Ejection Seats and Operating Envelopes
I was reading the thread regarding the tragic Greek F-16 crash and the subsequent accident report and let me say that I'm just trying to learn something here, there is absolutely no intention on my part to second guess the chain of events.
Firstly I had no idea that trim could have such a huge impact on aircraft handling at takeoff, that was a big learning point for me - I always assumed that standard control inputs always trump trim settings, even without the use of any rudder (in this case). Now I know better.
But the crash report also specified that the ejection seats were "outside their operating envelope" at the time of the accident and that's the part I'm trying to understand. With maybe 150 knots IAS and 50 feet AGL with no option for sink rate being an issue I would have thought the seats would be right in their envelope - could this have referred to the aircraft having rolled past 90 degrees or is there another seat operating parameter that I'm totally missing.
Just trying to understand what happened and not disrespect the fallen, if I'm out of line asking this just let me know.