I think there is some lens compression making it look more dramatic but I'm fairly sure it's not been photoshopped.

WWW

Whilst I do not condone what appears to be shown in the Tornado photograph posted and in the video link, and what appears to be an ill-conceived manoeuvre, it is worth stating that there are tasks that require, and approvals that allow, low flying at less than the 100 ft discussed previously. UK military registered fast jet aircraft with a rad alt sometimes perform simulated missile attacks against ships at 50 ft ASL (albeit nominally straight and level). Also, some pilots have a minimum of 30 ft on their UK CAA Display Authorisation, even for fast jet aircraft (G- registered, not current miitary aircraft). Note that if in a turn, the 30 ft separation from the ground applies to the wing tip. Obviously, this minima can only be exercised at an approved display site and not all display sites are approved for the use of this minima.

Thanks MSOCS. This is the thread I had in mind when I posted:

http://www.pprune.org/military-aviat...flying+tornado

Leon, Union Jack et al?

That thread doesn't seem to come to the conclusion that it is photoshopped......

The video seems to suggest not

Absolutely agree Tourist,

In the previous thread which was linked, all of the self-styled 'experts' appeared to have shut up about Photoshop as soon as the video was posted, as well they might.

Many many years ago, at a YVL air-day, I watched the Italian display team in their G91s bank, line abreast, in front of the control tower viewing area. The low aircraft put a 20 yard groove in the muddy grass. There was a bit of a wobble throughout the formation, but they carried on with the show!!

In the late 80's I attended an evening lecture given by the late Roland Beamont in Swindon on the subject of Canberra flight testing.

He showed one photo of himself displaying a Canberra at a Farnborough SBAC show with the aircraft in a turn, close to the ground. He told us that RAE technicians had analysed the photo and concluded that the lower wingtip was four feet off the surface.

Well I guess we might agree to disagree and, as we'd say if in the bar, let's change the subject? :ok:

No no no no no jindabyne, you don't get off that easy ;)

How do you still call Photoshop when there's video of the incident?

Doh! Not denying the video - I was, and still am, referring to the photo itself. Cheers - I'm off!

twothree,

Was in Leeming Tower one Saturday afternoon some 40+ years ago. A pair of Belgian F-104s, which had positioned and refuelled with us prior to doing their display at an airshow, did a low run for us on their way home.

They went into reheat as they shot past well below me. We went out after they'd gone and had a look.

There were scorch marks for 100 yds along the (short) grass ! :=

D.

In the FI footage, DUMBARTON CASTLE looked to be going quite fast. Now that must have been "Photoshopped". :ok:

Naah, that's not low, this is low.... :p:p

In truth, jindabyne, no one's that fussed whether or not it was photoshopped; the only thing that's mildly irritated anyone is you demanding folk accept your dogmatic assertion without explanation or debate. This is a discussion forum you know.

In your defence, at least you didn't compound it by being right which would have been much more annoying.

Even closer
 

How about the unscheduled take off at Bruntinthorpe? of the Victor, it's wingtip was extremely close to the ground before it righted itself.

Yes it does :ugh:

I loved it in the olden days when the low beat ups were common, character building. When pilots were real pilots. Now we have a cotton wool life full of sterilised pc people who dare not do anything even remotely daring :=:=

You obviously have had great experience doing such things. Or you might just be a **** who talks a good fight. Let me know.

Tornado picture - wingtip a foot off the runway
 

Bill2b.
My comment came from a background of just short of 3000 fast jet hours (and counting), a vast amount of which have been spent at low level. Sometimes as low as 100'. Might I enquired as to your own level of experience?
I won't resort to name calling just yet since you might be a low level legend in disguise but something tells me that potentially isn't the case.
BV

I suspect that video is not the same incident in the photo - just look at the clouds. In the video it's pretty cloudy above and behind the treeline; in the photo it's nice and blue above and behind the treeline.

P6Driver et al - suppose there is no photo of that Canberra around....hmm, thought not. Pity though!

Standard low fly min over the oggin for the SHAR was 50'. Stanley raid on 1 May 82 produced several HUD films showing between 5 and 15' RA over the sand dunes. It felt safer there somehow!

Still caught a 20mm though.

Tornado picture - wingtip a foot off the runway
 

Mogwi.

I dare say that if I was being shot at I could and would fly lower. That would be an excellent reason to test ones low(er) flying skills.

BV

And there was me thinking the only reason to fly as HIGH as 100/130/150/200ft (dependant on weapon carried) was to achieve weapon fusing.
Bill2b, I agree with much of your sentiment. The present day super safe, self-righteous sterilised pc people do eventually get to you. The way the present generation degrade what those who went before achieved sometimes is too much.
Yes we may have been dangerous, and sometimes downright stupid, but at least we could fly jets properly and have great fun doing it.
BV, don’t start quoting hours flown to gain credibility. There are some of us who achieved over double that fast jet and treble your total altogether. More incredibly we are still alive to tell the tale.
In the past 50 years every fast jet pilot (and nav) “worth their salt” has done at least one whacky takeoff.

Tornado picture - wingtip a foot off the runway
 

Dominator.

Do you really want to side with an anonymous poster (bill2b) and sully your own good name?
If you reread my posts you will see that I have made no attempt to denigrate the efforts of previous fighter pilots. I took issue with a post by an armchair expert.

In my puny 2800 hours of fast jet flying I have been guilty of over exuberance myself (not to the extent of the Tornado Tosser). I'm not proud of it and wouldn't ever condone it from anyone else. I don't think that fly by's like the one in the photo (real or not) prove that you are a better pilot. If that makes me over safe and boring then c'est la vie.

The Falklands and GW1 were examples of recent(ish) conflicts that necessitated some aggressive low flying. The guys that did it did an excellent job. If called upon I feel sure that modern pilots would be just as capable if required to do so.

If we now live in a culture where stupid stunts are less common then that's fine by me. It must be the QFI in me. As I replied to Bill2b life is too short and all I really care about is not making it any shorter by buggering around.

Anyway I feel like I am going round in circles and the guy that started this all has gone very quiet. I guess he cast his bait and caught a whopper. Well played. Tosser.

BV

BV,

Well answered. Much of what I said was slightly tongue in cheek. I would suggest that you have been a QFI for too long and you need to get out more.

You quoted "life is too short and all I really care about is not making it any shorter by buggering around". That is the difference between that fighter pilot of today and one 40 years ago. As young 20 year olds we lived fo "today". Many did not grow up until well into their 30s, some never grew up at all.

What happened to "Train as you mean to fight". Is it right to expect people to do things that they have not trained for and just say that "If called upon I feel sure that modern pilots would be just as capable if required to do so".

Tornado picture - wingtip a foot off the runway
 

Oh I know I have been a QFI for too long. It was a trap from which I could never escape. It's a long and boring story though.

In all honesty though I gave up trying to escape it when our third child arrived. I have now accepted my fate.

BV :(

Yeah, well. I was still getting bollocked as a Sqn Cdr by the display director at the Farnborough Airshow at age 42...helped (or not) by the fact that he was my creamie QFI at Linton many years earlier.

BV, don't worry about young Dominator - his bark is far worse than his bite. I can still recall sitting next to him in an OEU debrief while receiving an amusingly tongue-in-cheek AP3456 lecture on the proper take-off technique from our (very) eminent and world-weary Sqn Cdr; 1.3VStall came into it somewhere as I remember.

Dominator certainly seemed less than impressed at being tarred with my "youthfully exuberant" brush at the time...but he was old even then!

PS I'd guess that the bloke in the picture/movie forgot about the 15-degree flap switch that changed the Tornado's flight control gains. If the flaps/slats were selected early after take-off to 'manoeuvre' (in the forlorn hope of accelerating more quickly for 'display' purposes) you suddenly got a lot more than you bargained for with full roll control applied...all of which could be very exciting - especially accelerating, as one was, at one knot per fortnight that close to the ground in the Admiral's Barge.

Sarn1e,

Long time no see. Yes, I too remember the lecture that we ALL had to listen to on how to clear the departure end fence. Do you wish to tell us of things NOT to do on your last trip?
Remember that Freddy the Fighter Pilot was caught out by the change in roll gain when trying to "spice up" his display takeoff. Very close inspection of the grass soon after rotate.

Interesting debate. But there are some hard facts that are worth noting. In January 1991, of the six Tornados lost, the cause of two of them is unknown. However, one possible cause was that they hit the ground while egressing from the target. A number of pilots chose to disconnect the autopilot to get lower than the 200 feet (or higher) that the TFR was giving them - at night, and without goggles.

One further Tornado was lost in a training accident in Saudi Arabia just before the hostilities started. It hit the ground.

There is also a fairly famous video of a Tornado from Tabuk on a training mission in the hills in northern Saudi. At one point, the aircraft and its shadow come VERY close to coinciding.

So of the seven Tornados lost, three may have been due to CFIT. That is not a great statistic if one argues that getting down in the weeds enhances your chances of survival.

I was as spirited as the next man in my yoof (and a bit beyond), but the fact is, the ground has a PK of 1. If you hit the ground, you will probably die; if you get hit by a SAM or AAA, you probably won't.

Tigger Two, don't forget Keith Collister who hit the ground in his Jaguar during the build-up to invasion.

@CGB

True. Thank you for that.

Absolutely. Which is why the Marine Hornets, led by a very experienced Vietnam Vet, were expressly forbidden from operating (and grounded when caught) at low-level for the opening stages of GW1.

Very sensible leadership from the school of hard knocks...which ISTR was followed by the Jags once shooting began.

Messing about below 50ft in fast jets is largely peacetime entertainment for the terminally bored and under-aroused, though one shouldn't totally exclude its fleeting use for presence purposes in a suitably permissive environment. It worked well in Iraq and Afghanistan on more than one occasion.

Tigger two


"the cause of two of them is unknown"

You don't get to say that and then "three may have been lost to CFIT" as if that is somehow an implied fact.

You could just as easy say "only one was known to be lost to CFIT, but many may have been lost due to an unwillingness to fly low enough to avoid SAMs"

Even if they did hit the ground, one could just as validly say that insufficient extreme low flying training was carried out in peacetime to make them capable of carrying it out safely in wartime.

How many of the Argentinians hit the ground in the Falklands war? I'm willing to be corrected, but I thought that their tactic of ultra low flying is considered to have been a good move on their part, nullifying a lot of our defences.

When I were a lad all of us (except the AD bunch) tried to go as low and as fast as possibly because that's what we thought would give us an extra few minutes against those pesky Soviets. Inevitably, even during peacetime where the FJs were limited to 250ft or 100ft in those special places, there would be the occasional aircraft/granite interaction. In fact, looking back I think that the majority of mates' funerals I attended were due to such events. But the bottom line was that we trained to fly low, always.

GW1 came along and we started to wise-up. For sure, there was a low level role and the Americans quite happily watched us race about the desert at 2ft 6 with a bit of a climb for the 233 canisters to be popped-off. However, we also learnt that muds could do a good a job with laser designation etc from medium altitude as long as the necessary OCA and SEAD was in place.

It's been quite a few years since I scared myself in an LFA but I suspect the playing field has changed and there is even less need to tool around trying to ascertain the gender of individual Welsh sheep. So, when pilots do have to go that low, I'm guessing that they are less at ease in the environment.

Just because the last game had the particular circumstances where we had air dominance does not for a moment mean that we will next time.

Low still has it's place.

We can't just not play if we don't get superiority/dominance.

This does not just refer to fixed wing. The last two conflicts made it sensible for rotary to bimble around above small arms fire range. It is only a very narrow range of circumstances which makes that the case and it would be very rash to neglect NOE training.

Bob, at least you're still flying jets. They might not be capable of 9G and vertical climbs at full burner, but you're still living the dream that many want to but couldn't for whatever reason!

Quote:
'If you hit the ground, you will probably die; if you get hit by a SAM or AAA, you probably won't.'

Really! What percentage chance of not dying is 'probably'? What is the Pk of an ZSU-23, SA-10/20 or HQ-9?

Theonewhothinksheknows ...... sticks and stones :*:*:*

Blob Viking
I do not wish to brag about my flying hours and if you wish to know my name and address please PM me and I will give it to you.
I was a Rigger and was in from 77 to 2001, perhaps you are the type who does not want low life groundcrew in your forum?
My comment was purely from a groundcrew viewpoint, we often used to get beat ups in the early eighties one time at Lossiemouth we watched the reds take off and some folk on the hanger roofs on 226 had to duck because they were so low. The Jaguar weather ship used to beat up the CMD camp on the corner of the base nice and early each morning. It was fun to watch.
Low flying is and always will be a part of life but its a shame some don't like pilots who like to display their skills.
Please don't join the Jaguar site on facebook because there is lots of pictures of low flying in Oman. :=:=

Tornado picture - wingtip a foot off the runway
 

Bill.
I'm not sure I can possibly add anything to rival your erudite musings.
I think it's fair to say we've misunderstood each other and I shall leave it at that.
BV

Tigger

Out of interest, what is the Pk of being burnt to death or having your head sawn off after you survive the post SAM ejection?