Brazilian Air Force aerobatic crash
 

carb icing?
spacial disorientation?
Weather would have been similar to where I live, 27°C 70% humidity, dew point 21, except that airpórt is 900 metres asml (I am at almost zero)
temp would have therefore been closer to the dew point
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RRZRJ...eature=related

Looks like a classic case of the pilot being unaware of either his/her, or the aeroplane's limitations. Coupled with entering the maneuver at such a low altitude = disaster.

This is of course based on the information seen in the video...

It's a Tucano, turboprop, no carburator...

did the driver manage to get out?

see also:

YouTube - Acidente Esquadrilha da Fumaça em Lages, SC

(different angle)

.
 

The pilot did not survive.
He was the most experienced of the group, with 3700 hours and more than 200 air show performances, including in the USA

:(

Rest In Peace.

Apologies for a duff spell check. No offence intended.

VinRouge....
 

I'm sure you mean 'Rest in Peace'....:sad:

And he had an ejection seat, too! :(

At the bottom of a dive, in a serviceable aircraft able to pull g, the aircraft is usually your best chance of staying alive i.e. the aircraft can fly out of situations that are outside seat limits (approx 1/10th RoD). At a wild guess, I'd say he needed to eject well before reaching the vertical down to survive... and if that is the case, and he recognised the situation, he could have again recovered by e.g. roll and pull...

NoD

If the ROD is too excessive, no amount of pulling or airframe strength will save you.

The Thunderbirds team F16 accident showed how even a late ejection can save a pilot.

RIP

I met these guys at RIAT in 2008 - true Gentlemen and professionals all.

There are no hard rules about which is better, but as a guide, if the aircraft speed is high / can be pulled "hard", the the aircraft is the better bet.

Re the Thunderbirds he is well out of the 1/10th RoD guidelines, but survived. Points:

1. 225K is pretty slow for an F16, and the available 'g' therefore limited.
2. Just watch the in cockpit video, and you will see the swept wing, low IAS, "sinking" aspect that shows the aircraft has not got the "performance" to avoid the ground
3. He ejected in essentially a level pitch attiude, so the ejection vector was all in his favour
4. I would guess (but do not know) the F16 seat is higher performance than the Tucano one in view of the arcraft type

All of the above factors are "different" for the Tucano accident - and without getting into detail relying on facts we do largely do not have, I still stand by the principle that in this accident, I doubt that at any point would an ejection have been a "safer" option than using the aircraft to avoid the ground (of course assuming the aircraft was 100% serviceable).

NoD

ei-flyer

Clearly this pilot did not intend the outcome and so it is possible he made a mistake (it is also possible there was some kind of ac failing) but your summary is glib beyond belief and horrendously disrespectful to this professional aviator and experienced display pilot.

RIP

I said it looked like this, hence adding the 'disclaimer' onto the end.

No disrespect meant, I wasn't there and didn't know the pilot.

NOD

Correct on the seat issue. F16 has full rocket assisted seat, whereas the Tucano has a true "bang" seat. This results in a more restricted "safe" envelope, for example the UK Tucano has a 0/90 seat (IIRC) - 0 ft, 90 kts, the 90 kts required to inflate the chute for a safe landing due to less height on ejection, as opposed to a rocket seat that gives you a higher height on ejection (static example) so chute has more time to deploy. I seem to remember the 1/10 ROD rule for safe ejection in the Tincan - the solution during PFLs was to arrest the rate of descent to zero just before pulling the handle.

A similiar accident happened in Bratislava in '99 in a Hawk. The problem, IMHO, comes that the pilot has the stick fully back to try to fly it out and to get to the handle you need to let go of the stick to get your hand in. This might seem an unusual action in the circumstances. I stand to be corrected, and I'm not implying that this is the reason for the fatality in Brazil or Bratislava (pilot of Hawk was experienced TP).

The F16 event quoted was as a result of a missed gate height at the top of a manoeuvre. The US fly on QNH so need to factor airfield elevation into their maths. Result was safety man in the tower, pilot calls his top height, safety man does the maths and confirms or denys fit to go! I used to wonder why QFIs used to bang on about gate heights and how important they are.....seems obvious now.

Either way a sad event.

RIP.

spectators near impact.
 

This angle shows a few people watching from inside the display line. Two people were very close to the impact.
In the last few seconds of flight the aircraft has a left wing down which seemed to move the impact point away from these spectators.
A very sad day.

Mickjoebill

Perhaps not unusual to see a wing drop in this situation - if the pilot was pulling into heavy buffet as a reaction to the situation, then one wing will drop before the other.

The 50 sec. video below shows very well the sequence of events:

YouTube - Esquadrilha da Fumaça - Acidente em Lages (SC) 02/04/2010

The plane comes in a shallow dive performing 3 rolls, makes a low pass and climbs with a gentle roll to the right. At the top he is inverted, the smoke stops, then abruptly rolls to the left. Maybe, some kind of mechanical failure has caused this. The pilot appears to be struggling to regain attitude, but doesn't have enough altitude.

The smoke system in these planes uses a small reservoir that injects oil on the engine hot exhaust to create the smoke effect. The fact that the smoke has stopped may indicate engine failure?