Military Accidents
 

Chugalug 2

The web site:

http://www.dasa.mod.uk/natstats/acci...l/acctab1.html

gives the figures up to 2006.

You can also look at individual accident summaries back to the 1970s if you go to:

http://www.mod.uk/DefenceInternet/Te...ACHEHINT=Guest

JB

Many of those I've checked on the 'accident summary' website are the 'whitewash summary' and totally fail to provide the full details......

Typical:mad:

But even the whitewash is sobering, Beags. As you say the summaries say little, but the stats tell their own story. The spike in the number of deaths resulting form the Chinook crash at Mull in 1994, more than doubling the 1993 deaths. Of course the drastic cuts in the military aviation fleet over the years has to be borne in mind when one sees the graphs dipping ever further to the right hand corner.

Old Pair at Valley
 

Well, I cannot compete with the earlier colour picture, but I do have a rather scrappy shot of the Old Pair at a Valley Open Day in the mid-70's:-

http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f8...ir001_crop.jpg

The Vampire (as you've posted a picture LL) wasn't without its idiosyncrasies I believe. I never flew it myself, our course was the first to train on JPs, but Vampires and Meteors (for those too lanky for the MB seats in the Vamp) were used by the entries senior to us at Sleaford Tech. No doubt someone of their vintage will correct me, but AFAIK there was a band of Eng RPM that was verboten on the approach (to avoid surges?) not the cleverest limitation for a training aircraft. The effect of this was that the MO kept his window open, even in the depths of winter, with his mini parked outside. Thus one could be only half way through one's heart wrenching list of ailments and symptoms hoping for a sickie, when at the first peep of the station crash alarm you were addressing an empty chair!
The other endearing feature of the Vamp was that the U/C and flap selectors could and sometimes were confused. Thus the after landing tidy up could be anything but as with a graunch she settled onto her belly!

Accident rates are an emotive topic and it is hard to believe the numbers who lost their lives in the immediate post war period. Even in my time my course (19GE 1974/75) lost 25% of those who made it to squadrons in flying accidents. I almost added to that while CAT 5ing a Bulldog:eek:

RIP RR and NS:(

HF

The Vampire's U/C and flap levers were down the bottom of the throttle pedestal, virtually out of sight. The U/C knob was wheel-shaped and the other was squarish. When the port oleo was compressed a microswitch would put and interferance bar above the U/C lever therefore preventing it from being pulled up. It worked for me several times.
If you got a load of flak thrown up at you from the runway caravan it meant that your U/C was not down and locked or the bulb in the nose light that told him so was blown.

5500rpm, or was it 7500 rpm was the minimum on finals as the engine would take so long to accelerate without rumbling like a dinosaurs belly after a bathful of Vindaloo.

Refering to the post below I think this was an RAF FTC mod.

I know of at least one instance of an RNZAF T11 which raised its undercarriage while taxying. The QFI later became an Air Commodore!

From my album

Meteor F8 - 41 Sqn Biggin Hill 1954/1955. 41 converted to Hunter F5's in August 1955.

http://i145.photobucket.com/albums/r...nMeteor8-2.jpg


41 Sqn's Vampire T.11 taken at about the same time

http://i145.photobucket.com/albums/r...s/DiaTest6.jpg

Thanks for posting the pictures, you don't see so many colour snaps from that era.

You could perhaps spare the Vampire pilot's blushes by photoshopping another a/c next to him...

VP

It looks to me as if the T11 is on a taxiway. Not much room for formation.

Judging bythe dust coming from his port mainwheel, he is OFF the taxiway.

Meatbox accidents
 

I flew in the Middleton-st-George aerobatic team (the "Falcons") at Pershore's B o B Day display on 19 Sep 53. After flying back to Middleton on
21 Sep, I did not fly again until 28 Dec. I do not think the reason for the "gap" was a grounding; I believe I did the OATS course around then, whatever that was - anyway I did not get my oats! Any way, I flew a T7 on 28 Dec "418" with a Flt Lt Farley in the back seat on an air test. Any takers on which Farley?

I spent the evening of 27 Oct in London at 208's 91st reunion dinner, where I was guest speaker. I devoted some of my speech defending the reputation of the Meatbox against some of the malignant and somewhat hysterical abuse that it has attracted recently. Some significant facts are:-

About 3,500 Meatboxes were built and, according to Nick Carter's book, "only" about 25% of them were writen off in accidents.

Ejection seats were introduced with the Mk 8 and later Marks. At Driffield, where I did my conversion, and at Middleton where I was a "creamie" we used F4s for solo work and T7s for instruction. In the former, due to the high tail, bailing out was scarcely an option. In the latter it was an act of desperation because the canopy sometimes did not release cleanly, swivelled on its centre strut and decapitated both pilots. (Or so we were warned).

All Meatboxes had the old economiser oxygen system. The T7 was unpressurised and the F4s' pressurisation was not often serviceable. I am sure many pilots went partially anoxic.

The F4s and the earlier T7s had vacuum-driven instruments with pitifully low gimbal limits and long re-erection times, and these in short-endurance aircraft which had to operate at high altitudes. I am sure many blokes "lost it" carrying out of necessity a "limited panel" QGH/GCA. The Meatbox's descent angle with airbrakes out was steep.

The performance jump from the Harvard to the Meatbox was great.

There was an urgent build-up of the front line due to the Korean war. I believe students were being pushed off solo at the AFSs in conditions which were not acceptable on Flight Safety grounds. But Flight Safety was not the ultimate consideration at that time.

The idiot who tried to do a touch-and-go on one and went through the officers mess was at Middleton - in late 51 I think.

The attitude of the public in those days was "Dogs bark, ducks quack, jets crash". I don't believe there was any mutiny at the FTSs. Everyone wanted to fly the Meatbox because it was still King of the Sky

'Judging by the dust coming from his port mainwheel, he is OFF the taxiway.'

or it could be jet efflux!

I think many of the Meteor fatalities were due to, firstly practicing asymmetric with one flamed out, no FADEC or any accel device save the left hand and a general lack of knowledge of gas turbine handling. Secondly, the phantom dive which occurred when any flap was lowered with the airbrakes (wing mounted) out. According to my log book, the last time this happened was on Aug 6 1988 at Coventry when a CFS vintage Meteor did a display and left his brakes out for most of it. I was scrambling into my Harvard to try and get the radio working when he turned downwind to land. The dive, when it occurred was sudden and mind numbingly dramatic. Thank God he missed the housing estate. This is probably the history behind the first item on the pre-landing check of all the fast jets I ever flew "airbrakes in".

I am willing to stand corrected but was it not the lowering of the undercarriage (where one wheel came down before the other and created yaw) with airbrakes out that caused the phantom dive.

That's what the ex-Meatbox hands told me, Arters.

See http://www.caa.govt.nz/Publications/...ssue-1_Feb.pdf

AFAIK I completed a circuits sortie in a T7, and on taxying in found the airbrake out. In the later days of the Meteor (I flew at RAFCAW in 65) the airbrakes were limited, and only came out to about 45 deg. Is this why I did not experience the 'phanton dive'? Any comment? From memory the aircraft felt a bit odd but did nothing untoward.

IIRC the Dewent had only one accessory drive so the generator was on the starboad and the hyraulic pump on the port engine. When you lowered the U/C the hyraulics took the line of least resistance and lowered the port wheel first.
With the early oval fin the airbrakes, fully extended, would blank off the fin and tailplane therefore not dampening the inevitable yaw and the nose would drop. The later, Mk 8 and similar, with a different fin didn't suffer so much.

Fareastdriver, I managed to scrounge 3 trips in the back of 'Clementine', the Brawdy target-towing Meteor T7, whilst at TWU. Apart from watching my colleagues shooting at our flag, my overriding memory was of the odd light sequence during landing gear extension (preceded by a positive check of "Airbrakes IN") - and the nimble footwork of the chap in the front ensuring that the ball stayed in the middle!

Presumably the height loss involved in the 'phantom dive' needed to retract the airbrakes and recover to level flight was frequently greater than the height available? Particularly if both engines were at idle during the run in and break.

In the Hunter, selecting airbrake in and gear down at the same time with the idle thrust would put such a demand on the feeble hydraulics that the controls would revert to manual - which certainly got one's attention during a VRIAB!

At least in the Gnat it was physically impossible to select airbrake in and gear down together - it was the same system. 'Airbrake' was actually 50%-ish gear extension - a clever idea!