The T.4 which crashed was, I believe, the oldest Canberra still in service. It was built in late 1953 and delivered in, or about, May 1954. This makes it 50 years old this year!
But I've read this thread with growing dismay over some of the comments, especially the comment that "Canberras should be grounded". Why? It was a T.4 not a
PR.9! Totally different aircraft, different characteristics entirely. And if "old" aircraft are to be grounded what about the B-52?
If you have read the BBC's web-site "fact file" on the Canberra you'll find it is totally misleading in this instance - Quote -
The Canberra T4 is the training version of the plane, with the only difference from the PR9 being its dual controls. Rubbish! Any Canberra man will laugh at that. But that class of "understanding" is becoming obvious in this thread.
As for it being an "assymetric". Has this been proven? Is this the cause? If so, I apologise, because the "public" gen doesn't say that. To my mind, the fact that there is no canopy or nav's hatch and all three seat tubes are showing means that the crew had some warning of impending disaster (the nav would have gone first the two pilots almost immediately after) - an "assymetric" is sudden and violent. As other posters have mentioned on this thread, zero/zero seats
might have made a difference, but the crew didn't have them. If any of you feel the need to place blame don't put it on the Canberra, put it down to the bean-counters.