30 years since Thunderbirds Diamond Crash

[Fleet16b]

Does not seem that long ago ...RIP to the Team Mmebers that lost their lives that day

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On January 18, 1982, during a training flight four of Thunderbirds T-38 Talon aircraft crashed at Indian Springs, Nevada. The diamond performed loop in a line abreast, when the leader's plane received mechanical failure, which does not allow it to exit from loop.

Source: http://aerobaticteams.net/news/thund...h-30years.html

[The Inspector]

FOD KILLS! cause was, I believe, a previously dropped pen or pencil that which no one tried to retrieve that jammed the elevator system on #1

Old truism;
In and of itself, aviation is not inherently dangerous. But, to an even greater extent than the Sea it is terribly unforgiving of neglect.

[Clifford Bossie]

FOD KILLS! cause was, I believe, a previously dropped pen or pencil that which no one tried to retrieve that jammed the elevator system on #1

Old truism;
In and of itself, aviation is not inherently dangerous. But, to an even greater extent than the Sea it is terribly unforgiving of neglect.

It was pilot error. The lead topped out of a loop, below minimum for that maneuver and too low to recover. Later the the powers that be determined that a Thunderbird pilot "would not make that mistake" and the mechanical failure was invented, uh I mean "discovered".

Pilot error is always a regrettable finding. Too many people take that as a judgment of a pilot's character when it is indeed not. Merely that a mistake was made.

I read a blog entry that Ed Rasimus posted about this accident several years ago. It is an interesting entry and with his background in aviation I would take his words to the bank.

FOD does indeed kill, just not in this case.

[The Inspector]

Clifford,
Thanks for dispelling yet another well propagated aviation myth, always in favor of using a sifter to shake out bad info.

[Clifford Bossie]

Clifford,
Thanks for dispelling yet another well propagated aviation myth, always in favor of using a sifter to shake out bad info.

I was lucky in that about six months ago I went back over my notes to refresh the incident in my mind. It was a terrible tragedy and to me a learning experience. Four families lost loved ones that day. Aviation can be very unforgiving at times.

[Dudley Henriques]

Clifford,
Thanks for dispelling yet another well propagated aviation myth, always in favor of using a sifter to shake out bad info.

I was lucky in that about six months ago I went back over my notes to refresh the incident in my mind. It was a terrible tragedy and to me a learning experience. Four families lost loved ones that day. Aviation can be very unforgiving at times.

The whole deal was a royal mess. The investigation was at Holloman. They concluded pilot error. Creech bounced the report back to the investigative team. Al King had taped the entire thing from the Com Trailer at Indian Springs. His tape suddenly disappeared and to my knowledge is still missing. The "revised" report came up with a bungee failure in Lowrey's stabilator.
Nobody bought it. They STILL don't buy it! Chris Patterakis nailed it perfectly. It was a line abreast loop. The usual peripherals are missing in the line abreast loop for the two wings and slot. Add to this they were descending coming off the high gate float into the valley. This was the worst possible scenario for the wings and slot and there was no "go exploded call" or back up exploded call from the wing.
Lead's plane hit last. This was highly indicative and relevant.
To this day, it is widely felt in the team community that Lowery simply flew the front side of the maneuver coming off his entry with either an AGL initiation problem, too high a g line on the pull or a combination of the two, arriving at his high gate apex too low AGL , too fast, or both. You blow a high gate like that and once committed to the downline in a T38 past 60 degrees and you're history.
It is widely felt that had the maneuver been a Diamond Loop instead of Line Abreast, the slot would have picked up the error as a visual cue and called for the team to "go exploded". Contrary to popular belief, as well as maintaining position in a show diamond, both wings and especially the slot are capable of peripheral visual cue acquisition during certain phases of maneuvering formation flight as experience is gained through practice. This of course didn't happen.
As is the case in all accidents like this one, the cause was most likely a chain of error and contributing circumstance.
Dudley Henriques

[JohnB]

It was reported at the time the AF Chief of Staff had the video tape erased (presumably after the investigation board looked at it).

[donno21]

I remember that tragic day well, I was in the rear seat of one of our (4477th) '38's when we heard the radio traffic and we saw the smoke from TTR. No mechanical problem.

[JDK]

An appropriate reminder. It's of course neither the first, nor, I suspect, the last formation flight into terrain by an aerobatic team. Much less well known and from another era was the loss of six crew and four display aircraft in 1962 of the RAAF's 'Red Sales' aerobatic team.

http://aviation-safety.net/wikibase/wiki.php?id=67827

PDF links:
www.adf-serials.com.au/research/redsales.pdf

www.adf-serials.com.au/dfs/The-Red-Sales.pdf

In this case it was a barrel roll, but the same scenario otherwise.

It is perhaps also worth noting that last year was a particularly bad one for the RAF's Red Arrows with two fatalities, a sad result for an otherwise good record for many years (the previous fatality being in 1971 - forty years earlier.)

Regards,