WARBIRD ACCIDENT REVIEW

rstenevik · **Posted:** Thu Oct 04, 2007 6:35 pm

Have any of you tried to develop a data base on warbird accidents? There is no easy way, but alot of work on the NTSB web has potential: I do not want to spend the time if someone has a headstart on this project. All I have is the CAF history.
Thanks

bdk · **Joined:** Sun May 02, 2004 1:16 am **Posts:** 11324

I remember a document put out by the FAA (I think) documenting the cause of a number of warbird accidents through the 1960s or early 1970s. They had a report of a student pilot that had soloed a Cessna 150 then soloing (and crashing) a Mustang for instance. Lots of stories about unqualified pilots, IFR accidents, hypoxia, etc. I'd like to read that again if anyone can find it posted on the web.

JDK · **Posted:** Thu Oct 04, 2007 11:02 pm

I'm not aware of a national or international survey, and it's been a point of curiosity, professionally.

I think the problem is that warbirds isn't an agreed exclusive classification (usually being included within the greater category 'Limited', 'Experimental', or 'Permit to Fly' etc.) around the world so we are stuck doing a case-by-case roundup.

It would be well worthwhile, particularly an international one.

Bill Greenwood · **Posted:** Thu Oct 04, 2007 11:08 pm

Doug Rosendahl has tried to get a statistical update of warbird accidents. It is not that easy since the FAA does not characterize them seperatly. BDK, I am not home until next week, but somewhere I have a copy of the FAA report from back in the 50s or 60s about Mustang accidents. Some of them are beyond belief, like the French pilot who had Never even flown a 51,but decided to make his first hop a little cross Atlantic ferry trip. The bad thing is so most of these accidents were fatal and some had innocent passengers in the back seat. Doug says they average 10 warbird fatalities a year.

EDowning · **Posted:** Thu Oct 04, 2007 11:14 pm

John Lohmar has done quite a bit of this as a thesis for his Masters in Safety. I thought you and he had probably spoke about it, Bob.

Warbirdnerd · **Joined:** Fri Apr 30, 2004 7:34 pm **Posts:** 2923

A few years back I downloaded most of the PDFs from the NTSB website for accidents invlolving mainly Mustangs, but I have others too. I used Warbirds Directory 4 to narrow the date search. If someone wants them let me know.

Bill Greenwood · **Posted:** Fri Oct 05, 2007 8:17 am

We give lip service to safety in warbird flying, but sometime it gets pushed aside in peoples minds. Over 24 years of warbird flying I have had briefings and debriefings that told me I did not park in the right place, or taxi fast enough, or start early enough, or idle long enough, blah blah blah blah, but it is very rare when there is a genuine concern or suggestion of real safety made. There were good people that helped me when I came into Warbird flying, but is a rare exception when one of the new guys asks me for any suggetion about safety. I think aviation safety could be a seperate topic heading on WIX, I made that a PM to Scott, but never got an answer.

EDowning · **Posted:** Sat Oct 06, 2007 12:34 am

Bill Greenwood wrote:

Quote:

I think aviation safety could be a seperate topic heading on WIX, I made that a PM to Scott, but never got an answer.

Holy $hit, Batman, something that I agree with Bill Greenwood on.

T J Johansen · **Posted:** Mon Oct 08, 2007 5:06 pm

bdk wrote:

I remember a document put out by the FAA (I think) documenting the cause of a number of warbird accidents through the 1960s or early 1970s. They had a report of a student pilot that had soloed a Cessna 150 then soloing (and crashing) a Mustang for instance. Lots of stories about unqualified pilots, IFR accidents, hypoxia, etc. I'd like to read that again if anyone can find it posted on the web.

Would that be Dick Snyder's P-51 accident summary from the mid 60s?

T J

DougR · **Posted:** Tue Oct 09, 2007 10:08 pm

All,

As Bill said, I have unstatistically complied over 10 yrs of Warbird accident data. There are pretty steadily 10 fatalities in Warbirds each year. For the last several years I have done a presentation at NWOC. I have not done statistical analysis because the data pool is small, and frankly using 3rd grade math you can come up with numbers that make it clear that Warbird flying is more dangerous than flying current military aircraft in combat.

I don't have the data in any real neat format, but I have it.
Here are some highlights from some of those presentations:

2006 Warbird Fatalities
6 Fatal Warbird Accidents
7 Lives Lost
4 accidents & 5 fatalities in Jets
2 accidents & 2 fatalities in Props

1-25-06 Stephen Freeman L-39 Ketchikan AK
2-26-06 Terry Fregly, Skip Robertson, L-39 California City CA
7-16-06 Bob Guilford, Hawker Hunter Hillsboro OR
7-24-06 Wyatt Fuller F-86 Hickory NC
7-30-06 Gary Palmer TBM/RV-6 Oshkosh WI
10-21-06 Dr. Sleiman Salibi, T-28 Georgetown LA

In 2005 we killed 13 people in 10 Warbird accidents.

5-9-05 Jim Kern & John Hedgecock SNJ
5-28-05 Clayton Young PT-17
6-16-05 James Ford & Robert Lang PT-26
7-23-05 Rodger Modglin Yak 52
7-26-05 Dick James P-51
8-3-05 Niels Van Gemeren & Willem Van Gemeren BT-13
10-8-05 Art Vance F-6F
10-15-05 Fred Smith T-6
10-22-05 Jacob Lundell Nord
12-26-05 Raymond Kraft PT-17

3-25-04 George Cambron Mig 17
5-29-04 Don Hinz P-51C
5-31-04 John Matlock PT-17
6-03-04 John Rendzio T-28
6-16-04 Vernon Hupp SNJ
8-28-04 Kim Reed (pax) PT-17
9-04-04 Cliff Mc Cluney PT-19
10-19-04 Rocky Stewart L-39
10-23-04 Curtiss Bell Havard MkII
12-07-04 R. Gillenwaters T-34

From 1993 through 2003 there were 105 fatal accidents involving Warbird type aircraft
This data is from the AOPA database
This does not include aircraft over 12,500#
That is almost 1 fatal accident per month.
5 of those were CAF airplanes

We have to do better...

EDowning · **Posted:** Tue Oct 09, 2007 10:18 pm

DougR wrote:

Quote:

All,

As Bill said, I have unstatistically complied over 10 yrs of Warbird accident data. There are pretty steadily 10 fatalities in Warbirds each year. For the last several years I have done a presentation at NWOC. I have not done statistical analysis because the data pool is small, and frankly using 3rd grade math you can come up with numbers that make it clear that Warbird flying is more dangerous than flying current military aircraft in combat.

I don't have the data in any real neat format, but I have it.
Here are some highlights from some of those presentations:

2006 Warbird Fatalities
6 Fatal Warbird Accidents
7 Lives Lost
4 accidents & 5 fatalities in Jets
2 accidents & 2 fatalities in Props

1-25-06 Stephen Freeman L-39 Ketchikan AK
2-26-06 Terry Fregly, Skip Robertson, L-39 California City CA
7-16-06 Bob Guilford, Hawker Hunter Hillsboro OR
7-24-06 Wyatt Fuller F-86 Hickory NC
7-30-06 Gary Palmer TBM/RV-6 Oshkosh WI
10-21-06 Dr. Sleiman Salibi, T-28 Georgetown LA

In 2005 we killed 13 people in 10 Warbird accidents.

5-9-05 Jim Kern & John Hedgecock SNJ
5-28-05 Clayton Young PT-17
6-16-05 James Ford & Robert Lang PT-26
7-23-05 Rodger Modglin Yak 52
7-26-05 Dick James P-51
8-3-05 Niels Van Gemeren & Willem Van Gemeren BT-13
10-8-05 Art Vance F-6F
10-15-05 Fred Smith T-6
10-22-05 Jacob Lundell Nord
12-26-05 Raymond Kraft PT-17

3-25-04 George Cambron Mig 17
5-29-04 Don Hinz P-51C
5-31-04 John Matlock PT-17
6-03-04 John Rendzio T-28
6-16-04 Vernon Hupp SNJ
8-28-04 Kim Reed (pax) PT-17
9-04-04 Cliff Mc Cluney PT-19
10-19-04 Rocky Stewart L-39
10-23-04 Curtiss Bell Havard MkII
12-07-04 R. Gillenwaters T-34

From 1993 through 2003 there were 105 fatal accidents involving Warbird type aircraft
This data is from the AOPA database
This does not include aircraft over 12,500#
That is almost 1 fatal accident per month.
5 of those were CAF airplanes

We have to do better...

I have seen each of these presentations at the NWOCs over the years. Thanks for all you are doing, however, I must ask, what do you think the next step is? We don't seem to be getting anywhere by focusing on the stats.

Bill Greenwood · **Posted:** Tue Oct 09, 2007 11:37 pm

If there is an accident we may hope to find the cause. If the cause is something definite, mechanical and fixable; ie T-28 tail breakage, we seem to take action, sometimes the FAA makes it mandatory or it is passed through the type clubs voluntarily but generally accepted. Unfortunately there is often a tendency to resist change or to blame it soley on pilot error--that is the other guy was dumb, never me or my friend. It's not warbirds, but remember the Bonanza V tails. Over a period of 40 years 200 people were killed in airframe failure accidents. Beech and their proponents pretty much ignored the problem, invaribly blaming it on the pilots. A noted writer for Flying(I don't have the name in front of me, he's the one that just flew David Price's Mustang, wrote a long defense of Bonanza. Pilot operation is a factor, but any objective view could easily notice that Mooneys almost never came apart in the air despite being fast like Bonanzas and probably having lower time pilots. Why were the dumb pilots mostly in Bonanzas? Finally behind Aviation Consumer, the FAA mandated a study. Guess what? It was found that some maintenance conditions, either slack trim controls or unbalanced surfaces could lead to flutter, even if flown under red line and certainly if overspeed. Since the FAA mandated inspection of these areas and a reinforcment kit in some cases; in flight breakups virtualy disappeared. Too bad there was not as much effort made to save lives at the begining as there was to throw up a smokescreen, but it is human nature to resist change all too often.

Warbird Kid · **Posted:** Tue Oct 09, 2007 11:51 pm

What should be done, if this hasnt been really done yet, is to use WIX as a focus point to create a new part on the website for all recorded Warbird related accidents. It can thus be linked to the Warbird Registry. This is already been done on many of them.

EDowning · **Posted:** Tue Oct 09, 2007 11:53 pm

Bill Greenwood wrote:

Quote:

If there is an accident we may hope to find the cause. If the cause is something definite, mechanical and fixable; ie T-28 tail breakage, we seem to take action, sometimes the FAA makes it mandatory or it is passed through the type clubs voluntarily but generally accepted. Unfortunately there is often a tendency to resist change or to blame it soley on pilot error--that is the other guy was dumb, never me or my friend. It's not warbirds, but remember the Bonanza V tails. Over a period of 40 years 200 people were killed in airframe failure accidents. Beech and their proponents pretty much ignored the problem, invaribly blaming it on the pilots. A noted writer for Flying(I don't have the name in front of me, he's the one that just flew David Price's Mustang, wrote a long defense of Bonanza. Pilot operation is a factor, but any objective view could easily notice that Mooneys almost never came apart in the air despite being fast like Bonanzas and probably having lower time pilots. Why were the dumb pilots mostly in Bonanzas? Finally behind Aviation Consumer, the FAA mandated a study. Guess what? It was found that some maintenance conditions, either slack trim controls or unbalanced surfaces could lead to flutter, even if flown under red line and certainly if overspeed. Since the FAA mandated inspection of these areas and a reinforcment kit in some cases; in flight breakups virtualy disappeared. Too bad there was not as much effort made to save lives at the begining as there was to throw up a smokescreen, but that is human nature sometimes

OK, so is there a preventable action step in there somewhere?

Bill Greenwood · **Posted:** Wed Oct 10, 2007 12:12 am

Eric, I think there are two "next" of areas. Both are in the area of human performance or human pyschology. In some cases I think we get resigned to accidents and don't think we can really do anythjng about it. If we are honest we know the danger is there, it isn't as safe as driving or riding in the boredom tube, but can we make it better. There are starting to be some small efforts to address the mental aspect of pilot performance. Not just did the other guy do something dumb, but why did he do it ? Was he fatiqued or hung over, or desperate to get home? One obvious cause of a lot of fatals is low altitude acro. Another insidious one, especially as we get older is getting in a hurry. One reason I really like to get fuel and oil service when I arrive at a show is so I can then relax, both mentally and physically, and get prepared to fly. I could have flown just fine in the wind Sat at Midland, but I felt about 85%, not quite at my best. I find when we have to hurry we tend to miss things or make poor decisions, at least I might. The other part is how much do we really value safety, is it primary to us or just one of the concerns?

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