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Post by baronbeeza on Sept 30, 2011 8:14:17 GMT 12
Yep me too, I have re-read mine. The least of my concerns at the time was whether the seat was going to work, I knew it was. I was referring to the flying and the things we did...... I actually can't go into detail here, a public forum.
At times we were well out of the envelope, the seat had zero chance of helping.
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Post by paddy on Sept 30, 2011 17:53:47 GMT 12
At times we were well out of the envelope, the seat had zero chance of helping.
The seat can only do what it can do. Going from memory on the Escapac (A4K and TA4K) if you ejected below 1300 feet at 30 degrees nose down you were going in. (Not withstanding that it was a Zero Zero Seat)
If anyone wishes I can take you through the sequence of what happens as you eject. (Please don't ask about the TA4K as there was some incredible number of cartridges that had to fire at exactly the right time and in the right order)
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Post by Dave Homewood on Sept 30, 2011 18:41:09 GMT 12
Sorry guys, I just had to say what I did in case any civvies who don't understand the banter etc simply took it the wrong way. Cheers for the replies.
Paddy, feel free to expand on the sequence. I have a fair idea from my own training but a lot of people will find it of interest.
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Post by baronbeeza on Sept 30, 2011 19:10:48 GMT 12
Yes and I was about before the A4 seat change, I can recall that happening about 1980 from memory. My bluntie rides were years before Pete Lindsay banged out, his was one of the first with MDC. I believe both were hailed as improvements but in some of the flying we did the reaction time alone would have put us in.
The guys were spudding in about that time, John Dick and Rosco Tanner as well as some close ones also. Again the seats were going to be of no help in any of them.
As Dave indicated above though, when the seat had to be used it worked and worked well.
I was not in country when the guys in the subject aircraft had to use their seats but by all accounts all went basically as expected.
I spoke to a young Mirage pilot about his ejection... I think he was very junior at the time and it may have been Graham Butterworth. I did a Google but can't confirm who it was but the story was he had a gear failure and was told in no uncertain terms to eject.
He said he was terrified thinking about it, just quickly banging out would have been much easier. He did the right thing though and from memory pointed the machine out to sea etc with all other parameters in his favour. He was not injured.
Somewhere I have a pic of a boat race (drinking competition) the ref is one of the F-111 crew that had earlier banged out at Ohakea, - some great drinkers in action including a very young Rob Fyfe. A few in the winning team went on to senior positions.
It was a bit of a joke during the 1970's that to get to senior rank you needed to do an ejection. Perhaps jumping out of a Harvard got you into consideration. Now this is my memory, no research here; Hubbard, McIntyre, Thompson, Rudd, Kinvig, Donaldson ...
Maybe not all of them, and possibly more could be added. These were the Group Commanders and Base Commanders around in the very early 80's.
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Post by jonesy on Sept 30, 2011 20:07:27 GMT 12
The guys were spudding in about that time, John Dick and Rosco Tanner as well as some close ones also. Again the seats were going to be of no help in any of them. I remember Rosco going in. Wouldve been early '92? Just before I got out, was "volunteered"to go up to the pine forest for the recovery of the parts of the Blunty. By coincidence, my current boss was the Station Officer on the first fire truck from Rotorua on the scene, that day of the crash. Rosco was a good bloke thats for sure, but he never had a chance.
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Post by Tony on Sept 30, 2011 22:53:52 GMT 12
Charlie Farley (Base Firemaster) came over to Hobby to see me and asked if I had a set of (seat) pins for a Blunty. I showed him my trusty #2 Phillips!
What annoyed me was when the lunch-time gym club were on a bus heading to Long Bay for some R&R and Roscoe's name was mentioned. Jet M made a very disparaging remark. That pissed me off big time as I knew Roscoe quite well. A few of the others also to Jet to task over his comment and he did the decent thing and apologised.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 2, 2011 14:08:16 GMT 12
This may be a bit off topic but do any of you think it would be worth restoring 6 or so Aermacchi's for the Red Checkers? I think it would awesome, certainly raise public opinion of the RNZAF, seeing some jets with the RNZAF roundel on them.
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Post by jonesy on Oct 2, 2011 14:27:22 GMT 12
This may be a bit off topic but do any of you think it would be worth restoring 6 or so Aermacchi's for the Red Checkers? I think it would awesome, certainly raise public opinion of the RNZAF, seeing some jets with the RNZAF roundel on them. $$$ thats what its all about. So probably-no. Yes would look great, but pretty hard to justify spending heaps of dosh on somethings to look great at airshows? When the forces are slashing the guts out of everything...
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Post by guest on Oct 2, 2011 14:31:59 GMT 12
This may be a bit off topic but do any of you think it would be worth restoring 6 or so Aermacchi's for the Red Checkers? I think it would awesome, certainly raise public opinion of the RNZAF, seeing some jets with the RNZAF roundel on them. I love your exuberance, but no. The Checkers fly the aircraft the RNZAF train with. To use an orphan as the mount would detract from what the RNZAF is all about. As well, the cost of doing that would mean the RNZAF would have to give away something else, in full or in part; they have already done that once and I would think that they don't want to do that again.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 2, 2011 15:21:27 GMT 12
Oh ok fair enough, but if they brought the aermacchi's back into service like they were contemplating, then do you think that the Red Checkers would switch to them. The caravel would certainly look impressive with a closure rate of 1800 km/h
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Post by baronbeeza on Oct 2, 2011 15:27:27 GMT 12
Time for a name change RAAFfan..
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Post by Deleted on Oct 2, 2011 16:28:18 GMT 12
Nope, i would never change my name, especially to RAAF can't give the aussie's that satisfaction.
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Post by baronbeeza on Oct 5, 2011 17:52:51 GMT 12
I mentioned here the other day that I was speaking to Graham Butterworth about his ejection. It was only months after he had banged out and I could tell that every detail was still crystal clear in his mind.. www.ejection-history.org.uk/country-by-country/australia.htmMay 3rd 1980. I was checking to see when the Kiwis at Pearce parked their rental in a damaged condition.
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Post by Ykato on May 10, 2012 23:53:46 GMT 12
From Youtube channel Sierravalens
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Post by lesterpk on May 11, 2012 1:44:13 GMT 12
Wow, saw it once before but still sends a shiver up me spine.
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Post by fyl on May 11, 2012 11:17:01 GMT 12
Definitely...amazing how a video like that can affect you..the old pulse had increased quite a bit.. Can only imagine how the pilot and pax were feeling!!
What was the initial cause of the engine vibration??
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Post by skyhawkdon on May 11, 2012 12:45:34 GMT 12
A zero stage compressor blade broke off and went through the engine!
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Post by slackie on May 11, 2012 14:16:44 GMT 12
Love the quotes from the backseater!!
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Post by skyhawkdon on May 11, 2012 20:08:16 GMT 12
Amazing how hectic things got at the end eh! From memory they were only at about 200ft and right on the stall when they ejected. The HUD camera kept recording for quite a while under water. Quite a few avionics components from that aircraft ended up flying again in other Macchis (all the sealed instruments and a lot of circuit cards from boxes).
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Post by Dave Homewood on May 12, 2012 10:01:05 GMT 12
An amazing piece of footage.
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