Dallas Executive Mid-Air / B-17 - P-63

DropTank said:
Wait.... you really believe that?

Absolutely no way to mitigate risks and errors?

Seriously

You have no idea.

Yikes!
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I rarely explain, but in this case it's needed. No way to minimize the loss - the very significant loss of life and of history. Not a "small" event in the least and a huge tragedy for every family who had to say a good-by.

No way to minimize the possibility of errors and mistakes and to therefore address them. Perhaps better, "No way to minimize the need to address any mistakes/errors/omissions which may have contributed to the cause."

What I meant to say, and apparently failed in doing so, was to note the tragedy of human life lost and to NOT minimize the need to address policy and procedure so same doesn't happen again ("no way to minimize the tragic loss" and "no way to minimize the need to address failures which may have happened"). That is still clear to me as I reread the post, but you aren't responsible for the thoughts of my feeble mind - I am.

With respect, I may have more of an "idea" than you realize after nearly 40 years in emergency services, although perhaps not from your perspective.

In any event, my apologies for communicating to you the wrong idea. The fault is with me as the writer and I'm sorry I wasn't more clear with my thoughts - especially if you knew some of the people involved.
 
SteveC said:
"It's a girl, my Lord, in a flatbed Ford, slowin' down to take a look at me."
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Bob Ridpath said:
I rarely explain, but in this case it's needed. No way to minimize the loss - the very significant loss of life and of history. Not a "small" event in the least and a huge tragedy for every family who had to say a good-by.

No way to minimize the possibility of errors and mistakes and to therefore address them. Perhaps better, "No way to minimize the need to address any mistakes/errors/omissions which may have contributed to the cause."

What I meant to say, and apparently failed in doing so, was to note the tragedy of human life lost and to NOT minimize the need to address policy and procedure so same doesn't happen again ("no way to minimize the tragic loss" and "no way to minimize the need to address failures which may have happened"). That is still clear to me as I reread the post, but you aren't responsible for the thoughts of my feeble mind - I am.

With respect, I may have more of an "idea" than you realize after nearly 40 years in emergency services, although perhaps not from your perspective.

In any event, my apologies for communicating to you the wrong idea. The fault is with me as the writer and I'm sorry I wasn't more clear with my thoughts - especially if you knew some of the people involved.
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Alright, fair enough.
I take responsibility for the over reaction and I apologize.

(at least we both have intentions to prevent additional body bags)
 
tlewis95 said:
I was there. This was the first year in 4 that I wasn't flying in the bomber parade but had just landed as part of a Twin Beech formation instead and was just across the runway on a jeep when it went in. Thanks to those who checked in (there are now two of us on here that fly the B24 and B29 btw - he is ok as well)

Since I was actually at the brief and have flown behind that B-17 for many laps of bomber parade in the past - it is extra annoying to read everyone's speculation and it is amazing just how wrong people can get so many details that they think they know.

Tough and Competent. We will continue to operate these airplanes after learning everything we can from this incident to make sure that it doesn't happen again.
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Thanks for posting this Curt. All this Monday morning quarterbacking was making me boil, but your response was much better than what I could have penned.

Hope to catch up again with you soon!
 
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Nihon_Ni said:
All this Monday morning quarterbacking was making me boil …
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There’s a bunch of bright folks on here, a number of which have participated in accident investigations.

There’s really only a couple of interesting questions that need to be answered.

I’m betting the investigation will find the following:

- The show plan failed to establish adequate safeguards to maintain separation.

Perhaps there were other radio frequencies in use but I haven’t heard calls to suggest that bombers were to be cleared for their approach only after the fighter fly-by was completed.

- The P-63 pilot, knowing that fighter and bomber parades shared the approximate fly-by path, failed to establish position of the lead B-17. Even if the plan provided for lateral separation between the fighter and bomber fly-by paths, the issues of timing and consequences of the fighters overshooting weren’t adequately considered.

I’m also willing to bet that participants voiced few objections to the plan.

Pilots speculate and often get things right.
 
Pilot Fighter said:
There’s a bunch of bright folks on here, a number of which have participated in accident investigations.

There’s really only a couple of interesting questions that need to be answered.

I’m betting the investigation will find the following:

- The show plan failed to establish adequate safeguards to maintain separation.

Perhaps there were other radio frequencies in use but I haven’t heard calls to suggest that bombers were to be cleared for their approach only after the fighter fly-by was completed.

- The P-63 pilot, knowing that fighter and bomber parades shared the approximate fly-by path, failed to establish position of the lead B-17. Even if the plan provided for lateral separation between the fighter and bomber fly-by paths, the issues of timing and consequences of the fighters overshooting weren’t adequately considered.

I’m also willing to bet that participants voiced few objections to the plan.

Pilots speculate and often get things right.
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My point exactly. Lots of folks passing judgment on people's abilities that they never met and speculating on what may or may not have happened without the benefit of having all the facts first.
 
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Nihon_Ni said:
My point exactly. Lots of folks passing judgment on people's abilities that they never met and speculating on what may or may not have happened without the benefit of having all the facts first.
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That's why it's called "speculation"

and you'll get over it.
 
Pilot Fighter said:
There’s a bunch of bright folks on here, a number of which have participated in accident investigations.

There’s really only a couple of interesting questions that need to be answered.

I’m betting the investigation will find the following:

- The show plan failed to establish adequate safeguards to maintain separation.

Perhaps there were other radio frequencies in use but I haven’t heard calls to suggest that bombers were to be cleared for their approach only after the fighter fly-by was completed.

- The P-63 pilot, knowing that fighter and bomber parades shared the approximate fly-by path, failed to establish position of the lead B-17. Even if the plan provided for lateral separation between the fighter and bomber fly-by paths, the issues of timing and consequences of the fighters overshooting weren’t adequately considered.

I’m also willing to bet that participants voiced few objections to the plan.

Pilots speculate and often get things right.
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I dunno. No dog in this fight. I don't know jack about warbirds or formation flying. But I have heard pilots speculating and most of the time it looks like this:

OIP.jpg
 
Saw a video today and it at least appears that the P-63 may have had a bird strike through the prop. Even if it did don’t know if that would have changed anything just based on the trajectory though.
 
NovemberEcho said:
Saw a video today and it at least appears that the P-63 may have had a bird strike through the prop. Even if it did don’t know if that would have changed anything just based on the trajectory though.
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Distraction can kill ya - maybe that’s why he looked so fast…

Takes a bird through the prop, startled and confused he keeps on going but missed a power reduction he needed, then he’s racing around the routine…?
 
ppragman said:
Distraction can kill ya - maybe that’s why he looked so fast…

Takes a bird through the prop, startled and confused he keeps on going but missed a power reduction he needed, then he’s racing around the routine…?
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even is this were a factor, no confirmation yet that it might be. Basic Formation 101 rules; if you have some potential emergency issue, you clear the formation, you don’t keep raging around the pattern trying to rejoin at the same altitude where unseen aircraft not from your formation could potentially be, especially when you are stripped and far outside your proper ground track already to begin with. Climb and clear everyone else’s altitude block(s), then sort out whatever needs to be sorted out up high where no one is.
 
MikeD said:
even is this were a factor, no confirmation yet that it might be. Basic Formation 101 rules; if you have some potential emergency issue, you clear the formation, you don’t keep raging around the pattern trying to rejoin at the same altitude where unseen aircraft not from your formation could potentially be, especially when you are stripped and far outside your proper ground track already to begin with. Climb and clear everyone’s altitude, then sort out whatever needs to be sorted out up high where no one is.
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This makes the very key assumption that the guy flying knew wtf he was doing lol, do we know that? Or was this a rich warbird dude playing?

do we know much about the guy in the P63 at all for that matter?
 
ppragman said:
This makes the very key assumption that the guy flying knew wtf he was doing lol, do we know that? Or was this a rich warbird dude playing?

do we know much about the guy in the P63 at all for that matter?
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it’s the same thing done at Reno. Have an emergency? Climb to clear and climb to cope. Get clear of the race course.

And that was one of my original questions going far back a few pages, among other key questions. Background, training, proficiency, currency. I’m not on the investigation so I cannot in any way accurately comment on those. All I know of his background was he was a UAL pilot, and former CAL pilot in the early 1980s. Unknown to me if he was former mil.
 
The sad fact of the matter is, that a formation midair collision in day VMC conditions is very rarely not pilot error as the primary causal factor. Whether by one or by multiple pilots in the formation. In this case, even though the bombers and fighters were in separate formations, that the two formations were participating in the parade flyby in conjunction, and in close proximity with, one another, would fall into the classification of being a formation midair. Could there be factors causal aside from pilot error, such as a structural failure on one aircraft while in close form? There are always possibilities that need to be investigated and ruled in or out; but generally speaking, something a pilot did or failed to do, is often the primary causal factor of day VMC formation midair’s. Often someone zigging when everyone else was zagging. Of course, any accident can’t just be written off as pilot error and left at that, it has to be investigated “what error? How did that error occur? What course(s) of action could’ve been taken to prevent?” But like many primary causal factors in aircraft accidents, we certainly aren’t finding new, never-before-seen, ways to have formation midair’s on a clear and a million weather day.
 
NovemberEcho said:
Saw a video today and it at least appears that the P-63 may have had a bird strike through the prop. Even if it did don’t know if that would have changed anything just based on the trajectory though.
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I saw the same video and it's pretty grainy, hard to tell if that dot was a bird in the flight path of the airplane or a gnat 6 ft in front of the camera. The person who posted the slow motion video was not the person who recorded it and also said that based on the video the RPM changed and the pilot was trying to restart the engine, the NTSB should get that investigator on the payroll ASAP, he's already figured it out.
 
knot4u said:
I saw the same video and it's pretty grainy, hard to tell if that dot was a bird in the flight path of the airplane or a gnat 6 ft in front of the camera. The person who posted the slow motion video was not the person who recorded it and also said that based on the video the RPM changed and the pilot was trying to restart the engine, the NTSB should get that investigator on the payroll ASAP, he's already figured it out.
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Yeah it’s def not a great quality video and easily could not be anything related with what happened. And either way it seemed like whatever “it” was was in the frame just seconds before the collision occurred, certainly not enough time to be trying to restart the engine already, heck barely enough time to register what happened (if it did)
 
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