Comments on: Mere chance

By: Flatlander

Flatlander — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 23:09:49 +0000

Yeah, that’s an interesting point, frmr grunt. But, you know the notion of having a second set of eyes in the cockpit has never been welcomed by the single seat communities. To paraphrase Lex, I think the attitude is “every one who needs one should have one.”

I’m surprised never to have seen any statistics published on the comparative accident rates between single seat and multi-seat aircraft performing similar missions during similar eras. My guess, not informed by any data other than anecdotal experience, is that the single seat accident rate would be significantly higher. There has got to be thousands upon thousands of flight hour data available for such analyses.

While there is a significant cost to putting the second guy in the cockpit, we just assume that it’s cheaper to eliminate the cost. If we looked at the difference in accident rates, it might well prove to be a false savings. Who knows, the return on investment for that second set of eyes might just be enormous. Not to mention the lives…

I guess the assumption is that R2D2 is getting to be better than a second human; it would be interesting to see what the data says about that.

By: fmr_grunt

fmr_grunt — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 19:11:28 +0000

Coming from the rifle carrying end o things (i.e. cargo) my chances of this sort of thing were obviously smaller than most of the folks that hang around here. By way of background, I always enjoyed flying and unlike a large majority of my rifle carrying friends looked forward to being a passenger in a helo. Most grunts don’t like flying and the pilots and aircrew obviously knew this fact. Most flights included a bit of “let’s f with the grunts maneuvering”. These little events always brought a smile to my face and gave me ammunition when ribbing others in my platoon. Also, if we were flying , we weren’t walking.

Right in the middle of a Med cruise (last one before Desert Shield/Storm) we were finishing a field exercise in the Negev and happy to hear we would get a lift back to camp. Watched a beautiful sunset and ended up waiting for our ride long after the evenings chill had set. Course,in the desert the evening chill sets in about 10 seconds after the sun sets. A whirl of sand, some St Elmo’s fire lighting up the blades, the hand off of the name list to the crew chief as we trudged up the ramp and our ride was off into the clear night sky. My position in the back of the Ch46 this night did not afford me much of anything to look at so I spent most of my time watching the crew chief with his NVGs look out the side. We made a couple of turns and flared for our landing with the chief looking below. All of a sudden the chief yells into his headset and the helo jumps up hard and left. A speed increase, what seemed like a dozen hard turns and a few very calm minutes flying in a square later we made a landing and began to unload. Having a feeling that what just happened wasn’t another f with the grunts moment I asked the crew chief about it on the way out. He said that we had come within about forty feet of landing on top of one of the Cobras that had been our escort. I was one of the last cold warriors and was saved by the fact that the chief took the time to lean out into the rotor wash just a bit farther. A dark night, a ton of swirling sand and the more proof that another set of eyes can be a Godsend.

By: bullnav

bullnav — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 15:40:59 +0000

Max - three years ago at Thunder Over Michigan, there were 8 B17s. At the end of the show, they flew over together. Not quite some of those 8th Air Force missions, but as close as we can get today...

By: ASM826

ASM826 — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 14:33:03 +0000

Max Damage,
I was looking at links to bomber group sites, and the mid-airs that occurred as they stacked up over England before heading to Germany, and found this story:
” On what was to be my final mission we carried delay action bombs which we called “doodle bugs” and they were used on enemy airfield runways to keep them unusable as the bombs were set with delays from one minute up to a week or more. After we took off and reached assembly altitude over England with the rest of my squadron, I went back to the bomb bay, as my usual job to take the cotter pins out of the bombs. These held the little spinners in place that prevented the bombs from going off accidentally and were removed after takeoff. These spinners being miniature propellers they would spin off when the bombs were dropped. At that time the bombardier in the plane to our left was doing the same thing, His navigator, trying to save him a job went over to his electric remote control chin turret, loaded and charged his guns and stowed them to the side so they’d be ready to test fire when we reached the English Channel. However, when he was through he forgot to turn off the master switch so the triggers were “live”. He also left the guns pointing to the right at our plane instead of away from it as was regulation. When the bombardier returned and sat down his elbow brushed against the trigger and he riddled our waist with bullets. He killed one of our gunners and wounded two others. Our radio operator yelled to us that [deleted] was badly hurt, very badly hurt. He knew his buddy had been killed but couldn’t bring himself to say it. It was too emotional for him. So because of this and the wounded on board we had to return to our base. But you are not allowed to land with bombs on board, so we headed for the coast to drop them in the sea.

However, the regulations said that live bombs must be dropped 50 miles off the coast but “safe” bombs could be dropped just off the coast. Thinking that [deleted] our gunner could be saved if we rushed back, I proceeded to get back into the bomb bay and put the pins back into the bombs to make them safe. I had to line up three holes to insert the cotter pins. That was a delicate operation and had us all praying as one false move in lining up the parts to put the pins in could detonate the bombs. This was only the case for these delayed action bombs to prevent the Germans from defusing them after they had hit and laying there waiting to go off. I got them back in but sweated bullets standing in the catwalk of the bomb bay getting it done. When we landed and I helped carry [deleted] off the plane, we knew he was dead. We had rushed back needlessly. The two waist gunners were lightly wounded and [deleted], our tail gunner, had given them first aid.”

By: Navig8r

Navig8r — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 14:24:33 +0000

As a shipdriver by trade and an aviator by avocation, I have only had one midair close call. Flying through Pax River airspace talking to Pax approach. I get a call:

“93L, traffic 1 o’clock 1 mile [Huge roar and a blur down port side, loud enought hear through hedset] F-14.”

By: Kris, in New England

Kris, in New England — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 12:26:09 +0000

Gordo: so sorry for your loss. Living in CT myself, in a small town southeast of Hartford, I read about that accident. So young, so sad.

I think anyone who has had a “close call” goes thru that whole “why me/why not me” for years afterwards. Nothing aviation-related for me (more like a veal pen, AW1Tim…) but a couple of car accidents that I walked away from – and I shouldn’t have. Remains of injuries that are only visible on x-rays that tell me I shouldn’t be here anymore.

Makes life all the more precious. As my family’s motto says: We’re not here for a long time, we’re here for a good time.