Incident At Fairford RIAT
Fairford Runway Blocked
Incident At Fairford RIAT
TV teletext today mentions an Italian military aircraft bursting into flames on landing at Fairford. Hope its not TOO serious but does anyone have first hand info on this one?
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All are OK. No flying display as a result according to BBC reports. Runway blocked due to A/C, airbags & other removal equipment.
Glad nobody was injured and glad I never went today.
BM.
Glad nobody was injured and glad I never went today.
BM.
Join Date: May 2000
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Just been on the ITV news. Italian Transaal type thing appeared to land nose wheel first, bounced a few feet, came down again, nose wheel collapsed in shower of sparks and flame from the scraping belly. Pilot kept her straight and she stopped on the runway. Fire crews quickly in, crew quickly out, no injuries.
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Amazing pictures on the TV news, incredible nose down attitude in the very steep descent which required a huge round out which he just got slightly wrong landing a three pointer with a bounce and then nose wheel first on the second contact.......ouch!
PP
PP
Seen the TV news footage now on BBC 1. Ouch! He didn't give the poor nose wheel much of a chance when he got his pitch attitude out of sync with his bounces. Oh dear.
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Saw it happen in front of me today. Basically he was demonstrating a kai san (?) approach (steep approach from 1000' used in Sarejevo etc to avoid small arms fire). He bounced heavily, and appeared to land a 2nd time on the nose wheel. Lots of tyre smoke and then the nose gear collapsed. It skidded on its nose for about 800m with a small fire under the fuselage. Came to a stop and the fire was quickly put out. All rather expensive.
The flying program was interrupted and had to be hastily reaaranged, but luckily it happened in the first 2000' of runway so they were able to get some stuff away (firefly, hawks, helicopters, harriers etc.) Took 4 hours to finally reopen full length but the flying programme did resume in full, and in the end not too much was lost! Still a good day out. Feel sorry for the Italian Captain though, not a good day out for him!
The flying program was interrupted and had to be hastily reaaranged, but luckily it happened in the first 2000' of runway so they were able to get some stuff away (firefly, hawks, helicopters, harriers etc.) Took 4 hours to finally reopen full length but the flying programme did resume in full, and in the end not too much was lost! Still a good day out. Feel sorry for the Italian Captain though, not a good day out for him!
Last edited by Propellerhead; 20th Jul 2002 at 20:09.
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This forum is hardly the right place for RIAT incident.........BAs 777 was swanking around, as well as other commercial aircraft. I personally was quite relieved that there was a delay to the displays (thank god no-one was hrt of course), because I was one of the poor souls who (stupidly) chose the blue route M4 via Siwndon and it took 5 hours to do ? 15 miles. Despite leaving very early it was very frustrating how poorly the anticipated traffic was managed. Being back at Fairford where the access was so much better than Cottesmore, how on earth did it end up so appalling. The worst was listening to Jenny Catt on Vulcan radio 87.7 (commentating the show) who was brightly telling everyone how all the routes in Fairford were all moving. Couldn't get through to the d@*n station either to tell her what rot.
So finally arriving at 1330 when it should have been much much earlier, managed to catch the bulk of the displays, they even reran Eames Glider performance, which is just so beautiful to watch, and luckily the wx played fair game and all managed to to do full displays. An added bonus was the breathtaking B-12 over from Missouri with it's escort of 4 (this time) F15s who had to fly a little lower because of cloudbase. Awesome.
Congrats on the Red Arrows (do these guys have the luck or not, after some really nasty potential CBs and very low black clouds it all blew away to blue skies when they took off) Some excellent manoeuvres, and especially the Jubilee ? burst ?, very very good.
So finally arriving at 1330 when it should have been much much earlier, managed to catch the bulk of the displays, they even reran Eames Glider performance, which is just so beautiful to watch, and luckily the wx played fair game and all managed to to do full displays. An added bonus was the breathtaking B-12 over from Missouri with it's escort of 4 (this time) F15s who had to fly a little lower because of cloudbase. Awesome.
Congrats on the Red Arrows (do these guys have the luck or not, after some really nasty potential CBs and very low black clouds it all blew away to blue skies when they took off) Some excellent manoeuvres, and especially the Jubilee ? burst ?, very very good.
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Been watching him practice his display all week up at Farnborough (one assumes there's now a gap in the display here this week!).
It's a fantastic, and spiritied, display - guess we're all allowed a balls up every now and then.
Glad all got out OK. With the exception of salary, promotion and seniority aspects obviously....!
It's a fantastic, and spiritied, display - guess we're all allowed a balls up every now and then.
Glad all got out OK. With the exception of salary, promotion and seniority aspects obviously....!
"Trust Me"
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Great, great day at RIAT. Was watching the 222 do a very spirited display from the queue -not surpirsed he stuffed it!
But -the RAC signs were non-reflective and difficult to read in the dark -apparently motorists were overshooting them in daylight!!Nobody knew where the Early Brid CP was Friday night
Took 2 hours to walk in from the car park, only two X-ray scanners in operation -crazy.
Vulcan FM should be shot, never heard such an amateurish station for ages -it was Jenny Catt's first time on air, and it showed!! Even Sean Moffat's 'commentary' in the morning was very poor -lots of gaps and drivel -he desperately needed a script.
We arrived back at our motor home at 19.15, watched a Beemer take two hours to move 5 car lengths. Eventually left at 23.00 after the CP emptied for a flying run home.
Somebody -organisers, Glos Constabulary need to be shot !!!!
Understand it was BETTER a t Cottesmore because of the direct access to the A1?
Rgds
DOC.400
c.c. RIAT
But -the RAC signs were non-reflective and difficult to read in the dark -apparently motorists were overshooting them in daylight!!Nobody knew where the Early Brid CP was Friday night
Took 2 hours to walk in from the car park, only two X-ray scanners in operation -crazy.
Vulcan FM should be shot, never heard such an amateurish station for ages -it was Jenny Catt's first time on air, and it showed!! Even Sean Moffat's 'commentary' in the morning was very poor -lots of gaps and drivel -he desperately needed a script.
We arrived back at our motor home at 19.15, watched a Beemer take two hours to move 5 car lengths. Eventually left at 23.00 after the CP emptied for a flying run home.
Somebody -organisers, Glos Constabulary need to be shot !!!!
Understand it was BETTER a t Cottesmore because of the direct access to the A1?
Rgds
DOC.400
c.c. RIAT
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Didn't understand the x-ray scanner thingys. They asked me to put all my bag on the table next to the scanner, walk through and pick my bag up on the other side 
Any little clockwork+semtex items that may have been sitting in the bottom of my bag would have gone completely undetected
What is the point in scanning people only? It's the bags you want to check!! To have waited for two hours (well, it felt like it!!) only to find the whole exercise completely futile was rather annoying to say the least. Big round of applause to the people organising the crowd at the beginning and the end though - they had to put up with all manner of abuse. And a special mention to the bomb detection puppy who didn't even flinch as the first fast jet (forget what it was, stripey thingy, lots of noise) went over.
But despite the set backs, an absolutely stunning day as usual.
Any little clockwork+semtex items that may have been sitting in the bottom of my bag would have gone completely undetected
What is the point in scanning people only? It's the bags you want to check!! To have waited for two hours (well, it felt like it!!) only to find the whole exercise completely futile was rather annoying to say the least. Big round of applause to the people organising the crowd at the beginning and the end though - they had to put up with all manner of abuse. And a special mention to the bomb detection puppy who didn't even flinch as the first fast jet (forget what it was, stripey thingy, lots of noise) went over.
But despite the set backs, an absolutely stunning day as usual.
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I think the loadie suffered a minor injury (ankle?) when jumping out the back ramp (which, of course, was sticking some way up in the air). Front end crew went out the side windows.
If memory serves right it was a 222 which blew a nose tyre a couple of years ago at the end of his RIAT display in rather similar circs.
If memory serves right it was a 222 which blew a nose tyre a couple of years ago at the end of his RIAT display in rather similar circs.