Forum: F-16 News

Amazing that was caught on video! He was definitely pretty fast on rollout...I thought most pilots keep the speedbrakes open to 45 degrees until the nosegear touches down?

F-16.net Sponsor

You can't go full boards until the nose drops or you'll scrape the boards, so that's true. You should manually override the speedbrake limiter when the nose goes to the rwy to get sb full deflection.

Last edited by guy@rdaf.dk on Jul 30, 2011 - 07:54 AM; edited 1 time in total

No full aft stick, no speedbrake. Departing the surface at that speed, I would be using the fifth flight control channal by now! Weird.

Is he not strapped in propperly or did the inertia reels in the seat not do its job? Looks like he almost hits the HUD.

What are the chances they'll fix that bird? Its and older Block 30, I bet they'll write it off.

It is very strange the boards weren't out and the horizontal stabs aren't digging in. The one picture after he's stopped looks like there's thrust coming out of the engine... Late attempt at a go around?

exfltsafety wrote:

pitfu wrote:

His speedbrakes will do nothing for him at that slow of a speed.

???? They're both probably in the 80-100 knots range when the nose comes down. If the speedbrakes did no good, the flight manual wouldn't tell pilots to open them fully after the nosewheel is on the runway.

The story said 60. When I put the nose down, I override the boards to full open with heavy braking until a safe taxi speed, as VprWzl said. Granted, that is <25 kts, but a common (not to mention poor) technique is to slow to 60ish kts (no airspeed indication in the HUD) to 'expedite' clearing the runway...that's obviously not the case here though.

Anyway, after the initial heavy braking w/boards, whether you slow to <25kts per AFI or to 60ish per poor technique, everyone I know closes their boards. And by everyone I know, I mean actual viper pilots. And this comes from experience as a viper pilot, not forum wisdom and an old -1.

Quote:

The story said 60. When I put the nose down, I override the boards to full open with heavy braking until a safe taxi speed, as VprWzl said. Granted, that is <25 kts, but a common (not to mention poor) technique is to slow to 60ish kts (no airspeed indication in the HUD) to 'expedite' clearing the runway...that's obviously not the case here though.

Anyway, after the initial heavy braking w/boards, whether you slow to <25kts per AFI or to 60ish per poor technique, everyone I know closes their boards. And by everyone I know, I mean actual viper pilots. And this comes from experience as a viper pilot, not forum wisdom and an old -1.

As a current/qualified/been-there-done-that Viper pilot I agree 100% with exfltsafety. His boards don't even appear to be out when the nose gear lowers. I stopped a jet once in the overrun after an abort and I can guarantee you I nearly ripped the stick and the speedbrake switch off as I was crossing the threshold. And I don't close my boards until I come off the brakes... I can't speak for all the other Viper pilots I know since I don't examine their landing rolls.

The more I look at the videos of the mishap the more I think this pilot made the smartest decision he could have made. For whatever reason, he was almost out of runway and moving very fast. In front of him on the apron, his wingman was stopped. Further past his wingman, there was a whole bunch of aircraft and people parked on the ramp. To his left, there was lots of civilians and more airplanes. He had a small patch of grass that was relatively open, and he knew that once he departed the paved surface the nose gear would collapse and the aircraft would dig in and stop in a very short distance, hopefully enough not to hurt anyone on the ground. Despite the strong suggestion in the Dash One to get out of the aircraft if it was leaving the paved surface, he stayed with the jet.

Here's what could have happened if he didn't. Suppose he ejected just before departing the runway. There is a good possibility that his canopy and seat would have hurt or killed someone when they landed, and caused additional damage to parked aircraft. After his now pilotless jet plowed through his wingman's jet, it would have continued on past and through the fence and hit several of the aircraft parked on the other side. Think of an F-16 tumbling through the parked aircraft on the other side, strewing chunks of metal in every direction, possibly causing fires and other mayhem.

Did the pilot make a conscious decision to depart the runway and head for the open patch of grass, saving lives in the process? Only he can say for certain. He probably had only a few seconds to realize that he wasn't going to stop in time and had limited choices. If he made the decision to stay with the aircraft to avoid punching out and hurting or killing people, and actively steered the aircraft toward the open grass, he risked his own life to prevent a great disaster. There was a distinct possibility that the aircraft would have tumbled end-over-end, trapping him in the cockpit, or worse.

Let me add that I have no special knowledge of the event despite the fact that I work for Lockheed; I have only my educated guess based on twenty-nine years of being around F-16s. I don't know why he was moving so fast so far down the runway and I won't speculate. I do think that there is more to this story than we all know right now, and it will come out eventually.

I find the photos and videos jaw-dropping, though I have seen a few such events before. I did think it was kind of funny that the pilot remembered to take his helmet bag with him when he climbed out of the cockpit. I wonder if anybody in the immediate vicinity knew how close they came to getting killed.

Best Regards,

New callsign can be Moe or Mole?

jbob wrote:

Apparently he landed long. I'm hearing like half way down the runway.
Youtube up now: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SS8xFBgfp-Q

Mr Spock would say he either was unwilling to stop(Human error), or was unable to stop(electro/mechanical/hydro). Will be an interesting AIB.

I understand that Chuck Yeager bashed the pilot publicly at the Theater in the Woods at Oshkosh last night for a lack of basic airmanship. I love what Yeager accomplished during his career, but based on some of the things I've seen, and many others I've heard of, I kind of wish Bob Hoover had been flying the X-1 that day in 1947.

In the end it may be that the pilot screwed up, he wouldn't be the first to do so, but that's why they have an investigation...

Mike

Quote:

I kind of wish Bob Hoover had been flying the X-1 that day in 1947.

AMEN Brother! lol

pitfu wrote:

exfltsafety wrote:

pitfu wrote:

His speedbrakes will do nothing for him at that slow of a speed.

???? They're both probably in the 80-100 knots range when the nose comes down. If the speedbrakes did no good, the flight manual wouldn't tell pilots to open them fully after the nosewheel is on the runway.

The story said 60. When I put the nose down, I override the boards to full open with heavy braking until a safe taxi speed, as VprWzl said. Granted, that is <25 kts, but a common (not to mention poor) technique is to slow to 60ish kts (no airspeed indication in the HUD) to 'expedite' clearing the runway...that's obviously not the case here though.

Anyway, after the initial heavy braking w/boards, whether you slow to <25kts per AFI or to 60ish per poor technique, everyone I know closes their boards. And by everyone I know, I mean actual viper pilots. And this comes from experience as a viper pilot, not forum wisdom and an old -1.

If your initial comment was about lead after he was at taxi speed, I agree. But I interpreted your comment to mean the speedbrakes don't do any good after the nose is lowered. Granted, depending on touchdown point and speed, even full open speedbrakes with full aft stick and max effort braking may not have been enough to keep the aircraft on the pavement. I don't know what you mean by an old -1. The guidance on use of speedbrakes for normal and short field landings hasn't changed significantly over the years. Maybe you meant an old -1 reader. You're right, I don't have Viper time; but, I do have F-111 time and thus have some direct knowledge of Air Force aviation.

Seat reels worked as designed. The nozzle was open during the landing roll and I suspect that as the plane impacted the soft ground the pilot bumped the throttle up which closed the nozzle as you see it. The first jet was already well into the turn-off and wasn't in danger of being struck. I believe he made a wise choice in staying with the aircraft...I don't suspect it would have rolled at that speed and with the underwings configured the way they were.

Forum: F-16 News

ALANG F-16 overruns runway in Oshkosh