Yeah, I'm not a former RAF flying instructor, but I can read what one has to say:
David Learmount, a former pilot and RAF flying instructor, claimed the crash would not have happened if the plane had started at a higher altitude.
'If he had been 500 feet when he entered the manoeuvre and done exactly the same thing 11 people would be alive today.'
That the pilot survived the impact tells me that he almost made it. I would add that perhaps you Brits are better drivers, but in the USA a jet fighter pulling out of a vertical maneuver a few hundred feet over a 4 lane highway would likely cause a pileup.