therefore a crime.
Good post phil squares. I was based at Shoreham for some years and always had misgivings about its suitability for display flying. In addition to the populated areas the close proximity of the downs presents a challenge.
The issue of ‘cognitive impairment’ is always a consideration when flying any aircraft. Bear in mind that it is possible to pull +4g in a humble C152, or practically any basic training aircraft.
I have experienced induced impairment at less than 4g on occasion and it varies according to ones health and physical condition on any given day. It certainly gets no easier to combat as you get older.
https://www.skybrary.aero/index.php/G-induced_Impa...
The issue of ‘cognitive impairment’ is always a consideration when flying any aircraft. Bear in mind that it is possible to pull +4g in a humble C152, or practically any basic training aircraft.
I have experienced induced impairment at less than 4g on occasion and it varies according to ones health and physical condition on any given day. It certainly gets no easier to combat as you get older.
https://www.skybrary.aero/index.php/G-induced_Impa...
The guy accidentally killed 11 people. He didn't mean to. Something went wrong. He didn't want that to happen. It just did. We're talking micro-seconds between right and wrong. It is just that those micro-seconds had massive consequences. This was a dreadful accident. But accident it was. Whether it was one waiting to happen due to his flying manner, we will never know. However, I'm sure that he struggles to sleep at night.
Trophy Husband said:
The guy accidentally killed 11 people. He didn't mean to. Something went wrong. He didn't want that to happen. It just did. We're talking micro-seconds between right and wrong. It is just that those micro-seconds had massive consequences. This was a dreadful accident. But accident it was. Whether it was one waiting to happen due to his flying manner, we will never know. However, I'm sure that he struggles to sleep at night.
+1Some people really seem to think that if he isn't made an example of other pilots will quite happily start crashing into crowds secure in the knowledge that if they are still alive when pulled from the burning wreckage they won't go to jail.
Dr Jekyll said:
Trophy Husband said:
The guy accidentally killed 11 people. He didn't mean to. Something went wrong. He didn't want that to happen. It just did. We're talking micro-seconds between right and wrong. It is just that those micro-seconds had massive consequences. This was a dreadful accident. But accident it was. Whether it was one waiting to happen due to his flying manner, we will never know. However, I'm sure that he struggles to sleep at night.
+1Some people really seem to think that if he isn't made an example of other pilots will quite happily start crashing into crowds secure in the knowledge that if they are still alive when pulled from the burning wreckage they won't go to jail.
Aviation exist in an atmosphere of open and honest reporting, people learn from others mistakes and people make reports knowing they will be fairly treated and not vilified.
Prosecuting this guy would actually make pilots less likely to report their mistakes and decrease flight safety.
The BA pilot who ended up in court and killing himself back in the 80s had a massively negative affect on BA and on overall aviation safety for years.
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