ORIGINAL: rcjets_63

I think we can all agree that the crash of the large Hawk at Kentucky Jets was unfortunate; nobody likes to see a model crash nor the associated loss of time and investment by the owner. Fortunately, the crash site was in the overfly area completely away from the pilots/spectators and thus nobody was hurt.

It was a beautiful plane; I hope that one day I'll be able to paint as well as the folks in the paint shop at FEJ.

I spoke with James, Nir, and Lowell and offered my engineering assistance. FEJ was open to this and Lowell was quite nice and showed me the broken stab assembly as well as the complete assembly of the Hawk donated for auction. They seemed committed to finding a solution to the problem. Indeed, they have some sound ideas for improvements and, as more data and analysis becomes available, these ideas may be fine-tuned to provide a thorough and complete solution. As the saying goes, ''Rome wasn't built in a day.''

I suggest that we all lighten up a bit and give them that time. Nothing is going to be gained by getting into some lengthy slam-fest here on RCU.

Regards,

Jim