they have 9 pairs of eyes for our 1 - MY ARSE ;)
The Red Arrows dont have nine sets of eyes to look out.
Fly formation and I assure you you will quickly realise those other 8 sets of eyes are firmly fixed on the neighboring inboard aircraft and nowhere else. If you dont you will have a mid-air collision. Hence- only the leader aircraft looks out.
The other 8 aircraft wouldnt really know if the leader had misjudged a loop and was about to plant everybody into the ground in formation [ and thats what happened to a foreign team once - 7 or 8 neatly spaced holes in the ground].
The leader is effectively flying one quite large aircraft with hopeless manouvrability(sp) and they are going to have great difficulty taking avoiding action if they spot the little speck of an R22 a bit late.
I think it is a very good idea that formations are given very wide berths by all methods possible.
OOW