Wiggy observed that: "there may be issues with display authorisation, recency and exposure to the aircraft type."
That seems to me to hit the nail pretty accurately on the head.
It's always easy to blame the guy at the controls, and it is by no means my intention to do that. In my (perhaps over simplistic) view it seems fairly plain that the accident resulted from entering the manoeuvre too low, too slow, from failing to maintain thrust during the manoeuvre, and finally from failing to abort the manoeuvre when insufficient height was achieved at the apex.
But I would not agree with those who conclude that the pilot was wilfully or recklessly negligent, and would ask whether inexperience and lack of currency are not better explanations than a 'gung ho' 'cowboy' disregard for the consequences?
I hope that this does not cause offence, but I can't imagine that this pilot would be authorised by the Royal Air Force to display a swept wing fast jet in 2017. Why should the requirements for displaying such an aircraft on the civil register be so very different?
His Harrier experience seems to have been relatively modest (one tour?) and a long time ago - the GR3 had left frontline service by 1990 (That's 27 years ago). Do we think that he was so experienced (and current) on this category of aircraft that he should have been publicly displaying the Hunter with so few hours on type?
It's not as though he was a former service display pilot, a TP, or someone with bags of experience on swept wing fast jets, nor even someone who had lots of operational experience gained within the last decade - or even this century.