LOMCEVAK posted: Therefore, pulling up for a looping manoeuvre from straight and level at 200 ft agl would have been within the regulations so long as the pitch attitude was such that it would not have been considered 'aerobatic' before climbing through 500 ft agl. There are many definitions of what constitutes an aerobatic manoeuvre but in general 60 deg of pitch is probably the most restrictive.
I don't take any issue with what you say but it does throw up a number of reasonably foreseeable issues.
Not least of which is how does the pilot accurately judge his pitch angle? Certainly not by looking straight ahead. So he has his head out looking at the wing tip and really just having a punt. Then he needs to look in at the Altimeter... Really? More likely its a timing and practice thing of pulling "this" quickly... Except not really the type to be doing a lot of practice in is it?
So one question is what was the plan and how was that factored into the build up and what were the abort points??
Does he throw it away if he does pull too quickly and achieves this visually judged 60deg pitch up at 300, 400, 450ft? Plus of course we must remember the actual figure being flown is a 1/4 clover with the rolling element on the up line. In the first place its slightly unnatural to be waiting until +60deg before commencing the roll but now we need to factor in positioning, because if we have started that too early or too late now we in an altogether different position from that which was planned...
Its not hard to see how the workload in the first half of this can ramp up. It may have been better to put the rolling element on the downline and indeed that is what he had done only a few weeks before at a prior airshow.
Finally what are those persons who have oversight, but are external to the aircraft, what are their visual cues for the on going health of the display?? Again what was the plan?
It is undoubted that the pilot did not deliberately intend to do anything dangerous or wrong and the suggestion that he did is utterly idiotic but you can see how it isn't hard for the best laid plans to go off track and what is the plan then? This debate could ultimately be more about the events in the build up than on the day.
Just a view and regardless of the precise cause of the accident worthy of debate.