GrnBrt

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Quick thinking!!!!

Tall Paul

Harriers are NOT the best airplanes around!

khodges

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Hell of a way to impress the people on the beach. Wonder what happened? I wouldn't say Harriers aren't he best planes, but they can do some wild stuff with that vectored thrust.

I was out at our rocket launch site about 15 years ago down in eastern NC, we all heard a distant boom, and saw a black cloud rising from the ground about 5 miles away; didn't think much about it, but about 30 minutes later there were two C-130's orbiting the area of the smoke, and a Blackhawk flew by us and headed toward the smoke. When we left the field and headed back to town (Rocky Mount) we went right by the smoke, it was about 30 yards off the road, right in the back yard of a house, turned out it was a Harrier; never found out why it crashed, but do know the pilot punched out and survived. The side of the house was charred and about an acre of grass and trees had burned.

spad

[Hell of a way to impress the people on the beach. Wonder what happened?]

Looks like the footage of the RAF Harrier displaying at the annual Sea Front Airshow at Lowestoft in Suffolk, UK from end July a couple of years ago.
Simple engine failure was the cause, but damned impressive results eh!?!
I was just up the coast and saw it on the local news along with the recovery activities the following days.
Bet your life the pilot is watching for the slightest sign of trouble with that engine - I thought he was a bit slow getting out actually! Must have been waiting to be sure the plane was no danger to the bathers?
cheers
Rick

Planebeach

The crash was caused due to engine failure, doing vstol and engine quits is not the best combination

AU cary

My Feedback: (1)

my uncle flew for the bulldogs of VMA 223 out of cherry point, he he said the airplane was a real death trap. he had several inflight failure's. one time he landed and when he got out of the jet there were hole's all thru the horizontal stab. it was due to poor cement on the taxi way. he told me the MX guy on his jet was pissed!

cwrr5

My Feedback: (32)

I would be too.... send it out perfectly flyable, and he brings it back with HOLES [X(] in it?!?!?!?! And nobody was even shooting at him!

By the way, did the guy that punched out actually land ON the plane in the video??? What luck! good thing it wasn't on fire or anything.

Fletch124

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WHAT HAPPENED:
From my knowledge that i got off the Discovery wings channel is that if a Harrier hovers for over 90 seconds then the engines over heat and quickly lose power. So yeah it looks like he wasn't watchin his stop watch.

CP140

In Martin-Baker We Trust!

Bruno Stachel

My Feedback: (4)

I too thought the pilot appeared to land on the plane. He could easily have gotten tangled and pulled under. Does anyone know if he made it unhurt?

TOPGUNNER

This Video has been out there for alittle while, and from what I heard in another forum from some guy was it was from a bird geting sucked into the engine...[sm=confused.gif][sm=confused.gif]

After the pilot hit the water a Jet ski came out and dragged him to shore... Pilot was fine...And I was told that the Pilot was at a Bar right on that beach watching a twilight airshow/Firework that show that night talking to some people about the crash..

P.S. This info was told to me from someone that knew someone that was there and "Talked" to the guy......
Could be a big pile of -BS- or could be true...who knows.. [sm=confused.gif] it sounded good to me

LearjetMech

I also heard it was a bird! But as mentioned earlier, they have about a 90 sec hover limit. I believe the engines are water with possibly methonol injected for cooling during hover. And I think the tank capacity is roughly 90 sec. Could be wrong though!

HalH

My Feedback: (12)

I heard that he ran out of fuel !

Silvanskii

My Feedback: (17)

If they have a 90 second timelimit then the guy at last year's Dayton Airshow needed a complete overhaul of his engine after his display, which included 3, over 4 minute hovers including 2 short field takeoffs. Unfortunately that's all he did except for 1 high speed pass into a high G break.

TOPGUNNER

90seconds???????

The same engine that allows the a/c to hover is the same engine that makes the a/c fly......

3 words "nozzles" wait thats only 1



They can hover for a very long time..... """BUT""" They can easily over heat in hover very very quickly, thats why the AV8B has a water reservoir that only when in a hover you can cool the engine off with the water allowing it to hover for a long time. But once there is'nt any airspeed to cool the engine down with when your in a stand still in the sky with a engine that can put out 23,800 lbf of trust.. I imagine they can overheat and shutdown very quickly BUT as it being Modern Day A/C you would be getting those annoying "Warning! Warning!, EGGHH! EGGGHH! Warning! Warning!" inside the cockpit way before the a/c even had time to think about overheating and stalling out...

Ill post up a Question to see exactly how long the AV8B can stay in a hover in my other special forums, but I know for a fact its alot longer than 90sec. And like "Silvanskii said" Every time I see a Harrier at my local Air shows, they show off the V/STOL capabilities for a very long portion of the show. 10Min's plus.....


My vote goes to a Bird causing the problem or his knee hit the on/off switch..


_John_

GRANT ED

I saw a harrier display at Fairford and Farnburgh (spelling??) airshows. They were very impressive as well as being very noisy. They both hovered for about 4-5 min in a row.

Ian.W

I live near a few of the top UK air show places. every air show i see them, and every time i do see them i just look in awe when they bow to the crowd, fly backward, hover. everything a plane shouldn't do this can. However when doing a 2 week work experience for school, it was to my delight that i got to work on a harrier GR7 (i think). even better it was one featured in the news during the Falklands war (not that i was alive when that was going on, i don't think lol) that had a bomb explode just above the tail. i got to see its service history and everything. explaining what happened throughout its military life. Its quite amazing why these planes go through, from simple repairs that the RAF do, all the way to the plane being sent back to the manufacturer to be fully repaired.

Anyway,
It wasn't only the AV8B, correct me if I'm wrong that that was the original? Anyway, when repairing this plane for 2 weeks, i got to know the aircraft well, how everything worked, were everything was both inside the plane and outside, and in the cockpit. and just aft of the rear nozzles, which by the way are titanium, huge but very light, and also only the rear one is hot, i cant remember why, is a titanium water tank, quite large, i cant quite remember the exact size. this was only used when hovering to cool the engine, as John said above.

Just thought id say that
Ian

FLYBOY

My Feedback: (11)

Birds in turbins are nasty. We took a couple ducks in the left engine of our old citation, you could see light through the engine from the back. Your not supposed to be able to do that!

It is amazing what a turbin engine will suck through it though. They are made to eat something like a 9 pound frozen chicken. Nasty!

AmericanRedneck

yea i saw this on another forum i think they called it flat handing or sumthin heres the forum
http://dcxtended.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=5472
"There are limits the closer you get to the ground. Usually you will see helos mantain a forward speed, however slight. Also, helos are forcing fresh air below them while a Harrier is using engine exhaust at high speeds. The physics are different. They can mantain hover for very short periods, but they need to move around."

"That is called flathatting. I can assure you that wasn't an approved event, to close to people on the beach.

Flathatting ~ Unauthorized low-level flying and stunting--thrilling, sometimes fatal, usually career- ending if caught.

And, THIS is british flathatting!
http://www.hmm-364.org/flathatting.html"

randall1959

My Feedback: (11)

I think the water injection also has the effect of increasing the thrust in hover.

Flying Scotsman 70

Who said so!!! Oh yeah wait now its the JSF

RAF Rules


(im very patriotic)