O.P. wrote:
Hellcat wrote:
Good stuff, another set of curcumstances come from our air racer friends, who blow engines all the time and "dead-stick" in heavy racers. I wonder what are some of the rules for a bail-out as opposed to trying to land with no power? I can imagine a few of them, but it would be interesting to hear from some racers about when the decision is made to bail-out.
There was an excellent article in a Warbird mag a couple of years ago where Kevin Eldridge talked about jumping from the Super Corsair.
He talked about himself never really checking the parachute completely when he got into the plane and not really thinking hard about getting out of the plane.
When he jumped, he hit the tail, which hurt him really bad. When he tried to use the chute, the ring came off in his hand. He managed to survive the incident, and his story is incredible.
Since reading that, I make it a point to inspect the parachute. I also keep everything clear of the harness. And I think through the bailout procedures on the T28. I personally think that there is a 50-50 chance of getting hurt during a backseat bailout on a T28, but by thinking about it beforehand, I'll probably do better than most.
The Super Corsair was also never truly set up to fly straight and level. They would set a manual trim tab at one position for ferry flights and at another position for racing. The cockpit adjustment system had never been installed during the rebuilding. Neither let you fly hands off. That was one reason Kevin had trouble getting out. He let go of the stick and the thing started to roll over. He had to hang on to the stick and try to creep up enough to jump. I believe his exact moment of departure wasn't exactly under control. He was partly sucked out as he so he couldn't just dive over the side.
This kinda illustrates how any emergency has a multitude of factors involved. There rarely is just one thing to deal with. In this case blown engine, FIRE, low altitude and controllability of the aircraft.
If you ever see the video of this it is amazing. A tiny spec with flames about 3 times the length of the fuselage.
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