Duxford mustang incident
Discussion
Apparently one of the mustangs at Duxford yesterday had a problem.
A pair were up together and one had to make a quick return.
I have seen 2 rumours on good old facebook.
One is a bird strike the other is contact between both planes.
Does anyone have any info.
Apparently they both returned safely which is great
A pair were up together and one had to make a quick return.
I have seen 2 rumours on good old facebook.
One is a bird strike the other is contact between both planes.
Does anyone have any info.
Apparently they both returned safely which is great
Boatbuoy said:
Well that's handed the the anti-Airshow brigade a golden ticket!! Scary similarities to the Mustang V's Skyraider incident at Duxford in 2011.
They got away with it, this time.
To be fair, "they" pretty much got away with it back in 2011. Although "they" lost a Mustang, the pilot got out OK and the Mustang went cartwheeling into a wheat field so no-one on the ground was in any real danger.They got away with it, this time.
The change that came out of recent airshow incidents (specifically at Duxford) is that I believe the Police now close the entire length of Grange Road west of the M11. It was closed to through traffic for years, but many locals and plane spotters driving in to the area would walk down it and make themselves at home in the farmers fields facing the airfield. I was among them a couple of times, and it's undeniably exciting to watch 16 Spitfires turning in for a run along the display line right above your head. But I can see why it's undesirable to have crowds sitting out under aircraft maneuvering areas and can understand why they banned people from that area from last year (I believe).
Yet on the Youtube clip, it was clear that idiots (including, I suspect, the cameraman) are still getting into the area east of the M11 on the runway approach. In fact, before the M11 it WAS part of the airfield. What I find odd about the Duxford model is the fact that the displays are permitted at all. It's all very well banning the deckchair and binoculars brigade from sitting alongside nearby minor roads, but the elephant in the room is the proximity of the M11 itself.
I'm not a "ban it" kind of person, and I'd rather see Duxford continue as a living, working airfield than a dusty 'static' museum like Hendon, but in the post-Shoreham era how long can Duxford keep putting on these air displays? There have been a lot of incidents there, crashes, etc. The P-38 crash sent debris onto the M11. The Me109 crash saw that aeroplane 'bounce' out of the bounds of the airfield. I'm not sure which direction it was landing in, but that could have been a major incident on the motorway. I recall a jet ending up coming to rest ON the motorway too (L-39 Albatross?). Add to that the fact that traffic is often backed up in lane 1 of the M11 trying to access the show. Imagine (God forbid) that some warbird or other were to have some catastrophic mechanical failure on approach, and hit the motorway on a busy day.
What point am I trying to make? I suppose I'm saying that the organisers and the pilots involved in the displays really ought to be doing a better job of not flying into one another during major public events really. Even if it means fewer formation displays, and displays looking tame and flown at altitudes from which a safe recovery can be attempted in the event of a failure. Mechanical failures and pilot errors will happen, but it's asking for trouble when warbird pilots, who we are frequently told are "the best in the business", seem to fly their aeroplanes into each other with alarming regularity.
I love air displays. I've attended regularly since I was a kid, and still go to one a year at the very least. My spirits were lifted last night when two Merlins growled their way south over Farnborough. I was in my garage and got out too late to see what they were but I presume a pair of Spitfires heading from Duxford to Goodwood after the weekend's displays. I could see them flying in formation in the distance, or at least got a few glimpses through gaps between trees. I can't suggest a solution because I have no expertise in these matters, but I do worry that unless the warbird pilots and owners police themselves, there will come a time when the regulations governing the operation of vintage military aircraft are further tightened and a number of sites (such as Duxford and Shoreham) will be unable to continue to present these venerable old aeroplanes in their natural environment...
Three crashes in two months back in 2003 - http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/cambridgeshire/...
yellowjack said:
Three crashes in two months back in 2003 - http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/cambridgeshire/...
Only 1 of those was an airshow crash though.Dr Jekyll said:
yellowjack said:
Three crashes in two months back in 2003 - http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/cambridgeshire/...
Only 1 of those was an airshow crash though.Please don't read me wrong here. I don't want stronger regulation nor a ban on any of the traditional airshow activities, but this is far from the first time that there has been a collision between two warbirds in a formation display at this one venue. Some crashes are unavoidable, or at least impossible to predict through the regular maintenance regime, but pilots failing to avoid aircraft with which they are flying in formation? Surely that's basic airmanship being called into question. I realise that there's a lot going on in the cockpit during a display, but if the workload is too high for safely displaying the aircraft in close formation then surely limiting them to solo displays is the way forward? If the aviators themselves don't self-regulate then we'll soon end up with piston engined warbirds being severely restricted in their displays as vintage jets were after Shoreham.
At the risk of repeating myself, I don't want to see these priceless pieces of aviation and wartime history confined to their hangars, but we surely must accept that where there is proximity with residential areas and busy roads, then the safety of the majority who have no real option but to be there is not jeopardised by folks enjoying what is, when it's all boiled down to the bones, quite frivolous entertainment. Maybe this means that more remote airfields are the solution for air displays? I don't know. But right now, any time I see a news report about an incident at an air display generally, and Duxford especially, I'm really not surprised by it. I almost roll my eyes and shrug a weary "not again!", then cross my fingers and hope the crew are OK...
yellowjack said:
What I find odd about the Duxford model is the fact that the displays are permitted at all. It's all very well banning the deckchair and binoculars brigade from sitting alongside nearby minor roads, but the elephant in the room is the proximity of the M11 itself.
Sadly yes.It wasn't the brightest idea even back then to run a motorway through a runway without considering the implications of such
Sadly now, its much more of an issue, and that's ignoring the fact that some idiot keeps trying to get planning to build a motorway service area in that old area of the airfield to the east of the M11 where the 109 and more recently Miss Velma ended up
yellowjack said:
The Me109 crash saw that aeroplane 'bounce' out of the bounds of the airfield. I'm not sure which direction it was landing in, but that could have been a major incident on the motorway
Was landing from west to east. Its 20 years ago so can't remember exactly, but I think John elected to make an emergency landing not into wind (among the other errors in that flight 
) and pulled the stick to hop over the M11 when it was clear he wasn't going to stop in time and likely end up on the M11. Would have to read the report to clarify, but that's what I recall from memory, and from seeing it happen - ironically from the field to the south of the runway 
(in those days though, there'd be no more than a dozen or so people dotted around a big area, not the hoards it became in more recent years)Gassing Station | Boats, Planes & Trains | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff