What just happened at Reno?

[51fixer]

Rich,

I believe that blue material is the AstroTurf/carpet that was in that seating area.

Steve

Foam is from the plane. Had a piece hit me and it is definitely from the plane.

I have installed this in fuel tanks and suspected this was the same stuff.

[Nathan]

IMHO, the last second or two it looked like the plane started to pull up. Even if it was only slightly. How else could there have been pitch up unless the pilot was attempting the change?

[Nathan]

double post

[CAPFlyer]

Anyone hear from August yet? He was supposed to be there according to the WiX meetings forum.

[muddyboots]

[CAPFlyer]

IMHO, the last second or two it looked like the plane started to pull up. Even if it was only slightly. How else could there have been pitch up unless the pilot was attempting the change?

I think the picture just posted answers the question to a point. The elevators obviously have a bit of an "up" pitch. Additionally, as the aircraft started to regain speed, aerodynamics would cause it to start doing what it'd done initially - climb.

[51fixer]

Quite a good look.
Hard to tell if both elevators are at the same angle.
My son found these pics on a Jeep Forum-
http://www.jeepforum.com/forum/f7/reno- ... ndex2.html
One pic shows what looks like the tab floating away.
Lower pic looks down the trailing edge of the L/H elevator and the portion that remains of the broken tab is seen deflected slightly down giving up elevator.

[k5083]

Anyone hear from August yet? He was supposed to be there according to the WiX meetings forum.

Thanks for the shout-out CAP. I'm okay. My seat in the front row of the grandstand slightly west of the impact point was in the risk-of-injury zone, but I left just before the race. Was feeling a bit tired and hungry after an all-night drive from L.A. the previous evening, so left early for RNO, although I had plenty of time to see the gold race and still catch my plane so it was a close decision. I found out about the crash when other guys arrived at the airport for my flight, crying and in shock, having seen it. So a lucky day for me. My heart goes out to all the less lucky.

August

Last edited by k5083 on Sun Sep 18, 2011 8:15 pm, edited 1 time in total.

[JDK]

Glad to see you checking in August.

[mivey]

Rich,

I believe that blue material is the AstroTurf/carpet that was in that seating area.

Steve

Foam is from the plane. Had a piece hit me and it is definitely from the plane.

I have installed this in fuel tanks and suspected this was the same stuff.

Well that explains why I smelled like AV gas. Couldn't figure out why I smelled like gas because our box did not get sprayed by any liquids just some debris. A few boxes away there were people that were covered in gas. Thank god there was no fire. That would have been even more horrific. Maybe you are right Rich that the water had something to do with that. Been debating that with my buddies that were with me at the race.

[Randy Haskin]

IMHO, the last second or two it looked like the plane started to pull up. Even if it was only slightly. How else could there have been pitch up unless the pilot was attempting the change?

For exactly the same reason the airplane pitched up off the race course -- the trim tab was no longer there to encourage the airplane to fly in a straight path and it naturally wanted to climb.

I have a lot of experience teaching dive bombing from aircraft, and one of the toughest things to teach is making the pilot trim nose down while the airplane accelerates downhill. As it accelerates, the airplane wants to naturally pitch up, and if you don't correct it what results is called a 'banana pass', because from the side the flight path appears curved like a banana. The only way to make the bombing dive a straight line is to either trim nose down or gradually increase forward stick pressure as the airspeed increases in the descent. Aerobatics pilots have to fight this same tendency on the down-line of a Cuban 8.

IF the trim tab was the issue with the Ghost, then it all ready naturally had a climbing tendency of it's own with absolutely no stick inputs. The increasing speed as the airplane descended in those last few seconds would have only increased the airplane's tendency to want to pull up from the relative flight path. Thus it may have appeared a pilot was trying to pull the nose up, but the photos show the elevators in essentially a trailing position.

[Kyleb]

Are the reno racers now pulling speeds and G-loads in turbulent thick air never envisioned by the original design engineers?

Absolutely. That's what happens in all forms of racing. The problem with air racing is that when something fails, you can't just pull to the side of the road.

[mivey]

If you want to know what it really sounded like that day this is the best description I can give you.

http://www.rgj.com/article/20110917/EVENTS05/110917007

[lmritger]

If you want to know what it really sounded like that day this is the best description I can give you.

http://www.rgj.com/article/20110917/EVENTS05/110917007

Dear God. I'm very glad to hear you're ok, but so incredibly sorry you had to witness that... I cannot even begin to fathom experiencing that first-hand.

Lynn

[CoastieJohn]

If you want to know what it really sounded like that day this is the best description I can give you.

http://www.rgj.com/article/20110917/EVENTS05/110917007

That is a very unique sound. As I listened to it a few times, I wondered if that's what the Kamikazee planes sounded like just before impact?