Valiant crash, Wittering, August 1960

[Hipper]

On the 12th August 1960 a Valiant (XD864 according to UK Serials.com) of 7 Squadron crashed after take off from Wittering. All the crew were lost.

The aircraft's pilot was Brian Wickham and my father, Harry Bullen, was, I believe, navigator.

What I know of this incident comes from my mother.

The squadron was based at Honington but was shortly to go to Wittering. In August they were operating from Wittering whilst the families were still in Suffolk.

On the 12th August, XD864 took off but was having difficulties with its undercarraige. It seems a range of procedures to solve the problem was attempted, including 'waggling' the plane, then the aircraft came down (in a potato field).

Art Field in the 'did you fly the Valiant' thread of 2007 mentions that there were peculiarities with the undercarraige, and I wondered if this could have been a factor.

I haven't been to PRO Kew yet though. I have worked at Kew before but don't know exactly where Air Crash Reports might be. I presume they would be accessable under the thirty year rule?

Any comments anyone might have on this subject would be much appreciated.

[sedburgh]

There certainly seems to be a file at Kew, a search in the catalogue for XD864 came up with:

BT 233/439 Valiant B1, XD864: Spanhoe, near Wittering, Northants, 12 Aug. 1960 (http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/catalogue/displaycataloguedetails.asp?CATID=360525&CATLN=6&Highlight=%2CXD864&accessmethod=0)

Philip Morten

[Hipper]

Many thanks to you both for your help.

[RileyDove]

Various small fragments of this aircraft occasionally turn up at Spanhoe in the form of small pieces of aluminium skinning.

[Hipper]

I've now seen the document BT233/439 - RAF Investigation into Aircraft Accident.

For completeness I thought I'd post the basic information.

XD 864 took off from Wittering at 1035, Friday 12th August 1960, for a routine six hour exercise. The crew was Flt Lt B J Wickham, captain and 1st Pilot; Flt Lt W R Howard, 2nd pilot (on loan from 138 squadron); Flt Lt H G Bullen, navigator/plotter; Flt Lt A J Ireson, navigator/radar; Sgt R H Johnson, air electronics.

As the plane went up the nose wheel wouldn't retract. The captain was aware of this and was going to attempt to sort it out. He intended to enter the Wittering circuit and so banked to port but low airspeed caused the plane to stall and it came down on the disused Spanhoe airfield (which at the time still had three runways). The fuel tanks disintegrated and most of the plane was consummed by fire, including the cockpit and all five crew.

If anyone wants any more information, they are welcome to contact me.

[Pontius Navigator]

Hipper, thank you. Still very sad.

[Carol Johnson]

My Father was Roy H Johnson, a member of the crew on this plane. I was amazed to find this thred as I know little about what happend. I am looking to make contact with others who were affected.

[Hipper]

An article on this incident can be found at John Dillon's Vulcan site:

http://www.john-dillon.co.uk/V-Force/valiant_xd864.html

[RIHoward]

Looks like my father was piloting the plane for the take off.

The valiant was taken off V-bombing not long after 1960 (not sure when)
and put onto tanker duty, and then retired. Was the Valiant designed for high level bombing? and then switched to below radar flight when the Russians brought SAM's into service? Would this have any baring on the airframe?

I was 20 months old when my dad died in this crash, but I think it has had an influence on my life, mainly through the emotional toll felt by my mum, the attitudes of my wider family towards me. I think it has had a much deeper impact on my brother who was 4 and a half in August 1960.

[Art Field]

R I Howard. The Valiant continued as a Bomber as well as a Tanker until 1964 when the fleet was grounded after a Valiant broke its main spar on a training sortie out of Gaydon, the training unit. Yes the latter part of its life included low level but inspections of all Valiants after the grounding showed that regardless of their use the whole fleet was affected by metal fatigue in the main spar and that was why they were scrapped. I am not aware that there were any suspicions that other Valiant accidents were due to this problem and the reports on this particular incident point to a very different cause.

[RIHoward]

Art Field

Thanks for the reply.

I guess you know about the Comet here is one of many incidents

Canadian Pacific Airlines Comet 1A (CF-CUN) was being delivered, and on take-off from Karachi, Pakistan collided with a bridge, killing 11 crew and others on board. These accidents were originally attributed to pilot error: over-rotation had led to a loss of lift from the leading edge of the plane's wing. However, it was later determined that the wing profile led to a loss of lift at high angle of attack, and the engine inlets suffered from a lack of pressure recovery in these conditions as well.

This was 1952 and it's not clear how much later that the fault with the wing profile was discovered.

Sounds similar to the crash of Valiant XD864.

i.e. the take off was steeper than normal and sounded quieter.

"loss of lift at high angle of attack, and the engine inlets suffered from a lack of pressure recovery in these conditions"

Could the fatigue also affect the wings ability to supply lift? if they weren't quite so "stiff" as they were supposed to be?

And what about that feature of all early British multi engine jets, of putting the engines in the wings close to the fuselage, no one builds jets like that anymore. Do they?

The Board of Trade are not going to report that there was a design flaw with the Valiant certainly not while the Warsaw pact were watching. The fact is there clearly was a design flaw and that led to their removal from service in 1964. That fact, and the similarity of the design to that of the Comet suggest to me that it was the plane that was at fault and not Flight Lieutenant Brian J Wickham. He was very experienced and he had a very experienced crew (except for my dad) and obviously met something he had not experienced before on that day, he would have known what to do if the front undercarriage failed to retract as there were other similar incidents that didn't lead to fatal accidents with the Valiant.

Do you know anything about the trials involving rocket boosters and other aids for take off that took place in 1959?

http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/catalogue/displaycataloguedetails.asp?CATID=2939238&CATLN=6&Highlight=%2CVALIANT&accessmethod=0&Summary=True

Cheers

R I Howard

[Fareastdriver]

“Don’t worry about it, chaps. 217’s just a one off.” My squadron commander addressing us aircrew after we had been told what had happened to WP 217’s main spar. The B of I for the accident at Market Rasen in May 1964 was reopened on this evidence but it was not found to be a factor, they were still sticking to a tailplane actuator runaway. WP217’s crew were very lucky that the spar split sufficiently to disconnect the starboard flap drive otherwise it could well have twisted the wing and made it terminally uncontrollable at 2000ft..
The undercarriage was a Heath Robinson affair, as was most of the aircraft. Electrically driven, each leg had a main motor driving a screw jack and piggy-backed onto it was a smaller emergency motor, the same with the doors. Should this fail then the extreme emergency system, one switch for each main leg only, would blow away the uplocks, allowing the door to swing down and probably off and then the leg would be driven down by the main motor. A 543 Sqn Valiant did a wheels-up at Manston because they couldn’t get a main leg down using all three systems. Subsequently it was found out that the switches had been cross-wired so all they did was blow off the locks of the leg that was already down.
The stalling speed for a B1 at a TOW of 167,000 lbs with T/O flap was about 125 knots, going up quite rapidly with applied bank. With the undercarriage unlocked the limit was 170 knots so there so there was not much of a gap with 30° of bank on. There was little or no warning, I know that from personal experience, but fortunately in my case the aircraft rolled out of the turn. You were wasting your time trying to get the gear down with G. There’s no way it will force screw jacks around.
The main spars failing in 1964 were not as a result of a design flaw. There was insufficient knowledge about the behaviour of the alloys they were using. Reportedly there was a main spar assembly at Weybridge that had never been installed and that was as bad as the rest.
At about 175,000 lbs the unstick was about 145 knots and the technique was to start pulling the control spectacle at at 120 knots so that the nosewheel lifted at 130 and then pull it off at 145. If you were very light the biggest problem was over rotating and scraping the tail. Scraping the tail was also a flapless landing hazard.
She was a nice old girl to fly, being on tankers I saw a lot of the old Commonwealth but of the five accidents I can remember four were all very sudden and all the crews perished. On the fifth, a spectacular take off from Offut, they should have done but they all walked away from it.

[Fareastdriver]

Carrying on a bit further the rocket boosters, Sprite rockets if I remember correctly, were a bit of a waste as you had to return to the airfield to jettison them before you could carry on. The R/R Avon 205 had water-meth injection that gave you 8,300 rpm instead of 8,000 and another 1,000 lbs of thrust for 45 seconds. Towards the end of its life the 205A came along that allowed you to over-rev the engine to 8,200 rpm to cater for most of the loss of thrust if the water-meth failed on one engine.
Still took an awful lot of runway in the tropics. Though not as bad as the Victor Mk1.

[Pontius Navigator]

The Valiant problem was nothing to do with metal fatigue in the expected sense like the Comet or aircraft at low level.

The lightweight alloys used for the main spar had an inherent failure. They would crystalise when formed and became fatigued whether fitted to an aircraft of not.

After the fleet was grounded systematic checks were made on all the aircraft. A trials aircraft, with just 5 hrs on the clock, was about to be given a green light when they removed just one more rivet to be sure. Cracks were found and that was that.

Checks were made on spare spars and they too exhibited the same fatigue failures.

[RIHoward]

Fareastdriver

Thanks very much for passing on you're experiences and knowledge

“Don’t worry about it, chaps. 217’s just a one off.”

Did you believe him?

"WP217’s crew were very lucky that the spar split sufficiently to disconnect the starboard flap drive otherwise it could well have twisted the wing and made it terminally uncontrollable at 2000ft"..

Without reopening the B of I, Do you think the main spar braking was a more likely cause than the reasons laid out by the B o I? XD864 had completed its turn and had levelled off then began a rapid decent the port wing then dipped.
Does this sound like the characteristics of a stall to you?

The plane levelled again and the Captain increased power the nose came up and then fell in a shallow dive the port wing dipped again this time hitting the ground. Again this description seems, to me, to reflect the Captain struggling to fly a broken aeroplane.

What do you think?

"but fortunately in my case the aircraft rolled out of the turn"

Would that have happened if the main spar broke?

Cheers

R I Howard

[RIHoward]

O.K so the airframe was weaker than expected because of the crystalline structure of the alloy after it was formed (cast?) leading to cracks being easily propagated along crystal boundaries?.

All 5 Valiant crashes occurred on take-off. I think?

So I guess the most likely time for failure would be when the airframe is under the heaviest stress - take off with a large TOW?. In the case of
XD864 the take off was steeper than normal, at full power and the fuel load was 83% or there abouts.

Are these conditions the ones that stress the airframe most?

Thanks for your answers guys.

[Art Field]

R I Howard. There will always be aircraft accidents where the cause can not be stated with 100% certainty and this is true of the Wittering crash. The inquiry will then examine all the facts they have available and come out with the most likely cause. The facts point most strongly to indicate the aircraft was allowed to lose flying speed and subsequently stalled at too low a level to allow recovery. There was no indication of structural failure and the speed and attitude would not have placed undue stress on the airframe. The situation shows a possibility of classic "Distraction" where a relatively minor incident takes over as the main priority and attention is lost on flying the aircraft, sadly not an uncommon occurrence.
This may not be the opinion you want to hear but I think you should consider it the most likely explanation of the crash.

[RIHoward]

The fault with the alloy only emerged in 1964 so the B o I didn't have all the facts in 1960 (I think Vickers and the MOD knew though) .

I need to do more research, but it seems from what I've found so far main spar failure had occurred in Valiants prior to this crash and later as reported by a test co-pilot.
from
http://www.vectorsite.net/avval.html

"* Some years back, ..... I was contacted by an Australian who told me he had been test copilot on a Valiant when the wing spar broke. It didn't give way and the aircraft managed to get back down to the ground in one piece."

in 1964 when the full seriousness of the problem was realised the whole fleet was grounded, I think that fact alone is compelling. So I'm going with main spar failure, you can believe the B o I if you like. I guess we have to agree to differ, but I'm going to go on digging ;-)

ATB
RIH

[Milt]

Art Field

What do you know about the Valiant wing spar failure at Gaydon? Did the wing seperate?

On 29/4/57 The second Valiant prototype -215- had developed a fatigue crack in the bottom main spar cap through about 30% of its cross section. The rest broke under the stress of an AUW flight at 210 KIAS and about 20 degrees of bank in slight turbulence preceding the first seperation trials of two Super Sprites that had just been fired to measure take off performance.

We were carrying two 1600 gallon tanks filled with jettisonable water and another 1,000 gallons in the weapons bay to get to about 170,000 pnds AUW. The Super Srites gave us an extra 8,000 pnds of thrust over about 50 seconds for the measured take off.

The spar let go with a terrific bang and shock and the Valiant started to roll into the broken wing. This trimmed out OK and we three on board believed that our chase Meteor 7 had rammed us. Its pilot reassured us to the contrary so the next surmise was that one of the Super Sprites had not completed its purge of its excess High Test Peroxide oxident which may have exploded. One SS we had on closed circuit TV looked alright so we went ahead with individual seperation trials without delay and commenced water jettison, wanting to go to ground ASAP. We drenched Boscombe Down's runway and taxiways with water and considerable relief to be down but still not knowing what diabolical thing had occurred.

The fracture of the spar was soon located at the focus of pulled wing skin rivets and skin shedding just aft of the R main wheel well. Following defuelling and jacking with wing jacks the spar opened up with a gap of about an inch so that we could examine the fracture surfaces. The tide marks of fatigue crack growth were obvious and the remainder of the spar had broken under tension. The gap in the spar in flight was about 2 inches which would have extended the dihedral by about 3 degrees.

We had been saved from wing seperation by a steel cross brace extending from the top of a forward sub-spar to the main spar bottom cap outboard of the break.

In retrospect, if we had known that a wing spar had broken, we would not have jettisoned the water from the underwing tanks as their weight outboard would have been relieving moments on the wings. But perhaps instead we would have given our FTE an opportunity to use his parachute before leaving the only surviving prototype to her own devices.

I guess 215 eventually went to the recyclers!

[Carol Johnson]

Hello Richard,
It's good to make contact with you. My father died in that crash too and having read the report I am very saddened by very sad state of events. I am nevertheless very interested in your comments. regardig the crash. I would love to hear from you. I have been in touch with Michael Bullen for some time now. There has been a lot of suffering as a result of this crash and it seems very special to me to have this contact with you and Michael.
All the best,
Carol

[Art Field]

Milt, as I remember the incident the aircraft was on a training sortie at relatively light weight and one item of the trip was to practice a failure of pressurization drill in the climb. When the simulated failure was introduced the co-pilot who was not familiar with large aircraft pushed the nose down rather fiercely to level off. The crew heard a loud bang. Being unable to locate the cause they decided to recover to Gaydon. Upon joining the pattern they selected flap and the aircraft started to roll to the right so the selected it back in and flew a flap-less approach and landing. On shutdown they inspected the aircraft and found the right wing appeared to have moved away from the fuselage by a couple of inches or so. Because the Valiant flap mechanism was driven by a rod and cog system from electric motors in the fuselage the right wing system had disconnected due to the wing movement thus possibly saving the wing from being ripped off.

[soddim]

The reason fast jets prefer 2.5 deg approaches is because swept wing aircraft can be more easily controlled on the final part of the approach.

However, aircraft like the Tornado prefer a 3 deg approach if recovering single-engine. The 2.5 deg approach originated, I believe, with the Lighning which could not sweep its' wings forward for landing.

[Bartom]

At the time of the loss of the Valiant at Wittering in 1960 I was training - as copilot - at 231 OCU Gaydon and our crew [Capt. Flt Lt Dave Brooke] were posted to No 7 Sqn to replace Flt Lt Wickham's crew on 5Dec60.

As I recall from 'crewroom discussion' or maybe flight safety 'feedback' the following may [or may not] be a reasonable explanation for the loss of the aircraft and crew:
The aircraft was fully fuelled for a training sortie - heavy, but 7Sqn aircraft did not carry underwing tanks at Wittering - and the 9000ft runway was fine for the purpose.

The aircraft took off / the nose wheel failed to retract - or the 'three greens' were two greens and a red.
Captain hands control to Co. and intstructs him to turn 'Downwind' whilst he starts the process of resolving this minor problem.
Co - whilst turning aircraft, listening to radio messages intercomm and forgetting [perhaps] the stalling characteristics of a heavy aircraft in a turn could, in theory, be at fault but - at the time this lesson was not highlighted at Flying Training or OCU's.

The lesson I learnt from this unfortunate accident was to be cool, calm and "follow the book" when an 'after take off' occurs. It stood me in good stead in 37 yrs of operational flying.

[RIHoward]

Bartom

I haven't read the full B o I.
"Hipper" (who started this thread) is sending it to me. I do know that Co was doing the take off and that the Captain knew about the problem with the nose wheel . What you say is very plausible and theoretically could have been exactly what happened on that day.

I have a couple of questions though....

If as Captain your Co was entirely new to you and known to be inexperienced 100 and something hours on Valiants, would you be confident enough in his abilities to handle the plane in a situation like that?

Is it the Captains job to sort out the wheels or would he delegate to the engineer?

Given that the Valiant was brittle and could break if you pushed the stick too far forward too quickly or in a 20º bank in some turbulence with maximum TOW. Do you think main spar failure could be at least as plausible an explanation of the events of that day as the theory you've set out above? i.e. human failure.

I'm waiting for the full B o I to arrive as there are some things that aren't clear in the stuff I've seen so far, like who exactly was flying the plane Captain or Co.

So until I have read everything Hipper is sending me I'll not comment on here. I'd like to thank everyone who's commented on this thread so far all this input has been very helpful to me in uderstanding what happened on that day.

Hi Carol

I've sent you a message via this board did you get it?. Michael has my e-mail and phone number if you want to get in touch. in 2010 it'll be the 50ths anniversary maybe we all could visit Spanhoe and Wittering in August that year. I'm also looking at getting Brian Wikhams' name cleared as I really don't think he was to blame. These planes weren't put together right as is clear from the input to this thread.

ATB
Richard Howard

[RIHoward]

I'm just reading through the Board of Trade Inquiry into this crash.

Does any one know if there was a drill for emergency landing at Spanhoe if there was a need to, after climbing from take off at Wittering.?

Am I correct in thinking that, at that time, after take of from runway 26 you climb 1500 feet in 1,2 minutes covering a distance of 3nm?
and then turn to port to a location to begin ascent to cruising altitude.?

Can you freely turn anywhere to get on a reciprocal heading on the circuit ?
Were you required to radio the tower with your intention to turn and join the cicuit ?

[p beech]

Hi Richard
Your Dad and I were u/grads together at Birmingham '51-'54 and we remained friends after with R and M. I last saw M in '61 together with your Grandmother ( Mrs L-J ).
Monica and I often talk of R & M and were intending to travel to N Wales this summer to try and relocate M.
I would much welcome an opportunity to speak .
I found interesting info on valiants in " Vickers Valiant first of the V Bombers " by Eric Morgan but there is little about XD864.
Seems Valiants were on a fast track for design and build to beat the Handley Page and Avro projects.
My e-mail address is [email protected] .
Best Regards
Peter Beech

['Chuffer' Dandridge]

I once worked with a chap called Simon Wickham whose father was killed in a V bomber crash but he never had much information about the crash. Does anyone know if Brian Wickham had a son?

[p beech]

Hi Richard
It seems that e-mail addresses are deleted on the postings.So I dont know how to communicate direct.
I have a couple of personal photo's which you should have.
And I would appreciate any info on M.
Best regards
Peter Beech.

[photog]

As a photographer at Gaydon in 1964, 17 years old and still a Boy Entrant, I was sent out with a Cpl to photograph WP217 the day after this 'incident'.

By climbing a ladder we were able to see the wing upper surface where panels had torn apart an inch or so from either side of a spar. While these panels were removed, we photographed damage from inside the bomb bay. Later we moved back to the stbd wing where a broken shaft inside the wing was the main interest. I believe that this was the drive-shaft for the stbd-side flaps. After which, when the main-spar was uncovered, it was found to have sheared. I recall that it was close to the stbd wing-root but, I could be wrong on that.

Aside from the fact that we spent days and nights printing the photo's; we had an awful lot of interest with several aircrew visiting us. The most common comment being that the crew had been very lucky/skillful in making it back at all.

[Fareastdriver]

Photog, check your PMs

[Exnomad]

There was another Valiant accident along the south coast, I am not sure of the date. I was given to understand that the cause was total electrical failure, which left the only availalbe control by manual trim. The crew eventually ran out of luck and it crashed into the sea, I think near Shoreham by Sea. I was working near there at the time and saw it go past, and wondered why it was so low.

[Newforest]

Are you thinking of this accident on 11/5/56 at Southwick?

http://www.findonvillage.com/0843_a_near_miss_for_findon_in_1956.htm

[RIHoward]

Having read the BoI, its very obvious to me that they (the BoI) were hell bent on blaming the dead pilot Brian Wickham. So much so that they distort the facts of the flight, and the flight simulation tests they carried out can only be described as Pathological Science.

I have reconstructed the flight from witness statements, it is clear that the crew of XD 864 had ample time to avoid the crash. They ended up after a 110º- 120º turn lined up with Runway 14 at Spanhoe in a 2.5º glide. Obviously they were attempting a wheels up on the disused strip, as reported by eyewitnesses and the Times the following day, the BS in the report that Wickham "may have been approaching an over confident stage in his flying career" which "could lead to slow reaction times in an emergency" is just a lot of nonsense.
Wickham wasn't to blame.

Find out more here
XD864 (http://zkt.blackfish.org.uk/XD864/index.html)

[Exnomad]

Newforest,
my memory must be worse than I thought. In 1956 I was working at Shoreham airport, and remember the Valiant going past. I was living only about a mile from Southwick at the time, and do not remember the debris in the village

['Chuffer' Dandridge]

Hipper & RIHoward,

Check your PM Inbox

CD

[Peter John Davidson]

To Carol Johnson and R.I.Howard: I was very interested to discover this forum, because I grew up at Upper Laxton on a small farm on the eastern border of Spanhoe airfield (I'm now living in Brisbane, Australia) and, along with my two younger brothers, witnessed this terrible accident. The image is still clearly in my mind. I was 15 years old at the time.
Runway 14 started at the south-western corner of our farm.
Growing up in the post-war years, we seemed to be at the hub of so much flying activity, and developed a keen interest in the aircraft of the era, and could identify most of the aircraft we saw, and would record the serial numbers. The V-bombers were of particular interest to us, and we became very familiar with the Valiants on their training flights from Wittering, which followed a familiar pattern flying up the Welland valley then, somewhere before Harringworth, would bank to port and fly directly overhead on the return to Wittering.
On this particular day, we were about 200 yards from the airfield perimeter and heard the Valiant approaching. What caught our attention was the sound of the engines, which were on full power, and we knew that was not normal. We looked up, and saw the aircraft banking fairly hard to port - I would say about 30 degrees, very low. I clearly recall a steady bank, not a sudden manoeuvre. It disappeared behind the corner of the woods bordering our land, and almost immediately, there was a terrible explosion and ball of fire, which quickly became a churning column of smoke. We were about a quarter of a mile away, and began to run because we thought we would be engulfed. My father was further away in the garden, and felt the heat - he thought it was some sort of a convection current.
My brothers and I were among the first on the scene, and it was a very distressing sight to see the remains of these brave airmen among the burning remains of an aircraft we had so often admired from afar.
It was very clear where the wing first hit the ground just before the cross-runway, there was quite a deep furrow, then the main fuselage appeared to have exploded on the runway, and continued across the adjoining field.
We often speculated as to what might have caused the accident, and the only explanation that seemed likely was that the aircraft had simply failed to gain sufficient altitude coming up the Welland valley to clear the higher ground of the airfield, and the pilot put on full power, but too late. My feeling at the time was that, if he had kept it straight and level, he might have just made it. We considered the possibility of an attempted landing, but the high power setting of the engines seemed to rule this out.
Memories of this accident have remained with me until this time, and I have wondered about the cause. In particular, I have thought of the loved ones of those who died, the fathers you hardly knew. I hope my recounting of this event is not distressing to you - my purpose is to tell you what I know, and it is evident you are searching for answers about something which affects you deeply.
I have noted the date of the 50th. anniversary of this sad event, and may well time my next visit to Laxton to coincide with the memorial service at Harringworth. My thoughts and prayers go to you and to all who lost their loved ones on that day. Requiescant in pace.

[Chris Cramp]

Chuffer dandridge, I remember the crash very well, my farther was an armament officer at Honington and I went to the village primary school with Simon, although I am not certain that was his first name. He had a younger brother and we used to play together. After the crash I never saw him again, I think they were spirited away very quickly and there was little talk of the crash. When you are nine years old your understanding of situations are very confused, but it is one incident I never forgot, hence my recent researh into the crash. In later years we moved to Wittering and I now live in Stamford. I had no idea until recently the crash was at Spanhoe, I found out from a friend of mine when he took me for a flight from the airfield where he keeps his plane.

[p beech]

Hi Hipper
Just to thank you for linking me to richard howard and the subsequent entries to the thread. I met richard this week and whilst I felt somewhat sentimental I have to remain pragmatic. The reason for the crash of XD 864 will never be proved but there is sufficient evidence to show that on he balance of probability the verdict of the BOI was not justified.
best regards
Peter Beech

[RIHoward]

Thanks PJ for the account

The A/c that were turning near Harringworth were probably doing "circuits and bumps" The standard operational procedure was to turn to port at the top of the climb near Tixover at an altitude of 1800 QNH 3.75 nautical miles from Harringorth. Whether they were doing circuits and bumps or a training mission, so I'm surprised by your account that it was "normal" to fly at low altitude over Barrowden Village and turn where you say they'd normally turn. The A/c that flew directly over your head were probably heading out West, these A/c turned 40¯ South when they reached the top of the climb 3 nautical miles from the start of their take off from Wittering and crossed an air-lane some where near Banbury in Oxfordshire at a height of 17,000 feet.



How many other civilians do you remember being present when you got to the crash site? I think the pilot had the engines on full power because he was trying to avoid hitting a witness who was sitting on his tractor and when contacted in 2008 that witness said. "I had the distinct impresssion the pilot had seen me and tried to avoid hitting me" another witness was reported as saying that "the A/c almost made a perfect belly flop landing" which is supported by an article in the Times the following day which states "It is thought the pilot was attempting a landing" and the reconstruction of the flight which shows that the A/c was flying straight and descending at first rapidly and then in a "shallow" approach after it had turned 120¯by Red Hill Farm", it was flying slowly and in line with a runway. But as P Beech has said we'll never really know all we want to show is that the BoI couldn't condemn the Captain on the evidence they select because so many other bits of evidence suggest that they were trying to land the plane, and according to current Queens regulations A dead crew can only be blamed as neglegent when there is to quote: "absolutely no doubt whatsoever."
For more doubts :) see.....

http://zkt.blackfish.org.uk/XD864/index.html

[LyndaV]

I'm Johnnie Ireson's daughter (navigator/radar) and for some time I've been trying to find out more about the crash. I've also recently taken to wondering about the other children and their mothers so I was amazed to find this thread.

Are you aware that our father's names are on the new Armed Forces Memorial in Staffordshire? I haven't visited yet but intend to do so.

The little information I have comes from my mother who still finds it very difficult to talk about. However she is of the firm opinion that the BoI were wrong and that there was something seriously amiss with the aircraft so I've been fascinated to read all the information you have posted here with the various links. Thank you for your hard work.

Please could you keep me in the loop regarding the 50th anniversary memorial service.

If you PM me I'll let you have my contact details.

[Carol Johnson]

Dear Lynda it is so good to make contact with you I will PM you. Peter I am so gald you made contact. Although it is heart breaking to read your account of that day it helps a lot. I would be happy to talk with you.
All the best and thank you,
Carol Johnson

[Carol Johnson]

Lynda did you get my private message?

[Carol Johnson]

A memorial service will be held for the crew of XD864. The service will be in the village of Harringworth on Sunday August 15th at 3pm. Some of the children and grandchildren of the crew members will be attending as will others who would like to pay their respects. I am posting this in hope that others who may have known the crew or had connections with them in one way or another see it or hear about it and therefore have the chance of attending the service. The Reverend Jane Baxter will be conducting ther service. Harringworth is the village near Spanhoe where the plane went down. I understand there are still witnesses in Harringworth thus it is most approriate the service be held there.
I look forward to meeting any of you who are able to come.
Carol Johnson

[Gingie]

I'm so pleased i've found this forum, and more to the point this thread.

I have been looking for information regarding Spanhoe as I have an interest in old airfields, then I stumbled across the accident involving XD864.

I would like to attend the memorial service despite not having any involvement with the crew or aircraft, however I understand if the service is friends and family only.

Also are there any plans for a visit to Spanhoe airfield on August 12th, if so I would be pleased if I could attend.

Also with refence to the Armed Forces Memorial, this may be of interest:

AFM Start Page (http://www.veterans-uk.info/afm2/index.php)

Please do let me know.

Many thanks in advance.

Jerry

[A2QFI]

A general update. Carol Johnson, daughter of one of the crew, is visiting UK from Australia and will be at the Service. Jerry, who posts here as "Gingie", and I are hoping to take her to the airfield in the late morning of 15th and will obviously take anyone else who wants to come. The village pub, the White Swan, only does full roast lunches on Sunday but I have rung the owner and he says he could probably run up something more lightweight, baguettes etc. Let us hope for a fine day and a memorable service.

[Carol Johnson]

Hi Jerry,
Just a note to ask what you and Marin thought of the service. It was very moving for me. Did you take any photos of the service, seems that maybe nobody did, which I can understand. Just that my children were unable to attend and I want to show them as much as possible of the day. Thanks to you and Martin for your support on the day and for escorting us to the site. You know my private email - [email protected]
Best wishes,
Carol Johnson

[LookingNorth]

I think the pilot had the engines on full power because he was trying to avoid hitting a witness who was sitting on his tractor and when contacted in 2008 that witness said. "I had the distinct impresssion the pilot had seen me and tried to avoid hitting me" another witness was reported as saying that "the A/c almost made a perfect belly flop landing" which is supported by an article in the Times the following day which states "It is thought the pilot was attempting a landing" and the reconstruction of the flight which shows that the A/c was flying straight and descending at first rapidly and then in a "shallow" approach after it had turned 120¯by Red Hill Farm", it was flying slowly and in line with a runway. But as P Beech has said we'll never really know all we want to show is that the BoI couldn't condemn the Captain on the evidence they select because so many other bits of evidence suggest that they were trying to land the plane, and according to current Queens regulations A dead crew can only be blamed as neglegent when there is to quote: "absolutely no doubt whatsoever."
For more doubts http://images.ibsrv.net/ibsrv/res/src:www.pprune.org/get/images/smilies/smile.gif see.....

XD864 (http://zkt.blackfish.org.uk/XD864/index.html)

I've had a good read of this, as it's all rather local to me, and interesting reading it makes but I have to point out a few big holes in your interpretation.

I can't see why you think the turn was through 120 degrees rather than 180 as per the BOI PDF. An initial impact direction of 44 degrees veering to 110 degrees certainly seems to indicate the turn was nearer 180 from the initial take-off direction of 260 than the 120 you go with. Similarly, your flight path seems off, as it's drawn east of Harringworth but witness 2 says it flew over Seaton - NW of Harringworth. Mind you, witness 5 conflicts with this stating the turn was before the viaduct, east of Seaton. The witness reports are all so vague in positions and distances it is hard to make much of them really. Witness 1 in particular is no use as his location could be in any one of 11 'runway intersection' spots in the vicinity of the crash site, all of which vary the aircraft's path dramatically compared to others.

With wind reported at 350 (and this is backed up by the spread of scorching from the fire on the aerial photo of the crash site), runway 14 at Spanhoe was about the worst possible choice - shortest, tailwind, no fire cover, and poor surface quality. Recipe for disaster - particularly with a flapless approach!

With the impact point almost in the middle of the triangle of grass between the 3 runways and an initial impact heading of 44 degrees, you'd be better off making a case for them trying for a forced landing on the longest of the runways at Spanhoe (07?), which would have had much less in the way of a tailwind, though a hefty crosswind.

However... if a landing at Spanhoe was being attempted, why were the engines at high power? Why was the gear still up? If a belly landing was the intention, why was the cockpit hatch not jettisoned? Why were no radio calls made after the initial call that they were remaining in the local area to sort out the nose gear fault?

You postulate a possible fatigue fracture of a spar to explain it all - these failures did not show up on any production Valiant until August 1964, four years and a lot of flying hours later. Second prototype WB215's spar fracture in 1957 was in a different place and thought to be due to the beating the aircraft had had during its trials life - including heavy landings, wing flutter incidents, and repeated RATOG firings.

The only part of your page that I agree with is the criticism of the narrative style of the report (with its attempt to paint a picture of what might have been going on in the cockpit in those 3 brief minutes) - but it's a style used in most reports of that era.

Incidentally I see no inconsistency between "1800ft QNH" and "1000-1500 ft above airfield level (300ft)" - that's 1300-1800 ft QNH, and with multiple witnesses stating 'lower than usual' that's a pretty sensible hedging of bets. If I were being unkind I'd think you were trying a bit too hard to find "errors".

On balance, the conclusion of the report seems entirely reasonable and likely to me, and your theory so far away from likely that you need a passport, a visa and a damn long flight to get there. Interesting effort though.

[Hipper]

I don't think the BoI report says how large the turn was and it was probably my error that makes you think they said 180 degrees.

I wanted to write a summary of the report for my family and despite many re-readings of the BoI papers I couldn't find the exact amount of turn so I tried to work it out on a map. That's where I came up with 180 degrees. I was wrong and either I eventually worked it out or more likely Richard did and I now agree with him that the turn was approximately 120 degrees. The aircraft came out of the intended turn of 180 degrees early when the initial first stall appeared to occur. I have no real idea of the geography of the area but Richard does.

My family article is on John Dillon's Vulcan site with this 180 degree turn and I did ask him to correct it.

Apart from that, unlike Richard, I accept the conclusions of the crash report. Their job was to try and find a reason for the crash and that had to involve a certain amount of speculation as some facts weren't available.

[RIHoward]

I've had a good read of this, as it's all rather local to me, and interesting reading it makes but I have to point out a few big holes in your interpretation.Oh really?
I think you should pay more attention to the sources and not start with the pre-conceived idea that the BoI were right. The Tench report should alert you to the possibility of a cover up. A Quote from Tench

" A disturbing feature is the influence which senior officers seek to exert on the investigation process, particularly in the RAF. Presidents of boards are conscious of a hovering presence in the background. The pervasive nature of the involvement some station commanders and even commanders in chief, is an unwelcome intrusion upon what should be the complete independence of the board of inquiry

The opportunities for staff to influence the boards interpretation of evidence or even their findings, must throw some doubt on the complete freedom of the board to draw its own conclusions.
"
As Hipper rightly says the BoI never mention a 180 degree turn, They say the A/c would stall by the time 90 degrees of turn was achieved. This number was arrived at in the Simulator flights run on day 3 of the Inquiry and before the Board had reconstructed the flight on a map on day 4.

I can't see why you think the turn was through 120 degrees rather than 180 as per the BOI PDF. An initial impact direction of 44 degrees veering to 110 degrees certainly seems to indicate the turn was nearer 180 from the initial take-off direction of 260 than the 120 you go with.So if as the BoI state the A/c would have stalled by 90 degrees of turn, how could it possibly have made it to 180 degrees? (or 120 degrees for that matter) Considering that Pilot's notes for the Valiant states the A/c will invariably roll out of a stall in the turn without the intervention of the Pilot it would appear that 90 degrees is the maximum turn achievable according to the flight simulator tests. Further more a port turn (backing not veering) is consistent with a 140 to 110 change in direction and consistent with the photographic evidence and Witness 1's statement hitting with the left wing first.

Pilot's Notes also says stalling a Valiant is 'very unlikely'.

Why then do the BoI pursue this 'very unlikely' occurrence as a cause of the crash after 2 days of their investigation when they'd found a fractured centre line spar at the scene, the main structural component in an A/c designed with the 'safe-life' strategy, a strategy that could not guarantee safety in a catastrophic failure, built from a material that was known to and had previously failed catastrophically i.e. DTD683. Surely this is the more likely cause than the 'very unlikely' stall hypothesis. And yet it was not investigated at all, in-fact it was studiously ignored by all concerned.. How do you explain that?

http://zkt.blackfish.org.uk/XD864/images/25Centerplane.jpg


Also 'veering' means a clockwise turn, so a turn to starboard, no witnesses mention any turn to starboard only port turns and dips are mentioned. The 120 degree turn was arrived at by taking all the witness statements as a whole, not just each one singly there is a consistency in their statements, it's why the BoI chose them over the many others who'd witnessed the crash and made statements, taken together it's relatively straight forward to reconstruct the path, it's what you should try to do if you think I've got it wrong, use a map and try to plot it for yourself rather than this 'hand waving' approach you seem to favour, at least give me the credit of actually sitting down for a few hours and studying it and then drawing it out. There were many other witnesses that were not included in the report and I've spoken to a couple of them and I've spoken to and met Witness 1.

Witness 1 was delivering manure to the field you can see the piles he was in the process of making on the field you can also see the tractor tracks in the image. He was methodical, moving from left to right in the image he was in the process of making the third row of piles, and was either half done with the last pile in row 3 or about to start a fresh pile to the right.

http://zkt.blackfish.org.uk/XD864/images/BoI_photo2.jpg



Similarly, your flight path seems off, as it's drawn east of Harringworth but witness 2 says it flew over Seaton - NW of Harringworth. Witness 2 states it flew over Shotley not Seaton I do wish that you get your facts straight before posting to this thread because this error on your part makes the rest of your post meaningless.

I'd thank you sir not to patronise me as I spent a lot of time working out the flight path something you clearly haven't bothered to do.

http://zkt.blackfish.org.uk/XD864/images/OS_FP_Wit_Mres.jpg


...... The witness reports are all so vague in positions and distances it is hard to make much of them really.This is patently not true the BoI were careful to choose witnesses that agreed with each other and that corroborated each others statements.

Witness 1 in particular is no use as his location could be in any one of 11 'runway intersection' spots in the vicinity of the crash site, all of which vary the aircraft's path dramatically compared to others.Again simply not true and shows just how much time you've spent looking at the material (very little) you can quite clearly see on the photographs where he was working and as I say I've spoken to Witness 1 as is clearly stated on the web page. If you're not prepared to at least do me the courtesy of reading AND understanding the web page then please do shut up!

With wind reported at 350 (and this is backed up by the spread of scorching from the fire on the aerial photo of the crash site), runway 14 at Spanhoe was about the worst possible choice - shortest, tailwind, no fire cover, and poor surface quality. Recipe for disaster - particularly with a flapless approach!OK this statement is so full of holes it's incredible. Have you actually read the page because it looks like you've just scanned it given the level of comprehension exhibited in that last statement.

First what you call 'the spread of scorching from the fire' also contains the debris field including the engines, where they ended up is consistent with 140 degrees at impact.

RWY14 was as short as RWY 20. Trying to put down on 20 would mean a turn of 60 degrees, less time to loose height, flying on gave an extra 30 seconds of flight time and about the same distance for a glide approach. So no, I think 14 gave them more time and more opportunity to lose height and speed than 20 did. Spanhoe was a DISUSED airbase so no 'fire-cover' at all. The Valiant sir was the 'Recipe for Disaster' and it should have been scrapped or rebuilt in 1956 as other 'safe-life' designs were.

With the impact point almost in the middle of the triangle of grass between the 3 runways and an initial impact heading of 44 degrees,This is clearly an error by the AIB man he's obviously just left off a 1 at the start it should be 144 degrees, as in witness 1's statement flying along the line of the runway, RWY 14 that is.

you'd be better off making a case for them trying for a forced landing on the longest of the runways at Spanhoe (07?), which would have had much less in the way of a tailwind, though a hefty crosswind.Well if you're trying to fly a seriously structurally compromised A/c I don't suppose you'd have the luxury of choosing which runway. See the quote below from the ex chief test pilot who was flying Valiants in 1960.

However... if a landing at Spanhoe was being attempted, why were the engines at high power? There might be two reasons the first is to avoid hitting a man on a tractor and the second might be that too much height was lost in the turn, that is they had flown down into the Welland Valley and were trying to re-gain height, I favour the former, though Witness 1 does think that they had flown up out of the valley to some extent.

Why was the gear still up? If you suspect a fractured spar you leave everything alone where it is. See the quote below from the ex chief test pilot who was flying Valiants in 1960.

If a belly landing was the intention, why was the cockpit hatch not jettisoned?
He thought he could make it remember he was allegedly 'Over-confident'

Why were no radio calls made after the initial call that they were remaining in the local area to sort out the nose gear fault?OK there are a few things wrong with the assumption, that 'the problem' was the nose wheel, there was nothing to do in a nose wheel failure other than to abort, so there was nothing to 'sort out' with the nose wheel failure. Secondly what he was 'staying local' to sort out was 'the problem' and not 'the nose wheel', you're filling in the blanks with your own pre conceived notion of what 'the problem' was, 'the problem' may have been the structural failure of the fractured spar.
'The problem' may be indicated in the telegram sent out from Wittering at 1pm.

http://zkt.blackfish.org.uk/XD864/images/BoI_107_G2UnusualFeatures.jpg


G(2) above is why the AIB were involved at all (See Tench) and the 'UNUSUAL OR OBSCURE FEATURES' clearly does not indicate the nose wheel, which was neither 'UNUSUAL' or 'OBSCURE'.

We'll never know of course because Wickham and his crew are dead, and the BoI did not ascertain when the fractured spar actually failed. The AIB man states there was 'no evidence' of a pre impact structural failure, and as he clearly, studiously ignored and failed to investigate the spar failure he can say without lying that he had found 'no evidence' because he simply hadn't looked at the spar. This is similar to the Mull Chinook incident, one of the AIB investigators was asked if finding 'no evidence' of a technical fault meant there hadn't been a technical fault he replied, 'No'.

All of your questions were clearly not answered in the BoI it was the BoI's duty to answer these questions. It is telling that the BoI did not ask these questions and you should not expect me to answer them. If they thought they were about to blame the Pilot the BoI should have allowed the Pilot representation (See The Tench Report) at the BoI (even if he was dead) with the right to call and re-examine witnesses, Wickham was not given this right. Just another indication of the shoddy way he and his crew were treated by the RAF/MOD. Disgraceful I'd call it and it dishonours them.

You postulate a possible fatigue fracture of a spar to explain it all - these failures did not show up on any production Valiant until August 1964, It's not a postulation it's a FACT of evidence a fractured spar was found and it was not investigated. A fractured spar if found would be the most probable cause given that this fractured spar was the backbone of a 'safe-life' design made from a material that was known to be prone to catastrophic failure.

four years and a lot of flying hours later. Second prototype WB215's spar fracture in 1957 was in a different place and thought to be due to the beating the aircraft had had during its trials life - including heavy landings, wing flutter incidents, and repeated RATOG firings.You're just regurgitating the 'official' yarn if you read Andrew Brookes' 1980's book you'll see for example that when 138 Sqdn was being disbanded in 1962 one Valiant was 'so badly cracked' that it couldn't be flown out of Wittering and had to be broken up on site.

DTD683 was known (in 1956) to undergo a structural change when over stressed, which would lead to a rapid 'auto catalytic' and catastrophic failure. Humphrey Wynn mentions another fatigue failure in a Valiant in Africa a few months before the August incident he calls it a pre cursor. All this was known in '56 the Valiant should have been scrapped or rebuilt in 1956 a year after it had entered service

The only part of your page that I agree with is the criticism of the narrative style of the report (with its attempt to paint a picture of what might have been going on in the cockpit in those 3 brief minutes) - but it's a style used in most reports of that era.It's a blatant, clumsy and deliberate cover up which dishonours the crew of XD864.


Incidentally I see no inconsistency between "1800ft QNH" and "1000-1500 ft above airfield level (300ft)" - that's 1300-1800 ft QNH, and with multiple witnesses stating 'lower than usual' that's a pretty sensible hedging of bets. If I were being unkind I'd think you were trying a bit too hard to find "errors"If I were being unkind I'd say you are an idiot. The errors the BoI made show what a bunch of amateurs they were the errors show how sloppy their approach was how careless they were.

On balance, the conclusion of the report seems entirely reasonable and likely to me, and your theory so far away from likely that you need a passport, a visa and a damn long flight to get there. Interesting effort though.Ha Ha Ha poor authoritarians, always think the authorities never lie. Ha! 'entirely reasonable'? barely, only with a massive stretch of your tiny imagination is it plausible. The fractured spar is a more probable cause than the 'very unlikely' stall hypothesis. The spar was ignored in the investigation.

This report is not the basis on which to convict posthumously a Captain of 'blameworthy neglegence'. It is preciseley this kind of report that prompted the RAF to add

“ONLY IN CASES IN WHICH THERE IS ABSOLUTELY NO DOUBT WHATSOEVER SHOULD DECEASED AIRCREW BE FOUND NEGLIGENT”

To the regulations governing BoIs

Here's what an ex Avro chief test pilot who was flying Valiants in 1960 says....



The BoI findings appear to me to be 'a rush to judgement'. To me the telling evidence is that of witness statements that lead one to conclude that the Captain was attempting an emergency landing, and that the aircraft was under control as it flew along the disused runway. This is totally inconsistant with a recovery from a stall but fits in with the supposition that they had suffered a spar failure. In this case the captain would have tried to minimise the stress on the wing by limiting any changes in configuration, ie; u/c and flaps, and keeping the speed and angle of bank low. The only surprising thing to me is that there is not any evidence of a radio message.Kindly read and understand the material before coming here to wave your hands about in this feeble way. Read it with a genuinely open mind rather than the obviously closed one you have. You owe it to the dead crew.

[LookingNorth]

Oh really?
I think you should pay more attention to the sources and not start with the pre-conceived idea that the BoI were right.

I did not start with any pre-conceived ideas; indeed on first reading of your page I thought you had a fairly decent case. I spent several hours reading it and the BoI, drawing up a map as you yourself have done and plotting witness points etc. It would be nice if you were a little less hysterical and insulting in your response.

As Hipper rightly says the BoI never mention a 180 degree turn

OK, but why then does your own page state:

If you don't have time to read the BoI, Michael Bullen and John Dillon have written a web page (http://john-dillon.co.uk/V-Force/valiant_xd864.html) that follows the narrative put forward in the BoI. This page also contains some of the errors found in the BoI e.g. "after a standard 30° banked turn of 180°, the aircraft hit the ground". This is not what happened ( a 30° bank is the lateral tilt of the A/c in a turn. The 180° refers to the amount turned through) . XD864 actually turned 120º.

Further more a port turn (backing not veering) is consistent with a 140 to 110 change in direction and consistent with the photographic evidence and Witness 1's statement hitting with the left wing first.Where do you get 140 from? This is not the heading mentioned - in at least two different places - in the BoI.

Why then do the BoI pursue this 'very unlikely' occurrence as a cause of the crash after 2 days of their investigation when they'd found a fractured centre line spar at the sceneJust about every major component of the aircraft was fractured - it rolled into a ball and exploded. I would be amazed if the spar didn't fracture. It clearly states that "no evidence" was found of any pre-crash structural failure. Why do you ignore this?

...built from a material that was known to and had previously failed catastrophically i.e. DTD683.Can you name a single proven instance of production Valiant spar failure before 1964?

Also 'veering' means a clockwise turn, so a turn to starboard, no witnesses mention any turn to starboard only port turns and dips are mentioned.Impact on a heading of 44 degrees; debris distributed at 110 degrees from there. There is no 'turn to starboard' here. There is a massive fireball with bits going in all directions amidst an extremely violent arrival on terra firma. No witness is going to report that as a "starboard turn", are they?

if you think I've got it wrong, use a map and try to plot it for yourself rather than this 'hand waving' approach you seem to favour, at least give me the credit of actually sitting down for a few hours and studying it and then drawing it out.I did.

There were many other witnesses that were not included in the report and I've spoken to a couple of them and I've spoken to and met Witness 1.I'm afraid I can only go on the evidence presented in the BoI and frankly I wouldn't trust most witnesses 5 minutes after a crash let alone 50 years after.

Witness 2 states it flew over Shotley not SeatonYes, I do apologise. Late at night, tired old eyes and a poor quality PDF are all a combination for error. That at least makes the turn definitely east of Harringworth and removes the major inconsistency.

Again simply not true and shows just how much time you've spent looking at the material (very little) you can quite clearly see on the photographs where he was working and as I say I've spoken to Witness 1 as is clearly stated on the web page. If you're not prepared to at least do me the courtesy of reading AND understanding the web page then please do shut up!I'd thank you to remain civil.

Witness 1 states: "I was working on a field in SPANHOE airfield near the intersection of two runways.". He does not elaborate as to which two runways. There is nothing on your page that elaborates as to his exact position either. Therefore he could be within the grass triangle within the 3 runways at one of those 3 corners; or outside that triangle in any of 9 spots 'near the intersection of two runways'. 12 possible locations that one could infer from the BoI.

First what you call 'the spread of scorching from the fire' also contains the debris field including the engines, where they ended up is consistent with 140 degrees at impact.The debris field photos are illegible in your PDF of the BoI. The BoI clearly states the wreckage travelled 'nearly sideways' along 110 degrees magnetic. The scorched area both covers that direction - initially - and then further south (SE of impact point), consistent with wind from 350. I did go to the trouble of overlaying the only clear photo on a Google Earth view of the site to make sure of all this.

RWY14 was as short as RWY 20. Trying to put down on 20Where did I say 20? I said the "longest runway" and "(07?)". I'm guessing 07/25 was its heading at the time.

This is clearly an error by the AIB man he's obviously just left off a 1 at the start it should be 144 degrees, as in witness 1's statement flying along the line of the runway, RWY 14 that is.Again witness 1 does not state which runway. 44 degrees appears more than once in the BoI. Corrections have been made to much less important items on the AIB bit - yet a crucial initial impact heading is 100 degrees out? You don't think that you're reaching just a tiny bit to claim this?

If you suspect a fractured spar you leave everything alone where it is.Yet the Valiant pilots who really had such a failure happen to them extended the gear and landed normally. 4 years later. Unaware that a loud crack and malfunctioning flaps even meant they even had a fractured spar.

So you're now saying this crew, 4 years before any other spar failure, both suffered one, and recognised it for what it was, and were attempting to belly land an aircraft heavy with fuel and loaded with large underwing tanks that would be hitting the ground as soon as either wing dipped so much as a degree on the ground roll (well I say roll but obviously I mean crash)? On a disused airfield with a significant tailwind and a high approach speed?

Sorry, but that's a very, very poor theory indeed.

OK there are a few things wrong with the assumption, that 'the problem' was the nose wheel, there was nothing to do in a nose wheel failure other than to abort, so there was nothing to 'sort out' with the nose wheel failure. Secondly what he was 'staying local' to sort out was 'the problem' and not 'the nose wheel', you're filling in the blanks with your own pre conceived notion of what 'the problem' was, 'the problem' may have been the structural failure of the fractured spar. "Shortly afterwards the pilot of XD864 called on Approach frequency and stated that he thought his nose wheel was still down. The local Controller Flt. Lt. S. BLURTON confirmed that the nose wheel was down. The pilot of XD864 reported that he was staying in the local area to "sort it out"."

Right, so now you're saying that, having had the spar crack, recognise that it had cracked, the pilot made a radio call worrying about sticky nose gear instead, while then saying he was staying in the local area to sort out an entirely different problem which was of so much concern to him that he didn't bother mentioning it on the radio.

Very well, crack on.

'The problem' may be indicated in the telegram sent out from Wittering at 1pm.This is clearly a pre-defined structure of message; without knowledge of the structure - i.e. which questions it is answering, it is pointless to pick out a single phrase from a single line and assign any meaning to it. You could as well highlight one of the random YES or NO entries and claim this was a reponse to "Was this an in-flight failure of the spar?"

We'll never know of course because Wickham and his crew are dead, and the BoI did not ascertain when the fractured spar actually failed. The AIB man states there was 'no evidence' of a pre impact structural failure, and as he clearly, studiously ignored and failed to investigate the spar failure he can say without lying that he had found 'no evidence' because he simply hadn't looked at the sparThis is a remarkable statement and were I the man in question I would be less than pleased. There is precisely nothing in the BoI to back your claim up that he "studiously ignored and failed to investigate the spar failure"; indeed the statement that was no evidence of a pre-crash failure points to precisely the opposite.

You're just regurgitating the 'official' yarn if you read Andrew Brookes' 1980's book you'll see for example that when 138 Sqdn was being disbanded in 1962 one Valiant was 'so badly cracked' that it couldn't be flown out of Wittering and had to be broken up on site.I'm afraid I don't have that book; however I do have Eric Morgan's masterwork on the type. Only one Valiant with 138 Sqn was withdrawn in 1962 - XD875 - the last one made. No details supplied unfortunately. However, don't you think if the youngest airframe had been found to be 'so badly cracked' that it had to be scrapped that some sort of fleet-wide inspection would have begun, as happened when an actual spar failure finally occurred in 1964? Particularly if, as you claim, such a crack had caused a crash in 1960 but the RAF had hushed it up?

If I were being unkind I'd say you are an idiot.And I'd say you were being a conspiracy theory loving nutjob. Thankfully both of us are above that sort of childish nonsense though, eh.

I had some respect for your position before you posted; now I realise exactly where you are coming from and realise I shouldn't have wasted my time. A shame.

[RIHoward]

I find the way you argue similar to the BoI, You ignore any inconvenient evidence that contradicts what you say. Your approach seems to be to challenge me for my opinion of the BoI rather than present any evidence to support what you say, you indulge in further hand waving.

You admit your Seaton error and insist that you did draw the flight path on a map, shouldn't you then in light of your error redraw your map?

Here is what the web site says.

....the purpose is not to prove that XD864's centre plane spar fractured and caused the crash, the purpose is to show that the creation of such a narrative is possible, plausible, believable and evidence based, therefore the BoI should have contemplated the possibility that there was a structural failure prior to impact and investigated the fractured spar. Instead the BoI form their conclusions of pilot error and a stalled turn 3 days into the investigation and chose to ignore the fractured spar.

It's obvious from your response that you don't understand this.

Where in the BoI do they say they investigated the spar?

A fatigue failure and and impact break are both 'brittle fractures' they look the same to a cursory inspection, a full lab inspection would be required to ascertain when the fracture occurred, no such inspection took place.

Page 100 BoI pdf 23. distribution of wreckage
Describes where some major parts ended up

'starboard U/c 150 yds down the line of flight ... front fuselage ... 100 yds from point of first impact on the same magnetic heading.'

The A/c clearly impacted at 144º and not 44º the AIB man was probably working from notes writing his report and made the same error twice in his report i.e. he left off the one and got 44º magnetic not 144º, its a simple error, but shows a lack of appreciation of spacial awareness.

Here's a picture you won't have seen it's from the BoI. I've added the flight paths in question it's clear where the large bits of the A/c ended up and the paths they followed from the point of first impact.

http://zkt.blackfish.org.uk/XD864/images/Spanhoe_fp_comp_02.jpg




I've manipulated the above image in a 3D package so we can see it from above and super imposed it on the image of Spanhoe from Wikipedia. The location of Witness 1 is based on what he told the BoI and what he told me he was doing. He was having a fag break from making piles of manure sitting on his tractor.

http://zkt.blackfish.org.uk/XD864/images/Spanhoe_Fp_Comp01.jpg


There are no bits of wreckage on the 44ºM flight path from the point of impact.

And also Corporal Spence's drawing in the BoI page 72

http://zkt.blackfish.org.uk/XD864/images/Spanhoe_CS_068.jpg


Quite frankly I don't really care what your opinion is. All you offer in lieu of evidence is hand waving and name calling you are a waste of time and I find your attitude disrespectful and an insult to the crew of XD864.

[Al R]

Whatever the rights and wrongs, looking at the violent aftermath in those photographs and clearly being able to see what he was trying to do, he must have fought like a dervish all the way down. They're a salutory reminder of how disposable and less valuable life was (WW2 was only 15 years previously) and they're a chilling epitaph to a man's last moments.

The man though, spreading the manure. Given he had a stricken nuclear bomber howling down on him rather sharpish, were those piles of dung self administered?

RIP that crew.

[Juan Tugoh]

As Al R said RIP that crew.

As to the "debate" on the cause, the personal and toxic nature of the debate reflects poorly on those involved. Argue your case, it's merits or otherwise will speak for themselves, there is absolutely no need to resort to personal insults. Personal involvement does not excuse bad manners.

[LookingNorth]

I find the way you argue similar to the BoI, You ignore any inconvenient evidence that contradicts what you say.

This is precisely what you are doing. You have failed to answer every single question I have put to you. In the light of that there is clearly absolutely no point in getting dragged into a typical conspiracy theorist's argument as you will pick and choose 'evidence' to back yourself up (even if it it means changing the content of the report) while producing hearsay evidence as 'proof'. It is a shockingly poor way to advance your argument and loses you all credibility; and it means you do a disservice to the very crew you claim to be defending. Over and out.

[jindabyne]

All a bit distasteful, this.

[RIHoward]

What we are seeing in the response of LookingNorth is a typical Authoritarian Follower's response (http://members.shaw.ca/jeanaltemeyer/drbob/TheAuthoritarians.pdf).

In this case the Authority of the BoI and the AIB are challenged, and the Authoritarian Follower as described by (Dr Bob Altemeyer (http://home.cc.umanitoba.ca/%7Ealtemey/)) will defend those authorities aggressively (even to the point of violence) and irrationally even when presented with factual, evidence based reasoned arguments that challenge their authority. In military services the Authoritarian followers response is exploited by a hierarchy of power that must be obeyed no matter what, military training is designed so that the Authoritarian Follower's response becomes a conditioned reflex, you couldn't run a military service without it.

So in this case the AIB man makes two tiny errors in his report, probably working from notes he misses out a 1 and gets the wrong baring at impact. But to the Authoritarian Follower the AIB are infallible even though a close inspection of the Crash site photo on the web page (http://zkt.blackfish.org.uk/XD864/index.html) and in the post above (http://www.pprune.org/5968012-post49.html) shows a baring of 250º that and the drawing by Corporal Spence and in section Page 100 BoI pdf 23. Distribution of Wreckage show the baring had to be closer to 144º than 44º and so there is enough evidence to suggest a typo by the AIB man, but not to the Athoritarian follower the AIB man must be right and Corporal Spence and the 'Conspiracy theorist nut job' whose dad died in the crash can't be right, despite the available evidence to the contrary that the AIB man made an error in his report.

Anyway Authoritarian Followers bless em all!

I've mentioned the Tench Report in some of the posts above and as it's not that available I've put a pdf on the web (http://zkt.blackfish.org.uk/XD864/Tench_Report.pdf) so that anyone interested can read it. According to LookingNorth's view point Mr. W. H. Tench (AIB) CBE Ceng FRAeS is also a 'conspiracy theorist nut job'.

From Tench we learn that "Board of Inquiry (Air Force) Rules, 1956" were in operation in '60 and up to the time of his report in 1987 (made public in 2000)

The AIB needed to be asked to take part in a BoI for one of the reasons laid out in Tench. Here they are...

4.2.3 RAF. The AIB acts in the capacity of consultant to RAF Boards of Inquiry concerned
with accidents which appear to have been due to any of the following causes:-
a. structural failure in the air,
b. fire or explosion in the air,
c. serious technical defect,
d. unusual or obscure features of a technical nature,
e. defects which have become epidemic.

The phrase as in d. above 'unusual or obscure features of a technical nature' is exactly to the letter the phrase in G(2) on the telegram sent from Wittering at 1pm

http://zkt.blackfish.org.uk/XD864/images/BoI_107_G2UnusualFeatures.jpg


which would make it likely that the questions for the answers given in G(1) and G(2) on that telegram would be something along the lines of:- 1 Are the AIB involved? to which the answer on the telegram was:- G(1) YES and 2 Give the Reason (choose one from 5 from the list above) to which the answer was G(2) UNUSUAL OR OBSCURE FEATURES OF A TECHNICAL NATURE. There is no mention in the AIB Report or in the BoI of UNUSUAL OR OBSCURE FEATURES OF A TECHNICAL NATURE the reason why the AIB were invited along in the first place.

Here Tench gives the reason why the Captain of XD864 should have been represented once the BoI figured they could pin the blame on him.

5.3 ROYAL AIR FORCE
If it appears to a Board that the inquiry will affect the character or professional reputation of
any person, that person must be given notice of his rights under QR 1259. This entitles him
to have all the relevant evidence up to that stage read to him, and to elect to be present, and
represented at the remaining sittings of the board, (or at such times as the convening authority
or president may specify). He may also cross-examine former and subsequent witnesses.

That's All Folks!
Over and Out.

[Shell Management]

Does labelling someome not veer towards just the behaviour you seek to avoid?

If not go read this Conspiracy theory - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conspiracy_theory)

[LookingNorth]

It's classic conspiracy theorist behaviour. Refuses to answer questions that would demolish his case; refers to all sorts of minutiae and even unrelated material to back his case up, etc. etc. I won't bother responding further; only stokes the fires. Crack on "RIHoward" and remember that you began the insults. Shameful.

[RIHoward]

LookingNorth still chuntering on, petty minded, sore loser, compartmentalised mind, and ignorant of the facts. Now he's starting to look and sound like a Troll must have the last word in his bigoted and blinkered world view, sad sad man, well it's not going to happen while I'm still drawing breath. He's even resorting to lies and misrepresentation of facts to cover his sorry Authoritarian arse.

I hope that's shamelessly insulting enough to discourage any more of your inane nonsense LN.:ok:

So as LN is petty minded, let's accommodate him.
Let's count the errors he made in his first post (http://www.pprune.org/5962695-post47.html) to this thread, his so called questions that would 'demolish' the case his 'big holes'. (the only big holes around here are the ones between your ears LN, and the disconnection of your emotional intelligence from what little you have elsewhere)
What a hand waver!

180º as per BoI ERROR
Initial impact direction of 44º ERROR
veering to 110º ERROR
turn was nearer 180º from the initial T/o position ERROR
witness 2 says it flew over SEATON ERROR (the only one he admitted to)
witness reports are so vague ERROR
RWY 14 was the Shortest ERROR
RWY 14 had no fire cover ERROR SPANHOE was disused so had no fire cover at all

So at least 8 errors in the first post an insult to intelligence or what? a few big holes eh? LN? deserving of the epithet IDIOT?

See this post (http://www.pprune.org/5968012-post49.html), this post (http://www.pprune.org/5969370-post51.html), this post (http://www.pprune.org/5972074-post56.html) and this web site (http://zkt.blackfish.org.uk/XD864/index.html) for all the answers to LN's dumb :mad: questions.

[flipster]

Gentlemen, gentlemen

I think perhaps a little time-out is required?

Distasteful?.... Toxic? Perhaps. But let us also remember there are many strong emotions running around these pages, which may explain the heatedness of the exchanges but can, nonetheless, be forgiven - I would hope.

Mr Howard and Mr North, you are both obviously well-educated and informed people who just happen to have differing opinions. You both make many valid points but may I humbly suggest that we will never ever truly know what actually happened at Witerring/Spanhoe, so a majority of questions will forever remain unanswered. I can appreciate that this is no comfort to those who have lost loved ones and who may feel that blame was apportioned without rigorous investigation or for others may feel a theory of duplicity/conspiracy is also unpalatable. Please may I suggest we all cogitate on the following:

Did the ac have a nose gear problem? - Most probably.
Did it necessitate immediate landing? - No.
Did something else happen? - We don't know?
What was said and happened on the flight deck? - No idea (no ADR/CVR).
Were they trying to land at Spanhoe or turn d/w then stalled? - Not sure.
Was the investigation of scene of the accident thourough? - Probably but not sure.
Was spar failure investigated? - Yes, but to unknown depth of detail.
Was the spar failure before impact considered? Probably but not fully.
Were Valiant spars likely to suffer failure in 1960? - Possibly not but not definite.
Were all RAF BoI procedures in 1960 rushed and seriously flawed? - Yes, they were changed in 1980s, 1990s and more recently, after Haddon-Cave.
Did the 1960 Inquiry have a shadowy presence of an AOC lurking in the background? - Not sure but it was known to have happened.

Ultimately, however,

Would a modern inquiry have come to the same conclusion? - ABSOLUTELY NOT - given the available evidence, they may not have found out the cause but neither would they have blamed the crew.

In sum, I don't think anyone can be sure of what happened that sad day, other than that a crew of professional aircrew perished whilst doing their best with a bad lot. It is a very sad tale and may I offer my condolences to those who lost loved ones - who may (or may not) be comforted by the last of my observations?

Kind regards,

flipster

RIP crew of XD864