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Old 15th Jul 2005, 19:01
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pr00ne
 
Join Date: May 2003
Location: London/Oxford/New York
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That was SO close! I was enjoying a day of corporate hospitality, strolling along with an ex Buccaneer Nav and a friend who has no aviation connections, when I stopped them all to watch the Typhoon practice display.

It was an excellent routine, but when I saw it descend below the level of the hangar opposite the runway still going downhill at one hell of a rate of knots with a worryingly high angle of attack I froze. I was convinced he had left it too late and was just waiting for the bang, either of impact or Martin Baker. With an enormous tongue of flame and a deafening roar he managed to miss the ground, by around 20 feet I would guess.

I turned to ex Buc Nav to see him white as a sheet, even my legal mate asked if that sort of thing was normal. Apparently I was as white as a sheet too.

How come the normally fiercesome Flying Display Committee did not order a land right away?

That has to be the closest I have ever been to seeing an airshow accident, do 29 (R) have more than one authorised display pilot?
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