Rousch Racing Premier 1A crash at Oshkosh . . .

Gotcha, thanks. What's the largest jet that has flown into that show? Seems like a famous event so I'd guess some important aluminum has come through there.

 

Airbus A380 was there last year. The Dreamlifter, Super Guppy and Beluga have also been there in the past.

 

The Antonov 225 (biggest airplane in the world) has been there and the monster Airbus is there right now, but the big planes arrive on IFR flight plans and that isn't an issue.

They have a procedure for GA arrivals that has worked out for years and years. You fly to a checkpoint and get in line and fly nose and tail and fly into the pattern. The controllers will ask you break out and go back in line if spacing isn't ok, but you basically enter the pattern and the first guy lands long, the second one lands in the middle of the runway, and the third lands short. Rinse, repeat as many times as necessary... As soon as you are down to taxi speed you get off the runway and they keep doing it. They handle an amazing amount of traffic and it all works well, but the spacing is a lot closer than you will ever find and if you aren't sharp you will be TOLD to go around. If you are not close to the guy ahead of you they will tell you to pick it up. The controllers there are the BEST in the world and it is a huge honor to be selected to work ATC at Oshkosh.

Aviation, as with the sea, is an environment that is unforgiving of any carelessness, incapacity or neglect... Moreso when you have that much traffic around.

 

In a jet, slow flight is certainly part of the initial and recurrent training curriculum (I spent quite a few years as an instructor and check airman in various business jets), as is maneuvering at minimum speeds, and even below those speeds. The average jet guy probably gets more stall and slow flight practice than a typical 172 weekend warrior, interestingly enough. That said, there are still jet stall-spin accidents (Learjet into Groton CT a few years back, for instance).

In a jet, you will typically calculate a reference speed, usually 1.3 x stalling speed, and you must always want to stay at that speed or above. If you are using more than 15 degrees of bank, in many jets you would add 10 knots to that speed as a minimum. Many jets also have an angle of attack indicator, which will give you a visual indication when you are approximately at 1.3 Vso.

I have no idea about the Premier's stall characteristics, but many swept wing jets will bite hard if you get into the stall regime (others are so docile that they will just mush ahead with full roll control), so it pays to keep away from it.

 

Don't know on the Premier's engines but some jet engines are known to have discernable spool up time. Means that one has to anticipate the need for more power as it is not instantaneous.

Jeff

 

Don't forget, the Concorde used to appear there!

 

Scott- You are correct. Only 60 times too high. Too many beers when I made that post. Cruise on twin engine turbofan fighters was about 6000 lbs per hour, low level at 480 knots was 12-14,000 lbs per hour. Mach 2+ at FL40-50 in max A/B with ram effect dropped substantially to 30-60,000 lbs per hour from low level in afterburner. Could not do it too long because the aluminum airframe heated up too much, even though theoretical fuel flow was pretty good.

Taz
Terry Phillips

 

A friend of mine flew DC-8's for UAL. When they were near the end of an east to west flight the flight engineer said that they would ONLY have 13,000 pounds of fuel on board when they would arrive at SFO. My friend, the pilot in command, elected to go to an alternate because SFO was getting low weather. He told me that if he had to make a missed approach there wouldn't have been enough fuel to complete a go around. I can't recall how much fuel a JT4 burns at full throttle but I do remember that the fuel lines are about 3 1/2 inches in diameter and boost is high.. I think that I remember that a JT3 will process 450 pounds of air per minute at 100% .

 

After UAL ran one out of gas in PDX, I bet they became pretty conservative on their fuel reserves for a while!

 

The friend that I mentioned referred to this flight before the PDX incident. He was one of those professional pilots who was always ahead of his airplane and had everything figured out on the safe side. I flew with him many times in his personal aircraft and he taught me many things while saying little. While I was flying with him IMC one day and I had the airplane he started checking his head set and I asked what the problem was he said, " Well, you must have gotten a new clearance that I didn't hear because you are 300 feet above our assigned altitude." Many little innuendos like that was his style.

 

Harsh, but hammers home the point effectivly...

 

Oh wow.

Those guys are getting the hell outta there. The look in that guys eyes in the second and third picture...

Too bad those pictures don't have sound.

 

Looking at the Avweb 1st photo, I don't see the flaps configured in the landing position.
Gary Bobileff

 

Hmmm, that wing does look a bit thin in those photos.
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That photog in the second pic must have been an amateur; a pro would have stuck it out, dug in his feet and "got the shot".

I on the other hand would have run so fast I wouldn't have been in the frame.

P.S.

That is a great pic for "is it real or photoshop". I bet most folks would claim photoshop given the disappearing wingtip.

 

Here is a shot just before impact from a different angle, the flaps are down, but that airplane doesn't have a lot of flap, or maybe he wasn't at full flaps. What is down does look pretty much the same as the stock photo of the airplane, so maybe that's all you get.

They are also fowler flaps so there is an area increase with flap extension, so some of the low speed lift comes from that too.

http://www.tmz.com/2010/07/28/nascar-team-owner-jack-roush-plane-crash-photographs/

 

I think you are right - that's all you get.

 

The stock photo shows what looks like a good 40 deg. of flaps. If they are indeed fowler flaps they not only increase wing area but form a slot to maintain attached flow. Early fowlers didn't come down at as much of an angle as simple or split flaps so that may look like there wasn't much of an extension. Russ is correct, that looks like a really thin wing.

 

In high wing loading aircraft a classic stall may not occur and the aircraft may simply depart controlled flight. This is often accompanied with a roll-off or yaw, or both, in an unpredictable direction, sometimes quite violent. The usual recovery procedure is to unload and roll wings level to regain control authority and flying speed. In this case, it appears the aircraft was departed through pilot error with insufficient altitude and control authority to recover. Bad judgement overflying the aircraft into a corner of its envelope from which recovery was not possible at the pilot's level of skill. Too much bank, too much rate of descent, and too late realization of what was happening. Both occupants are lucky to be alive.

Hero approaches are not what you want when you are not flying an aircraft frequently enough to feel everything she is trying to tell you.

Taz
Terry Phillips

 

That's a fancy way of saying rocks don't fly!

 

Affirmative. Having flown one for 20 years, the scenario is all too familiar. You really want to learn what an aircraft will do at altitude so when you screw up, someone can place a pillow where the rock will land.

Taz
Terry Phillips

 

If yaw is fed into a stalling swept wing at the low end of the speed range the retreating wing " disappears" as a lifting element and the advancing wing becomes a forceful rolling moment. If the angle of attack gets high enough and speed is low, the advancing wing quits and the airplane can roll the opposite way from when it started. It appears that that is what happened in this case. Swept wings don't act like straight wings when they stall and they can bite hard just as Terry said. This is why some big multi-engined jets have huge vertical fins and powered rudders because sometimes a fatal stall and snap roll can be stopped by controlling the yaw.