11/12/2022 - Texas Raiders and P-63 King Cobra collide

[deskpro590]

I would like to offer sincere condolences to the families and friends of those who lost their lives Saturday. I was there and am still trying to process it. I couldn't begin to imagine what they are going through.

[RyanShort1]

I've been directly involved in professional accredited accident investigations. On one, I went in thinking I already knew what happened because I had a lot of time in that type of airplane. I was wrong. The conclusions were quite different. I felt like an idiot.

It taught me to shut up about most accidents until the proper investigation is complete.

Accident investigation by social media is unprofessional -- a quote from me in the past.

For information's sake, formation flying at airshows happens according to this system: http://flyfast.org/ That way all the pilots and the airboss are on the same page. It's worth a look.

Thanks for this Dave.

I'd like to offer that the reason airshows are important, is because of the people, and their stories. One of the crewmembers who perished, sadly, was Dan Ragan, who was a veteran who had served in the same unit that Texas Raiders flew with in the Navy. He gave a genuinely wonderful talk a few hours before the accident. Here's a shot from his interview with Texas Raiders taxiing in behind him.

Again, let's wait on the speculation, and for now, focus on the guys and all of the good.

[CH2Tdriver]

Also be VERY careful with some of the raw news chopper and drone feeds, there is sensitive content.

I watched it originally and maybe its fortunate I didn't know what I was looking at besides wreckage. Is the significance of the traffic cones being placed in spots what I think it is?

[ricusa]

Saw a pilot spectator interview this morning who was monitoring the tower frequency. He stated he heard the Air Boss give permission to a fighter pilot to go ahead and catch up with the rest of the formation just before the accident, he stated he thought it was risky move to do at the time. I was at the Museum just last week!

[bluehawk15]

Some may be interested in the history of Texas Raiders. Here is a link to a site that may be of interest.
https://www.b17texasraiders.org/index.p ... as-raiders

[DoraNineFan]

Also be VERY careful with some of the raw news chopper and drone feeds, there is sensitive content.

I watched it originally and maybe its fortunate I didn't know what I was looking at besides wreckage. Is the significance of the traffic cones being placed in spots what I think it is?

I cannot say. There's a full unedited feed from a news helicopter and they were zooming in on all of the debris fields and I wanted to warn everyone that there are some unpleasant images in that raw video.

[kalamazookid]

From ICAS. Nice way to support families:

On behalf of its board, staff, and members, the International Council of Air Shows offers its heartfelt condolences to the families of those individuals involved in Saturday’s accident in Dallas and to our colleagues in the Commemorative Air Force (CAF).
In response, the International Council of Air Shows Foundation, in association with the CAF, is accepting donations for the families of those involved in the accident.
To donate, go to https://airshowfoundation.org/support/ , select “Donation in honor or memory of an individual” and type “CAF” as the “Name of Memorialized”. 100% of the money collected through this effort will be provided to the families as emergency funding, with all received funds being split equally amongst those families impacted.

[maradamx3]

Was this P63 the same one that was based at West Houston airport many years ago (early to mid 90s)?

[Randy Wilson]

If you haven't seen it yet, the link below lists the names and a photo of the six CAF members lost in the B-17 and P-63. There is also info on support for the families, similar to the above post. Randy

https://commemorativeairforce.org/news/names-of-the-aircrew-from-texas-raiders-and-the-kingcobra

[Xray]

Saw a pilot spectator interview this morning who was monitoring the tower frequency. He stated he heard the Air Boss give permission to a fighter pilot to go ahead and catch up with the rest of the formation just before the accident, he stated he thought it was risky move to do at the time. I was at the Museum just last week!

I was thinking it could well be control related, the way he was seemingly rushing on a trajectory unrelated to the rest of the stream, but we'll see.

BTW, Airboss has his own freq, would not have heard it monitoring the tower.

[Nathan]

We lost 6 fellow warbird wing mates. We might not have known them, but we shared the same love of warbirds and aviation history. They had a love and dedication to saving aviation history and the skill and passion to keep that history alive. It's our job to continue the work they did and carry it on for future generations! They are heroes to me personally. RIP to all

[dougdrivr]

Dave Hatfield can speak more from a display pilot point of view, I am speaking from the view of someone who has been in the air during a number of shows and attending countless show briefings, from what I can tell from the videos, the P-63 was descending to make a low pass with the other fighters, however, he was lining up on the wrong show line and the path he was flying, his nose would have blocked his view of the B-17 until the last second. Every airshows has several showlines, the line closest to the crowd is for the slow movers, the ones further from the crowd are for faster planes. Had he lined up on the correct showline, there would have been no conflict. The lines are usually marked by landmarks such as semi trailers or busses parked on the field, buildings, and other landmarks.

Take a look at the first 10 seconds of this video. The Mustang preceding the B-17, that the P-63 was following and most likely concentrating on, appears to be dead ahead of the collision.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3O0fb0cKp3Y

[Matt Gunsch]

Take a look at the first 10 seconds of this video. The Mustang preceding the B-17, that the P-63 was following and most likely concentrating on, appears to be dead ahead of the collision.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3O0fb0cKp3Y

there is another video shot from the same location that has the 51 passing almost directly over the top of the photographer, the B-17 is a fair distance behind and to the right of the fighters, as they would be if they were flying on their show lines, the 63 flew far to the fighters right and was closing on the 17. https://youtu.be/Qfz7eFSX_FU, the attached photo shows the fighters path in blue, the B-17 in red, point of impact was just inside the airport boundary fence.

Attachments

[Mark Allen M]

Beyond tragic. Beyond belief and beyond sad.

[RyanShort1]

This was my last "intact" shot. For what it's worth. From that distance, the fighter flight's spacing didn't look as bad as it does in some of the videos from the US-67 highway perspective of the accident. I'd go so far as to say that the vast majority of the people close to show center didn't know if it was a midair, or just a freak accident that blew up the B-17 unless they had a camera lens on it. I wasn't even sure, especially as there was only one plane obviously going down since the P-63 came down in so many pieces. It was probably half an hour before we knew that the P-63 was for sure gone, even though I knew that the two P-51s were in formation by themselves.

The accident actually happened quite a ways from show center. I was pretty close to the airboss location.

And this was the airboss stand, shot taken as the Tora show ended with the formation pass celebrating Buddy's career and fini flight with a wall of fire.