Mid-air at Duxford, Pilots ok

[RyanShort1]

or mechanical issues that caused the Skyraider to be unable to maneuver his aircraft away from his lead.

Didn't seem to have any problems maneuvering around the patch & landing tho.....

Something as simple as a sneeze or a hiccup could be disorienting if it happened at the wrong time and if the ball gets rolling in the wrong direction momentum-wise, it can be hard to stop. I've flown our L-5 behind the J-3 Cub as #2 in the formation. When we do that, I drop half flaps and am at a reduced power setting as I'm flying a 190hp aircraft behind an aircraft with 65 hp. If I get behind at all, I have to be really careful in how I catch up. One HAS to pay attention ALL the time.



Ryan

[CAPFlyer]

Guys, can I refer you to the pictures posted by Bomberflight of the accident aircraft during the pass prior to the accident -

viewtopic.php?f=3&t=41707

As the formation comes back in for the second pass ~ you can see the P-51 and Skyraider in the 3rd element



The Skyraider seems to be trailing something ( smoke or vapour )

This is not show smoke, it's oil smoke. If you look at the previously posted pictures of post-landing, there is a LOT of oil on the airplane. Is it possible there was also some sort of engine issue developing as all this happened that affected the Skyraider mechanically or the pilot mentally?

[Randy Haskin]

Just for discussion sake, even if there were an engine problem or other issue distracting the pilot, there is never a task which should keep a wingman from adhering to his most basic contracts (keep sight of lead, don't hit lead).

[RyanShort1]

Just for discussion sake, even if there were an engine problem or other issue distracting the pilot, there is never a task which should keep a wingman from adhering to his most basic contracts (keep sight of lead, don't hit lead).

That's for sure.

Ryan

[EDowning]

Another factor may have been if the Mustang had a slight speed change. The Skyraider is kind of massive, and probalby wouldn't be able to slow as quick as the Mustang.

I won't make any comment on what happened, but I can say in my experience flying formation with Mustangs, the Spad (mine in particular, A-1E with heavy armament) has a ton of drag. If I am flying with a Mustang a slight pull off of power and I slow way faster than the Mustang.

[happymeal]

This is not show smoke, it's oil smoke. If you look at the previously posted pictures of post-landing, there is a LOT of oil on the airplane. Is it possible there was also some sort of engine issue developing as all this happened that affected the Skyraider mechanically or the pilot mentally?

Being close to the french Skyraider team, I can assure you there in nothing abnormal here. They runtheir engine rich, and it shows with that smoke whenever the plane is flying. When the tree-ship of Skyraiders flew early on that day, all of them were trailing the same kinda smoke.

[Steve S]

This is not show smoke, it's oil smoke. If you look at the previously posted pictures of post-landing, there is a LOT of oil on the airplane. Is it possible there was also some sort of engine issue developing as all this happened that affected the Skyraider mechanically or the pilot mentally?

Remember -this is a 3350 -

[WallyB]

I hate to break it to you but it is not a requirement to be a pilot to know things about formation flying.

Actually, yes it is. The important things.

[Randy Haskin]

This has been a VERY bad season thus far. It's time for the entire industry to take a hard look at safety. Some changes are definitely indicated.

This is essentially what Doug Rozendaal said to the assembled fighter and trainer warbird groups at OSH last year.

His message, and he can correct me if I'm inaccurately paraphrasing him, was that the warbird community needs to take a serious look in the mirror and figure out a way to reduce the number of pilot-error incidents.

The follow-on discussion amongst the pilots an owners was pretty revealing, acknowledging that there is an underlying training, proficiency, and experience issue that is most likely the root cause.

All that being said, let's not forget that there are plenty of other acts of exemplary airmanship that take place daily amongst warbird operators and which are rarely acknowledged or appreciated (the Liberty Belle's safe off-field landing with an in-flight fire, and subsequent evacuation of the crew and pax from the burning aircraft is a prime example).

I'll be the first one to say that "excellence is the standard" and that precision in high performance flying rarely warrants accolades outside of the personal satisfaction of the individuals involved...but there is a lot of good aviating going on out there, too. It's the Santa Monica Pier flybys that, unfortunately, garner all of the discussion.

[Speedy]

Just for discussion sake, even if there were an engine problem or other issue distracting the pilot, there is never a task which should keep a wingman from adhering to his most basic contracts (keep sight of lead, don't hit lead).

I believe that falls under "aviate, navigate, communicate", right?

[Speedy]

This is not show smoke, it's oil smoke. If you look at the previously posted pictures of post-landing, there is a LOT of oil on the airplane. Is it possible there was also some sort of engine issue developing as all this happened that affected the Skyraider mechanically or the pilot mentally?

Remember -this is a 3350 -

Ah, yes...."externally lubricated".

[Dudley Henriques]

This has been a VERY bad season thus far. It's time for the entire industry to take a hard look at safety. Some changes are definitely indicated.

This is essentially what Doug Rozendaal said to the assembled fighter and trainer warbird groups at OSH last year.

His message, and he can correct me if I'm inaccurately paraphrasing him, was that the warbird community needs to take a serious look in the mirror and figure out a way to reduce the number of pilot-error incidents.

The follow-on discussion amongst the pilots an owners was pretty revealing, acknowledging that there is an underlying training, proficiency, and experience issue that is most likely the root cause.

All that being said, let's not forget that there are plenty of other acts of exemplary airmanship that take place daily amongst warbird operators and which are rarely acknowledged or appreciated (the Liberty Belle's safe off-field landing with an in-flight fire, and subsequent evacuation of the crew and pax from the burning aircraft is a prime example).



I'll be the first one to say that "excellence is the standard" and that precision in high performance flying rarely warrants accolades outside of the personal satisfaction of the individuals involved...but there is a lot of good aviating going on out there, too. It's the Santa Monica Pier flybys that, unfortunately, garner all of the discussion.

Doug was right as he usually is when it comes to safety issues.

I would agree it's a given that there's a lot of good aviating going on in the airshow community. I think collectively, we have some of the finest pilots in the world working the venue.

My personal view as a pilot and instructor has always been that what I did 1 second ago in the air must have been all right as I had survived that. What might kill me was what I was about to do during the NEXT second. I spent an entire career thinking about that next second.

I've always approached display flight safety the same way. I leave the accolades and kudos alone. They're a given. I try to consider what's being done right as simply the starting point for dealing with what I might suggest doing to correct what's wrong. This has been my own flying philosophy through my life and remains with me today. I think if you actually parse it down, most all of us who have spent any amount of time in and around high performance flying feel this way, you ,me, and Doug for sure.
Dudley Henriques

[ZRX61]

Ah, yes...."externally lubricated".

The only thing right about it is the name.... & they spelled that wrong...

[Taylor Stevenson]

If anyone knows the pilot of the Mustang, ask what brand of chute he has. After watching this video, I'm thinking I need a new one!

[flyride]

At least in regard to FAST/FFI standards, the pop-up break is a non-standard break, and for a reason - it creates a lot of complexity for the flight.

It needs to be carefully briefed and practiced, to include climb and G profiles, and flight characteristics of dissimilar aircraft. The first rule of any break is to acquire the preceding aircraft as soon as possible. Several folks have stated that the AD pilot should not have lost sight of the Mustang - that's utter silliness, the AD's pilot head immediately went forward as he is the temporary flight lead and responsible for clearing the flight path as soon as the Mustang pulled. If you can't find the preceding aircraft, knock it off.

Two observations:

1. Look at the difference between the Mustang and the AD's pull. The Mustang pulls up, then rolls, then very gentle pull for flight separation. The AD pilot almost immediately rolled wings up. Very little UP and a lot of OUT.

2. The AD appears to pull a LOT of G throughout the maneuver. That would quickly put BBD under the cowl or wing. The AD may have picked up the trailing aircraft on downwind from the previous flight. Spacing would have appeared excessive, which would have encouraged the AD pilot to keep power on and tighten his turn.

I don't typically fly up-and-out breaks to downwind, but have done them out of close trail. We always brief UP, acquire, roll, pull (OUT) for separation, then match altitude and heading.

It sure would have been interesting to listen in on that debrief.

All of those are factors that should have been completely considered and discussed in the preflight briefing.

Outside of a specifically-briefed scenario where the roles are reversed, it is ALWAYS the responsibility of the wingmen to keep their lead IN SIGHT and AVOID HITTING their lead. That includes taking into consideration all of the potential performance differences between aircraft and compensating for them with that maneuvering. That also includes maneuvering up to and including over-Ging your own aircraft to avoid a collision.

There's a second part of the contract, though, that experienced flight leads know -- that is, always maneuver predictably so as to not surprise your wingmen. An erratically-flying lead gives his wingmen 3D problems to solve that are much more difficult (think of how a dogfight works -- it's basically formation flying with non-cooperative leads and wingmen) and may not allow wingmen the time to maneuver to their "out" should a conflict pop up.

With respect to this particular incident, it is tough for me to pin blame on either the Mustang lead or the Skyraider wingman, as we don't know if there were any mechanical issues that caused either the Mustang to fly in a non-predictable way that the Skyraider pilot did not expect, or mechanical issues that caused the Skyraider to be unable to maneuver his aircraft away from his lead.

Either way, formation pilots all need to take this opportunity to remember that these contracts are "written in blood", and that violation of these contracts can have disastrous consequences as shown in this incident.